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Probably because the comment can be mostly summed up to: 'The majority of humans are idiots who need to be protected from themselves by the government.'

chrismorgan 6y ago
It’s not that humans need to be protected from themselves (individually), but that they need to be protected from other unscrupulous people, because computers are empowering the unscrupulous (and even the accidentally unscrupulous) more than they are empowering the common person. I broadly agree with ojnabieoot.
- grawprog 6y ago
  So why not teach people so they can empower themselves instead of making them rely on yet other people, who may or not be scrupulous themselves for protection? Because the government is always scrupulous and trustworthy...and nobody that's ever said trust us we'll protect you has lied...
  - chrismorgan 6y ago
    You can try that, but that approach tends to fail, because people don’t like changing what they do, and they definitely dislike jumping through extra hoops. You can improve things with education, but only up to a point. Most people just don’t want to think about any of these things, so until it gets really bad (most commonly of the “leopards ate my face” variety, when something you’ve tacitly endorsed suddenly starts to harm you), they’ll normally just go along with whatever happens. This is the whole reason for government, to maintain rough balance so that no one gets too upset. It’s extremely imperfect, as you correctly imply, but that’s the general idea of it, and it normally works well enough (better than nothing, at least), and no one has presented any better alternative.
  - ojnabieoot 6y ago
    Again: you could make the same argument against the fire department (“don’t rely on the government, learn fire suppression yourself”) or dangerous pharmaceuticals (“the peer-reviewed articles are out there, you just need to learn how to read them”), or protection against assault and theft, or protection against dangerous wild animals, etc etc. In general your argument is “proving” way too much and doesn’t say anything useful. Nobody is disputing that the government can be corrupt, and at its best will be incapable of protecting everyone from everything. And if you are sincerely anarchist then that’s more of an ideological dispute beyond the scope of this comment. But I suspect that you actually support regulation around food and medicine, since “a fatal case of salmonella is a small price to pay to make sure we don’t rely on the government” isn’t actually a good argument. And, unlike people who are ignorant about computer technology, you probably have empathy and understanding for people who are ignorant about whether the ground beef they are purchasing is actually safe to eat. You would not be sympathetic to a libertarian food safety specialist came in and said “well I can tell that the ground beef is unsafe, why not teach everyone my skills so they can defend themselves?” The idea that the government can protect people when it comes to health, medicine, transportation, and personal property... but NOT when it comes to privacy, is just not coherent.
ojnabieoot 6y ago
I am in fact saying “the majority of humans are not capable of defending themselves against every possible criminal, and therefore that responsibility belongs to the government.” I sincerely have no idea what your problem is.

chrismorgan 6y ago

It’s not that humans need to be protected from themselves (individually), but that they need to be protected from other unscrupulous people, because computers are empowering the unscrupulous (and even the accidentally unscrupulous) more than they are empowering the common person. I broadly agree with ojnabieoot.

grawprog 6y ago
So why not teach people so they can empower themselves instead of making them rely on yet other people, who may or not be scrupulous themselves for protection? Because the government is always scrupulous and trustworthy...and nobody that's ever said trust us we'll protect you has lied...
- chrismorgan 6y ago
  You can try that, but that approach tends to fail, because people don’t like changing what they do, and they definitely dislike jumping through extra hoops. You can improve things with education, but only up to a point. Most people just don’t want to think about any of these things, so until it gets really bad (most commonly of the “leopards ate my face” variety, when something you’ve tacitly endorsed suddenly starts to harm you), they’ll normally just go along with whatever happens. This is the whole reason for government, to maintain rough balance so that no one gets too upset. It’s extremely imperfect, as you correctly imply, but that’s the general idea of it, and it normally works well enough (better than nothing, at least), and no one has presented any better alternative.
- ojnabieoot 6y ago
  Again: you could make the same argument against the fire department (“don’t rely on the government, learn fire suppression yourself”) or dangerous pharmaceuticals (“the peer-reviewed articles are out there, you just need to learn how to read them”), or protection against assault and theft, or protection against dangerous wild animals, etc etc. In general your argument is “proving” way too much and doesn’t say anything useful. Nobody is disputing that the government can be corrupt, and at its best will be incapable of protecting everyone from everything. And if you are sincerely anarchist then that’s more of an ideological dispute beyond the scope of this comment. But I suspect that you actually support regulation around food and medicine, since “a fatal case of salmonella is a small price to pay to make sure we don’t rely on the government” isn’t actually a good argument. And, unlike people who are ignorant about computer technology, you probably have empathy and understanding for people who are ignorant about whether the ground beef they are purchasing is actually safe to eat. You would not be sympathetic to a libertarian food safety specialist came in and said “well I can tell that the ground beef is unsafe, why not teach everyone my skills so they can defend themselves?” The idea that the government can protect people when it comes to health, medicine, transportation, and personal property... but NOT when it comes to privacy, is just not coherent.

ojnabieoot 6y ago

I am in fact saying “the majority of humans are not capable of defending themselves against every possible criminal, and therefore that responsibility belongs to the government.” I sincerely have no idea what your problem is.