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Can somebody explain to me what racial profiling necessarily has to do with "what it's like to live in a surveillance state," or am I correct in my evaluation t

Can somebody explain to me what racial profiling necessarily has to do with "what it's like to live in a surveillance state," or am I correct in my evaluation that this article is doing PR for our own surveillance state by conflating two forms of oppression?

skywhopper 9y ago
I'm not seeing the "PR for our own surveillance state". But the fact is that surveillance regimes and racist propaganda and intimidation of othered ethnic, racial, or religious groups usually go hand in hand. Hyping invented criminality of or subversion by particular groups is key to convincing the populace that they are under threat and should give in to extremely intrusive measures. Each feeds into the other. Political regimes use lies about (often invented) outsider groups to justify their growing power. And then true believers and overzealous apparatchiks begin harassing members of that group, often using those very tools, which leads to a growing perception that yes these people who are receiving international calls are clearly terrorists or terrorist supporters, who need to be surveilled. Etc.
cryoshon 9y ago
this was my impression as well. "look at all these bad things we do, that the chinese also do-- oh yeah, but they also do OTHER stuff that's horrible too" the line between a surveillance state and an oppressive political state doesn't exist, as surveillance is oppressive-- but it's not the only form of oppression. the article seems to forget that oppression has many effectors. it is too convenient of a slip. the political oppression of the uighurs is, as the article notes, uniquely chinese-- but these things could have easily happened without any real surveillance whatsoever. harassing minorities for arbitrary reasons doesn't need the evidence that surveillance can provide-- malice is not based on evidence to begin with. as far as the chinese idea of han ethnic supremacy: it isn't new. in fact, it's old. the leaders' chinese vision of their country is that of a han chinese monoculture with a very particular apoliticism (they wrap passivity in many different terms). i was about to say that they aren't genocidal yet, but i dunno if that's really true; they have done quite a number on tibet, but my knowledge of the situation is very shallow.
mirimir 9y ago
It does seem that China has implemented some impressive surveillance in Xinjiang. And it does seem that Uighurs are being targeted. And the methods were developed in Tibet. But racial profiling isn't the focus of the article. It focuses on the methods. Also, although there may be some China bashing in the background, I don't see anything about the US being better. And it doesn't take much imagination to see how such total surveillance is becoming normalized here.
- dna_polymerase 9y ago
  > Also, although there may be some China bashing in the background, I don't see anything about the US being better. There is a surprising amount of people that think of China as the bad communist state and the US as the superior nation. Even here on HN where I usually would expect the average commenter to have even some basic education. It is the same population, I suspect, that is totally oblivious of the state of surveillance in their country and how this actually is bad and won't stop crime of any sort.
- woodandsteel 9y ago
  > I don't see anything about the US being better. There is a lot bad going on in the US, but China is ten or a hundred times worse. For instance, the web is massively censored, and political dissidents get sent to jail by the hundreds or thousands. Furthermore, in the US we still have enough freedom of speech that we can criticize surveillance at places like HN, and even organize efforts to resist it, even political campaigns, but in China that is completely impossible. It seems to me that if people were to come to believe that things are as hopeless in the US as in China, then they would give up all efforts at resistance. I think that would be a terrible mistake.
  - mirimir 9y ago
    I agree. Surveillance in the US is by no means as bad as it is in China. However, consider that the NSA intercepts all Internet traffic, excerpts and indexes the data, and makes it available through a Google-like interface. But they claim that there's no substantive surveillance until some human queries that data. Arguably, even AI processing would not be considered to be surveillance. And sure, they claim that they're not looking at traffic between US citizens. However, there's the SOD program:[0] > The unit of the DEA that distributes the information is called the Special Operations Division, or SOD. Two dozen partner agencies comprise the unit, including the FBI, CIA, NSA, Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Homeland Security. It was created in 1994 to combat Latin American drug cartels and has grown from several dozen employees to several hundred. > Today, much of the SOD's work is classified, and officials asked that its precise location in Virginia not be revealed. The documents reviewed by Reuters are marked "Law Enforcement Sensitive," a government categorization that is meant to keep them confidential. > "Remember that the utilization of SOD cannot be revealed or discussed in any investigative function," a document presented to agents reads. The document specifically directs agents to omit the SOD's involvement from investigative reports, affidavits, discussions with prosecutors and courtroom testimony. Agents are instructed to then use "normal investigative techniques to recreate the information provided by SOD." DEA even has a history of SOD online.[1] That is, parallel construction. And given the secrecy about SOD-based evidence, we have no idea how widely it's used. Potentially, the full power of the NSA could be turned against anything that federal investigators consider as legitimate targets. I could go on at length. And I won't. But consider the situation at the Mexican border. Consider surveillance around presidential conventions, WTO meetings, etc. Consider reports about Stingray units cited near USCIS offices. And those surveillance aircraft circling over areas of interest. Sure, things aren't "as hopeless in the US as in China", but they're getting there in some ways. And all it would take is some serious crisis and drama, real or manufactured. 0) https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dea-sod/exclusive-u-s-directs-agents-to-cover-up-program-used-to-investigate-americans-idUSBRE97409R20130805 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dea-sod/exclusive-u-s-dir... 1) https://www.deamuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/042215-DEAMuseum-LectureSeries-MLS-SOD-transcript.pdf https://www.deamuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/042215-...

