IALP Newsletter

O-pinion – Edwin Delsing, September 28, 2025

The referendum on the introduction of the E-ID in Switzerland on September 28th closed the door for me. At the last minute, the majority of Swiss voters voted “yes” to its introduction in 2026. In 2021, they had voted “no” by a large majority. The bureaucrats didn’t let it go and simply continued development. You also need a smartphone for it. You have to download an “app.” The Swiss Libertarian Party was vehemently opposed. So was I.

The Smart hype started with a small car. An ambitious Swiss novice from the makers of the Swatch. Now there are smartwatches made in China, we have smartphones, and we’re living in smart cities. Your house is becoming smart too.

Try arguing against that. Try scoring points with stupidity. It won’t work. The “i,” which stands for “intelligent.” iPhone, iWatch, iToilet. Or, also trendy, the “e”: the “e-wallet,” the “e-Timmermans,” and the “e-U” with its soon compulsory “e-V.”

It’s brilliant, because you don’t want to know the opposite of all this beauty: you don’t want a “dumbphone,” no, you don’t want to live in a Dumb City or have a Dumb Identity, do you? The D-ID: the dumb ID?

Rebellion against the technocracy?

Start a countermovement? Do something against the “smart” ideology, against the commoditization of intelligence, against the grotesquely insane forced electrification of society? Not a chance. The young generation. The e-, i-, and smart generation, the Smarties, want a Smart, i-, and e-for everything: i-underpants with a built-in i+ gender tracker and an e-pubic hair meter for automatic e-age verification. This generation desperately wants the government to have them by the balls. Because they have nothing to hide, right? And nothing to gain, right?

God, I’m so frustrated about the outcome of that referendum in the Alpine country. I was so hoping they’d vote “nein/non/no”, so I could keep saying: “do you see why the EU is afraid of direct referendum democracy?“

If I refuse all this new nonsense now, I wouldn’t be allowed to work in the UK anymore (I don’t really want to, anyway), and empress Ursula won’t let me participate in “her” society anymore either. Do I really want that? A society led by Smart People? With aging Young Global Leaders? The e-i-YGLs?

Good heavens, I feel so powerless against the steamroller propaganda machine of bureaucracy. My voice has no reach; I’m a voice crying freedom in the wilderness. With only a few lovely young female followers (YFF) on X, handed to me by the algorithm, encouraging me to spend even more time on the e-platform and to seduce me to have me verified.

Smart. And I thought I already was. My rebellion is also virtual. Not an analogue, manual rebellion. It has to be a Smart digital e-Rebellion now, at least. Of smart, artificial, virtual e-Libertarians, equipped with an e-ID, which is the precursor to the AI-ID, or, in Flatlandish: the KI-ID.

I’m passé, a thing of the past. A dinosaur that no longer keeps up with the times. But damn it, I still pay using cash, and I just dropped my iPhone in the water. Thus, for a moment, I was unphoneable, untraceable, ungovernable. What a liberation! No beeps, no tunes, no jitters. I grin. With the “o” for off-the-grid..

And hooray, “o,” I’m special: I’m a time-stopper. An o’-timer.