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Bruce Schneier: The response to the "If you've got nothing to hide" argument
- nazgulnarsil 18y agohe contradicts himself, but there are still some excellent points. I actually think that "the government gets to define what's wrong" is a better argument than an "intrinsic" right argument. Ayn Rand may not be too popular around here but I think this applies: There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor objectively interpreted and you create a nation of law-breakers.
- a-priori 18y agoJust curious: Why do you say that Ayn Rand may not be popular around here?
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- ivey 18y agoThat tends to be a safe assumption in most places.
- maw 18y agoBecause bad parodies are, well, bad, and Atlas Shrugged reads like nothing so much as a parody of classical liberalism written by a recent convert to communism without a shred of literary talent.
- gills 18y agoWow, that's pretty harsh. I'm currently reading that book for the first time, and I don't agree with you. Quite the opposite, actually. Despite the repeated and annoying misuse of the past-tense form of 'light', and the obviously strained attempts to inject philosphy into dialogue, there are some good points in the book. I would be interested in reading any elaboration you may personally wish to undertake.
- jfarmer 18y agoWait until the book turns into an action movie in the last few hundred pages.
- maw 18y agoThere are good ideas in Atlas Shrugged, but they're presented so badly as to resemble a strawman argument. My copy is 1069 pages long, but Rand says nearly everything she has to say within the first hundred. Although, to be fair, I'd read about her and was already a small-l libertarian, so there wasn't a whole lot new. But before I forget: yep, I'm a small-l libertarian. Rand and her followers and I wouldn't get along well, for the most laughable -- if they weren't pathetic -- of reasons. Peruse some of the results at http://www.google.com/search?q=objectivism+and+libertarianism http://www.google.com/search?q=objectivism+and+libertarianis.... Pretty sad, really. Rand had a number of other beliefs about topics such as the role of women in a heterosexual relationship and homosexuality that many people living in a modern society in the 21st century will have a hard time swallowing. That her ideas were unpopular doesn't make them wrong, of course. But I think they often were. Back to Rand's writing in Atlas Shrugged, I agree that the dialogue is bad, often simply not credible. But suspension of disbelief only works when some aspects of the story -- be they characters, settings, events, or something else -- remain recognizable from reality. But very little in Atlas is, certainly nothing key to the story. We the Living is a much better book than Atlas Shrugged, for what it's worth.
- netcan 18y agoReads better then The Republic
- nazgulnarsil 18y agoAyn Rand makes some salient points, but they were hardly original, even in her time. Rand took classic liberalism to its extreme, not realizing that all political systems are compromises between liberty and social power (or collectivism, or democracy, or mob rule or whatever you want to call it). Modern libertarianism is not too popular for good reason: most libertarians assume that if you get rid of government everything will be better, ignoring the fact that human societies have never gone without governments for long. Almost everyone wants to give up some measure of their freedom for safety, otherwise we would all think Somalia was a great place to live. The argument is over how much. Both anarcho-capitalism and utilitarians represent the extreme ranges of the political scale and are clearly unworkable: no one wants unlimited freedom with no safety, no one wants unlimited safety with no freedom.
- byrneseyeview 18y agomost libertarians assume that if you get rid of government everything will be better, ignoring the fact that human societies have never gone without governments for long. Wait, really? You think it just never occurred to libertarians to wonder what would happen if their philosophy were implemented? Almost everyone wants to give up some measure of their freedom for safety, otherwise we would all think Somalia was a great place to live. Why are you assuming that there should be a single monopolistic provider of these freedom-for-safety exchanges? And are you deliberately confusing anarcho-capitalism (which Rand abhored) with Objectivism (which calls for governments to maintain police and the military)? no one wants unlimited freedom with no safety, no one wants unlimited safety with no freedom. You're still acting as if it is obvious and intuitive that if someone wants something, they want the government to provide it. I think it might be illuminating to replace the government with some other entity, like, say, IBM or the local library, e.g. "Everyone knows we need to provide for people in their old age. That's why I think IBM should take some of my money every time I get paid, and give it to old people." This sounds absurd, of course, but it does bring up the question of why one should automatically assume that a monopolistic government is the only entity that can do certain tasks -- that we should give that stuff up in a no-bid contract without question.