skywhopper 9y ago

I'm not seeing the "PR for our own surveillance state". But the fact is that surveillance regimes and racist propaganda and intimidation of othered ethnic, racial, or religious groups usually go hand in hand. Hyping invented criminality of or subversion by particular groups is key to convincing the populace that they are under threat and should give in to extremely intrusive measures. Each feeds into the other. Political regimes use lies about (often invented) outsider groups to justify their growing power. And then true believers and overzealous apparatchiks begin harassing members of that group, often using those very tools, which leads to a growing perception that yes these people who are receiving international calls are clearly terrorists or terrorist supporters, who need to be surveilled. Etc.

cryoshon 9y ago

this was my impression as well. "look at all these bad things we do, that the chinese also do-- oh yeah, but they also do OTHER stuff that's horrible too" the line between a surveillance state and an oppressive political state doesn't exist, as surveillance is oppressive-- but it's not the only form of oppression. the article seems to forget that oppression has many effectors. it is too convenient of a slip. the political oppression of the uighurs is, as the article notes, uniquely chinese-- but these things could have easily happened without any real surveillance whatsoever. harassing minorities for arbitrary reasons doesn't need the evidence that surveillance can provide-- malice is not based on evidence to begin with. as far as the chinese idea of han ethnic supremacy: it isn't new. in fact, it's old. the leaders' chinese vision of their country is that of a han chinese monoculture with a very particular apoliticism (they wrap passivity in many different terms). i was about to say that they aren't genocidal yet, but i dunno if that's really true; they have done quite a number on tibet, but my knowledge of the situation is very shallow.

mirimir 9y ago

It does seem that China has implemented some impressive surveillance in Xinjiang. And it does seem that Uighurs are being targeted. And the methods were developed in Tibet. But racial profiling isn't the focus of the article. It focuses on the methods. Also, although there may be some China bashing in the background, I don't see anything about the US being better. And it doesn't take much imagination to see how such total surveillance is becoming normalized here.

dna_polymerase 9y ago
> Also, although there may be some China bashing in the background, I don't see anything about the US being better. There is a surprising amount of people that think of China as the bad communist state and the US as the superior nation. Even here on HN where I usually would expect the average commenter to have even some basic education. It is the same population, I suspect, that is totally oblivious of the state of surveillance in their country and how this actually is bad and won't stop crime of any sort.
woodandsteel 9y ago
> I don't see anything about the US being better. There is a lot bad going on in the US, but China is ten or a hundred times worse. For instance, the web is massively censored, and political dissidents get sent to jail by the hundreds or thousands. Furthermore, in the US we still have enough freedom of speech that we can criticize surveillance at places like HN, and even organize efforts to resist it, even political campaigns, but in China that is completely impossible. It seems to me that if people were to come to believe that things are as hopeless in the US as in China, then they would give up all efforts at resistance. I think that would be a terrible mistake.
- mirimir 9y ago
  I agree. Surveillance in the US is by no means as bad as it is in China. However, consider that the NSA intercepts all Internet traffic, excerpts and indexes the data, and makes it available through a Google-like interface. But they claim that there's no substantive surveillance until some human queries that data. Arguably, even AI processing would not be considered to be surveillance. And sure, they claim that they're not looking at traffic between US citizens. However, there's the SOD program:[0] > The unit of the DEA that distributes the information is called the Special Operations Division, or SOD. Two dozen partner agencies comprise the unit, including the FBI, CIA, NSA, Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Homeland Security. It was created in 1994 to combat Latin American drug cartels and has grown from several dozen employees to several hundred. > Today, much of the SOD's work is classified, and officials asked that its precise location in Virginia not be revealed. The documents reviewed by Reuters are marked "Law Enforcement Sensitive," a government categorization that is meant to keep them confidential. > "Remember that the utilization of SOD cannot be revealed or discussed in any investigative function," a document presented to agents reads. The document specifically directs agents to omit the SOD's involvement from investigative reports, affidavits, discussions with prosecutors and courtroom testimony. Agents are instructed to then use "normal investigative techniques to recreate the information provided by SOD." DEA even has a history of SOD online.[1] That is, parallel construction. And given the secrecy about SOD-based evidence, we have no idea how widely it's used. Potentially, the full power of the NSA could be turned against anything that federal investigators consider as legitimate targets. I could go on at length. And I won't. But consider the situation at the Mexican border. Consider surveillance around presidential conventions, WTO meetings, etc. Consider reports about Stingray units cited near USCIS offices. And those surveillance aircraft circling over areas of interest. Sure, things aren't "as hopeless in the US as in China", but they're getting there in some ways. And all it would take is some serious crisis and drama, real or manufactured. 0) https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dea-sod/exclusive-u-s-directs-agents-to-cover-up-program-used-to-investigate-americans-idUSBRE97409R20130805 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dea-sod/exclusive-u-s-dir... 1) https://www.deamuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/042215-DEAMuseum-LectureSeries-MLS-SOD-transcript.pdf https://www.deamuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/042215-...