The CEO of Mullvad is the main financer of the far-right Swedish Örebro party

Somewhat of a verification, here's Mullvad's response to the post on Mastodon: https://mastodon.online/@mullvadnet/116822244689326681

Will you be creating a VPN?

Including a statement from the other founder.

This one's gone too.

It's confirmed. And the party in question is quite extreme, at least by Swedish standards.

And everyone is free to chose not to buy products from people who have opinions that differs fundamentally from their own?

And some opinions cannot be tolerated in a democratic society. An obvious example is anti-liberal/anti-democratic opinions as they threaten the system itself. You cannot have a free democratic society if a majority removes the freedoms of a minority.

For most people, the concern is the money, not the voting. People don't want wealthy people reshaping politics to fit their interests through their wealth. They can vote for whomever they want.

You have freedom of speech to advocate for your politics. The rest of us have the freedom of association to not want to be involved with you in any way.

These are not contradictory - they are both essential freedoms.

> in that case we might punch em in the face

Nobody is calling for violence though?

In a free democratic society nobody is forced to do business with anybody they don't agree with, and free speech means they can talk about their decision without fearing repercussion.

> "punch em in the face"

Very weird interpretation of "voluntarily choose to not continue supporting them financially"

Presumably you want everyone to be forcibly compelled to finance the political parties they disagree with? And you would define this as a democratic society?

So far in this thread you’re the only one mentioning punching anyone in the face.

What's wrong with choosing who you give your money to?

Is that somehow undemocratic?

Is anyone censoring the guy?

Haters will now say that the far right will destroy exactly that: "our" democracy. The Western morality is a joke, and many HN readers comment like an infant. I feel ashamed.

They might be having some capacity issues, it was 404 for me for a while but now it's back.

Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20260629105534/https://det.socia...

It's not only about trust, but also about not wanting to give money to an entity that will pass it on to a political party you don't want to support.

Yes, not only trust but my willingness to contribute money towards his paycheck. I don't want my money to end up in far-right parties.

Look at Zuck and Musk. Their platforms are still used by millions. It's only "us" that care about the pedigree of our tech founders, most people couldn't care less.

In some ways I would say it could even increase trust: if the guy is a privacy absolutist, ultra-libertarian, "my business is not the state's business" type, his VPN products are likely to be pretty good.

On the other hand, he might have other strong right-wing views that users don't agree with, and which might take precedence in one's set of priorities. If I like football and they like football, but they also want to kill me because of <other reason>, I don't think I'd want to give them my money.

Wanted to mention the Analogue since ModRetro was mentioned.

https://www.analogue.co/products

https://www.analogue.co/editions

I think these look a lot cooler, though they're less hackable.