[lazyjones]

> Could anyone shed some light on which problem this is supposed to solve exactly and what triggered it in the first place in Austria right now?

Existing hate-speech legislation allows persecution of users already, but in some cases the offenders hide too well or Facebook does not cooperate with authorities. Online newspaper forums are also now full of professionally organized dirt campaigns, sometimes tolerated by left-leaning media. The government wants to be able to persecute those who break the law and thinks it's the responsibility of media to at least make their users identifiable for authorities.

[codedokode]

Isn't it enough just to remove those comments?

[lazyjones]

No, for example when there are death threats or defamation of well-known people that goes viral.

[raxxorrax]

In theory, if you are connected by a medium to almost everyone and utter an opinion, the probability of getting a death threat becomes 1.

[masswerk]

Since this is intended for international audiences, it maybe worth stating that "left-leaning" is what was considered center just a few years ago. (The idea of a general consent is somewhat a thing of a past.) Particularly "Der Standard", the newspaper the post is linking to, is now often attributed as "left" and its forum, the biggest and oldest one in Austria is subject to diffamation. (If you're reading the comments in this forum, there's a feeling that the law is meant to implement a premature censorship of sorts, an idea which is also maintained by some law and media professionals.) – While this is nothing like the US divide, there's no such thing like a common (political) perspective in Austria anymore. As a result, even comments meant to remind of the constitution and rule of law are sometimes countered by a qualification as left wing hate speech.

Edit: Previously, the political center of Austria was slightly to the left, like in most European countries. Bored with the great center coalition, the conservative party (ÖVP) has burned all bridges to the center-left social democrats (SPÖ) and is now considering the center rather more near its own right wing. Refugees and immigrants and "punishing" those are now the go-to argument for every legislative initiative. Also, governmental "message control", i.e., controlling what may be leaking of internal political communication or what may be setting an agenda, is deemed of high strategical importance by the ruling parties.

[lazyjones]

> it maybe worth stating that "left-leaning" is what was considered center just a few years ago.

Please don't attempt to change the meaning of my post with your own interpretation. When I write "left-leaning", I mean exactly that.

[masswerk]

Where are there any "left-leaning" public posts of notice in Austria? This isn't the 1970s anymore, when there were actual Maoists… "Left-leaning" is now somewhat of a contested concept and there is no common consent on its meaning – which is what I was trying to point out.

[xnyan]

All political terms and discriptors are in constant flux. That is normal. Generally speaking when you refer to left-leaning in a specific country, you mean the leftests of your contemporary time. I’m not sure what Austro-Maoists in the 1970s have to do with today’s leftists in Austria

[masswerk]

Personally, I do prefer to keep a more general perspective in view, regarding the history of political ideas. If we just focus on the accidental socio-historical situation, we may miss the general spectrum. E.g., in the 1970s and '80s, there was actual left-wing terrorism or individuals who played with the idea of a substantial change. However, it has been decades since we did see such things even sparsely in public discourse. (But still, we may reminded ourselves of what a real "left" or leftist action may imply. Social-democrats are still centrists, after all. On the other hand, nowadays even the former vice chancellor and leader of the conservative party is considered "left" by some. If we would subscribe to such an idea, we may lose orientation.)

Yet another historical marker, at the end of WW1 about 15% of the Viennese population was anarchists, some of them living in illegal settlements. (These anarchist settlements were mostly converted to allotment associations, some of them still carrying auspicious names like "Future". The reintegration of those who had already left the common political ground into a more traditional spectrum is a special and generally overlooked treat of the political history of Austria and probably the cause, why communists were rather rare in Austria as compared to the neighboring countries.)

[masswerk]

In other words: If there's only an ever-shifting relative spectrum, plain conservatives were the fascists du jour at the opposing end, most of the time. This is certainly not what you want. It may be worth treating political opinions fairly for what they are.

Notably, this was about "left-leaning" as a qualifier for hate speech, which may be subject to prosecution (compare the original comment).