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- mike_organon 18y agoI often like Schneier, but his arguments are weak in this article. "My problem with quips like these -- as right as they are -- is that they accept the premise that privacy is about hiding a wrong. It's not. Privacy is an inherent human right, and a requirement for maintaining the human condition with dignity and respect." I do agree with Schneier's examples and reasons of the importance of privacy, and I agree that the point is not about hiding a wrong. In addition to "an inherent human right" it's also "a basic human need," he says. I would say that the right to life (including property) is fundamental, and privacy of different things is something one can choose to protect or not depending on the issue. Most people don't care about phone number and address being public; they don't cover their faces walking around town; they don't care that grocery stores and credit cards track purchases. Privacy as an extension of life and property makes more sense. You protect it where it's important. I don't see that he argued any points about dignity and respect being essential to his point - I think those are just some of the reasons you want to keep some things private, not essentials.
- sown 18y agoI think one way that dignity is essential is that we all have secrets and all humans have a strong desire to keep them that way. It breaks a person down to not have it. An example might be during boot camp where there are few secrets and humiliation and lack of privacy are used to break a recruit. For example, in some churches, a list of the highest and lowest tithes from parishioner. Of course, the goal is obvious: to humiliate and subject people. Of course you don't have to go to that particular church but if one is devout and that church is the only local representation of your particular denomination you can see how that would be ...undignified. I could go on. Vis a vi: Revenge of the Nerds II when the Alpha Betas are plotting on how to humiliate the Tri-Lams.
- natch 18y agoOf the churches you've heard of doing that, which denominations were they, may I ask? I wonder if any churches would go so far as to post this on the web.
- sown 18y agoI should also point out that it is extremely selfish when people repeat the "If you've got nothing to hide" argument. They advocate giving away their rights and yours at the same time. miffed
- pierrefar 18y agoYep. When they say "you've got nothing to hide" I ask them if they close their curtains at night. Or if they lock their door. Or ask them for their exact salary, how they spent it, and why they chose to spend their money that way. I think many people don't realize how much they value their own privacy and so I try to give them examples to force them value it on their own.
- cstejerean 18y agoI got much better things to hide than how much money I make and what I spend it on.
- pierrefar 18y agoSadly, those wanting my privacy don't. See you have a life and they don't.
- known 18y agoI think Government must always be smarter than Businesses!
- vixen99 18y agoWonderful. A copy of this should be sent to every legislator. However I think he misuses the word 'right'. Privacy is not a human right - evidently so because there is no general agreement as to how it's defined and respected. A right is nothing unless it's accepted (with due regulation) by all reasonable people. Governments have shown increasingly that they, the elite, wish to determine absolutely the limits of the privacy we naturally seek.
- cdr 18y agoA 2+ year old article by Bruce Schneier that has nothing to do with coding? HN is now officially Reddit.
- pg 18y agoI remember once hearing that a privacy advocate had replied to that argument from a politician with "Senator, when you make love to your wife, do you kiss her breasts?"
- stcredzero 18y agoThe fundamental right to privacy is actually based on the right to personal safety, or the right to protect yourself from the mob. In any particular context, an individual may well have the need to hide something. For example, one might happen to be gay and alone on a bus with 7 violent homophobes. This is an extreme case, but history is rife with examples where even the "society at large" context was manifestly unjust. (Our own towards homosexuals, for example. Last night, I was hired as a musician for a Baptist singles ministry group. I thought it was prudent that I kept conversation away from certain topics.) Saying that there's no right to privacy implies that all contexts are benevolent and just. But we know that the world is not always just, so there must be a right to privacy.
- derefr 18y agoIf everyone could find out such knowledge about everyone else on a whim, would people stop being so paranoid about the question, and all others like it? I see privacy as just a way to protect oneself in light of an unequal balance of informational power. If this imbalance were corrected--if everyone instantly knew everything and anything they wanted to know--a form of mutually-assured destruction would ensure continued politeness, or as the author put it, "dignity and respect." We would simply stop caring about such things--gossip is a non-issue when everyone (metaphorically, mind) lives together naked in a brightly-lit room, and speaks in sweeping motions and loud voices. In a privacy-less world, the senator would simply reply "yes" or "no," but the question wouldn't have been asked in the first place, as it wouldn't be especially inflammatory--anyone could know all they wanted about anyone else's sexual habits, and so it wouldn't be at all interesting, or even at all intimate (once the novelty wore off, of course.)
- earthboundkid 18y agoSuch a world will never be allowed to come to exist as long as there are powerful men who want to cheat on their wives.
- Alex3917 18y agoI still favor, "Just because I have something to hide doesn't mean I'm doing anything wrong." It seems to be the most technically correct answer.
- jazj 18y agoThis thread sure got raped by lolbertarians fast