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There are many who not only remain unconcerned but often seek to diminish or dismiss concern as hyperbole or exaggerated, often by pointing to the current statu
by tobbyb 11y ago
There are many who not only remain unconcerned but often seek to diminish or dismiss concern as hyperbole or exaggerated, often by pointing to the current status quo.
No one is interested in you the individual, but they are certainly interested in building the capability to track all individuals and preempt anything that threatens any entrenched status quo.
We are not currently a police state but we are certainly building the capability and the cultural language to justify it. The moral high ground and the entire framework of values that powered it have shown to be near meaningless by the alarming ease with which they have been discarded in favour of the language of security and paranoia. Everyone is safe in a cage. It will be naive to believe in the context of how modern states operate that a cluster of extreme right wing medievalists in the ME are bringing on this state of affairs, the bulk and most powerful of whom are paradoxically our best friends in the region.
Surveillance states are not a on/off thing, you don't suddenly wake one day to a surveillance state. These capabilities take time to build, but once the infrastructure is in place it will inevitably get used.
In this case we can see all the pieces being put in place methodically with language that makes George Orwell look astonishingly prescient. And its the self absorption of this generation who have inherited and enjoyed a relatively 'free' and equal state with 'hope for improvement' but are going to willfully pass on something more ominous.
- eternalban 11y agoKeep these 2 points in mind: (1) unlike previous police states, this one is machine mediated and pervasive. There will be no place to hide and it is hard to see how it will be dismantled once in place. (2) our children are growing up in a culture that no longer reflects the traditional values held sacred in the West.
- fao_ 11y agoWhat traditional values would those be? Could you clarify, because your second point depepnds largely on the generation within which you were born.
- littletimmy 11y agoI think OP means the values of classical liberalism, i.e. freedom from oppression of the state, and everything that goes with. When you empower the state to the degree that it will be empowered once they can keep tabs on everyone at all times, we will have oppression.
- Create 11y agoFor the last thousands years, we, our mothers, and our fathers have been struggling for freedom of thought we have sustained many horrible losses and some immense victories and we are now at a very serious time. From the adoption of printing by Europeans in the 15th century we began to be concerned primarily with access to printed material. The right to read, and the right to publish were the central subject of our struggle for freedom of thought for most of the last half millennium. The basic concern was for the right to read in private and to think and speak and act on the basis of a free and uncensored will. [...] By the end of the 19th century, that struggle for the freedom of reading had begun to attack the substance of Christianity itself and European world trembled on the brink of the first great revolution of the mind it spoke of "liberté égalité fraternité" but actually it meant freedom to think differently. The "Ancien Régime" begun to struggle against thinking and we moved into the next phase of the struggle for freedom of thought which presumed the possibility of unorthodox thinking and revolutionary acting. And for 200 years we struggled with the consequences of those changes. That was then and this is now. Now we begin a new phase in the history of the human race. We are building a single nervous system which will embrace every human mind. https://benjamin.sonntag.fr/Moglen-at-Re-Publica-Freedom-of-thought-requires-free-media https://benjamin.sonntag.fr/Moglen-at-Re-Publica-Freedom-of-...
- s986s 11y agoIm in the pessimistic group. What can an average person do? - blow a whistle and be on the run like snowden? - put their name on a petition which also acts as a watch list? - publicly protest and hoping to be covered by mainstream media which basically means quitting their job abd taking a < 10% risk of success - start a viral shame campaign which both google abd facebook have attempted multiple times only to have cisa pass and this sort pf thing to become the "status quot" Really, what is there to do but watch the future unfold into dystopia? Really, tell me? In reality we are tools turning the coorperate machine. Individuals freedom is not more important the economic evolution. Online communities are unaminously against evil but in reality, they are made up of fattened happy pigs that do very little but talk to one another and hope to get their oen lives a little more perfect. Governments have been corrupt for more than a mellenia. Recent attempts at being humane should be taken with a grain of salt
- clouddrover 11y ago> start a viral shame campaign which both google abd facebook have attempted multiple times The business model of both Google and Facebook is based on intensive user (and non-user) surveillance. They don't and never will "campaign against" a dystopian surveillance state because they very much are that dystopia. As Eric Schmidt from Google says: “We know where you are. We know where you've been. We can more or less know what you're thinking about.” http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Eric-Schmidt-We-Know-Where-You-Are-We-Know-2478136.php http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Eric-Schmidt-We-Know-Wher...
- s986s 11y agoNonetheless, the created a facade. Unless someone like pewdiepie decides its a good idea to rile up 12 year olds, Mass majority of adults are more willing to listen to coorperations than to internet personalities or nobodies screaming conspiracy
- jsmcgd 11y ago> What can an average person do? Don't incorporate in the UK.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]