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Why is it framed as totalitarian and unfair when China do what the US has been doing since 2001?
by 1stop 11y ago
Why is it framed as totalitarian and unfair when China do what the US has been doing since 2001?
- LesZedCB 11y agoAh, it's because we have Freedom™ instead of ideology[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk8ibrfXvpQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk8ibrfXvpQ
- vgoh1 11y agoWhat the US has been doing since 2001 has been totalitarian and unfair, of course. Let's not play "but that guy is doing it too, so it's not that bad". It's all bad, and all needs to be stopped.
- Cheezmeister 11y ago> It's all bad, and all needs to be stopped. Look, I'm not a fan of Big Brother either (I don't think any of us are). But unqualified black-white statements like this (combined with Good Intentions™) are largely what got us into this mess in the first place.
- daveguy 11y agoYup. From the article -- "The bottom line: A top Chinese military contractor is building a data analytics platform to help authorities identify terrorists before they strike." So.... excactly what NSA does (alone and with private commercial ventures). I thought there was going to be an aspect of identifying potential for crimes and rounding people up who haven't done anything yet (which would be a step beyond what NSA and company have done. But nope, It's exactly what we've done for over a decade. A few other things from the article: "The government revealed last year that it was also building a nationwide database that would score citizens on their trustworthiness." ... I doubt we do this. It seems like NSA data collection is broad and encompassing, but not detailed analysis on every single US citizen. Sounds inefficient if the goal is to stop terrorism. Also FTA -- "New antiterror laws that went into effect on Jan. 1 allow authorities to gain access to bank accounts, telecommunications, and a national network of surveillance cameras called Skynet." Skynet?! Really?! Come on China. It was a movie not a playbook!
- sergers 11y agoNSA already has a program labeled Skynet. details were leaked May 2015
- imglorp 11y agoNo one would confuse NSA data collection as effective at stopping potential criminal attacks. If the government was truly worried about US deaths, it would be looking at drunk driving, lung cancer, and heart disease in earnest, some half million deaths a year. No, both the NSA and Chinese efforts are aimed at identifying and suppressing dissent. We're not that different.
- mikeash 11y agoHow does the NSA program suppress dissent? Seems to me that it's about stopping deaths. The reason they don't go after drunk driving and heart disease is because different kinds of deaths are valued differently. And while that's obviously crazy from a rational perspective, it's how the public views things.
- EC1 11y agoWow, how precious, someone who believes in the system! It suppresses dissent subconsciously. You start censoring yourself. If you think there is a shred of humanity within any of the NSA or any of the alphabet boys, you're in for a ride.
- mikeash 11y agoI don't believe in the system, I just don't see how the NSA's program suppresses dissent. There's no punishment for dissent, so how would it be suppressed? I'm sure they can and do listen in on people who want to overturn Citizens United or replace the government with a monarchy or whatever, but if there's no punishment that follows, then how does anything get suppressed?
- dublinben 11y ago
- tptacek 11y agoIs there a way to answer this question without the respondent being put on the hook for every unfair or unjust thing the US does in response to terrorism? Because there's a straightforward answer to the question you asked.
- mikeash 11y agoBecause when the US does it, it's also framed as totalitarian and unfair?
- sbuttgereit 11y agoBecause in China there can be serious consequences to holding and advocating for ideas that are out of favor with government. In the USA, even with all the monitoring you can still hold and advocate for ideas that are very much out of favor of those in government without serious reprisal. Note that "Terrorism" is a very convenient word in politics as it allows just about anyone to be labeled as such. I suspect my definition is very different than the Chinese definition. To be fair about the data collection efforts in the USA, something that I very much oppose as an affront to the individual rights of its citizens, I suspect that those efforts are nonetheless almost always conducted very much for proper purposes of protecting national security and the lives/property of its citizens... rather than to ensure government entrenchment in spite of its citizens. Where the NSA and like agencies go wrong is in assuming ends justify means. They don't. And of course the possibility of misuse of these methods to be used against citizen rights rather than to protect them.
- Zigurd 11y agoIf you go to protests in the US, you will become a surveillance target. That by itself has a chilling effect. Protest organizers get visits from the FBI, and the NSA feeds information to the FBI to be laundered through "parallel construction." misuse of information to stifle dissent isn't theoretical, it's practiced all the time.
- ap22213 11y agoChina and the US may be somewhat alike in this regard, but at least in the US people are allowed to talk about it and rally against it.
- Barrin92 11y agowell as long as it doesn't change anything, that is. Which makes the whole thing even worse
- matt_wulfeck 11y agoMy guess is that the likelihood of you getting a fair and speedy trial is significantly better in the US than it is in China.
- mineshaftgap 11y agoYour logic is not welcome here.
- trynumber9 11y agoIt was framed as totalitarian when the US did it too.