soupdidoup

“

Rede von Lola Voronina

International coordinator Pirate Party of Russia

Chief Administrative Officer, Pirate Parties International

Friends, citizens, ...pirates.

 

As you gather here, you are not a German party. You are the flagship of an international community of freedom fighters. The enemies of liberty, free ideas and culture, and the net must know that the price of that policy is being kicked out of office. Being _fired_. For _incompetence_, towards the office and the public. No people in the world have shown that better than you who are sitting here today, and I think it is something you should be proud of.

 

But paradoxically, the net is not only liberating of ideas. At the same time, it is the greatest equalizer that humankind has ever invented. The ability to tell your own story means that nobody is able to hijack your interests and claim to speak in your name, ever again. What this means is that a nine-year-old girl in Paraguay with her first laptop is an equal to all of us sitting here in the rich parts in the world. That is ... I think that is something fantastic, and something worth defending.

 

So ironically, we are better at liberty than those who would previously call themselves liberals, and we are better at  equality than those who would previously call themselves socialists. These are not opposites. They come together - with everybody being able to speak for themselves. This is why the Net changes the world more than the printing press did.

 

But there are those who would prevent this liberty, participation, and equality. Those who see that it removes their privileges. Privileges of interpretation, of telling lies, and of deceiving the world for profit. The battle has only just begun, and they have won many victories. It is us, and only us, who have discovered their critical weakness: their very political power.

 

We are one of the last lines of defense of all that we believe in. The world is watching.

 

But the world is not watching to see when we trip over, for the

opportunity to laugh at us. No. Not anymore. They are watching us in _respect_. They are watching us, so they can _copy_ us.

 

I have a hard time thinking of a finer and more honest way to show us respect. Fair winds, my friends. The decisions you make here will be wise. I am proud to call myself a pirate.

 

Enjoy the assembly.

”