On: German parliament passes Internet censorship bill

um isn't viewing child pornography illegal in Germany? Seems kinda redundant

Of course it is. As it is in 99% of all countries. But there are elections this September, so they did all kind of silly bills to get publicity for their party.

And with many people this works: "Oh, child porn on the internet? You have to DO something against it so nobody can access it. Hiding it is the right way to go."

That deleting it and prosecuting the people responsible for it would be the much better way, and required by the law, is forgotten if you can impress some voters. And it's cheaper and easier for them.

And now that we have this censorship instrument, let's block xyz (replace with something they don't like) too. No matter that our constitution says "censorship doesn't take place".

there should be a law that prohibits passing of any major policy bills (except emergency ones) in say 3 months preceding the election.

Then they'll do it 4 months prior. Your intent is sound, though.

yeah true. but public memory is short, I'm guessing that the influence/impact of those bills would be lesser if done 4 months before the election, than 1 month before.

So the politicians pass the pandering laws 4 months prior, but talk them up around the election.

Then they'll just call it an emergency and pass it anyway.

This is (so the government says) directed at material which is hosted in countries that do not cooperate in the deletion of such material. Of course the government made a big joke of itself when publishing lists/numbers of those countries. It was a disgrace.

Government said child porn is not illegal in India and other countries. They forgot _every_ kind of porn is illegal in India. #fail