7 ms·

Good thing the United States has a constitutional amendment that totally protects us from having our location data harvested sold and deanonymized by thousands

Good thing the United States has a constitutional amendment that totally protects us from having our location data harvested sold and deanonymized by thousands of data brokers!

tdhz77 4y ago
This practice should extend to the private sector in my opinion. Protection of location data should fall under the 14th amendment.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
xeromal 4y ago
My favorite comment. Let's ignore any valid criticism and complain about something else instead.
- noobermin 4y ago
  The unfortunate reality is a lot of people post comments like GP but do so reflexively to deride non-US governments then play defense for posts critical of the US. Some do it for China, and so on. It would help in general if people are reasonably (emphasis on reasonably) skeptical of all states.
  - jolux 4y ago
    Let’s not pretend that China’s laws and norms are comparable to those of the US here, though. Yes, it’s reasonable to be skeptical of all states, but there’s definitely a difference of degree in state overreach.
    - pphysch 4y ago
      Simply not true. For every (actual, not just FLG disinfo) overreach of Beijing you can find one for Washington You are more likely to be permanently incarcerated in America than China
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - ms4720 4y ago
        That is right, hard to survive a firing squad
        shapefrog 4y ago
        A firing squad is just another form of lethal injection.
    - roenxi 4y ago
      They are comparable. China is still worse, but: 1) I fully expect to see the US government make up most of the US economy by spending in my lifetime (I'd argue they are already there, but that involves an argument I don't feel like typing). 2) COVID shows us that the US government also sees their role as deploying an invasive level of social control for The Greater Good. COVID level threats aren't going to be that rare, we'll see another one in our lifetimes. 3) The US government pioneered using phones to support a global surveillance apparatus (probably military too, I expect more than one missile has been targeted on an iPhone). So to repeat myself, although I'd still rather take the Americans than the Chinese, these are not categorically different things. They see their roles as the same and their methods are converging. Especially on the subject of surveillance and the risks it poses to ordinary people.
      - jolux 4y ago
        2) is a weird objection to level given as almost all restrictions have been lifted in the US and China remains a repressive nightmare on this issue as it has been since 2020. The US did not come anywhere near what China did with regards to lockdowns. And it’s a core responsibility of all states to protect their citizens. Overall our response was bad but we developed effective vaccines that have mostly saved us now while China refuses to use them for nationalistic reasons. Very different situations.
      - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
        China lacks rule of law, or even an attempt at it: the Chinese government has stated that the notion of rule of law is just western imperialism. This is why, China having a constitution that guarantees freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and so on, is completely meaningless (no independent judiciary means the law is whatever officials claim it is) whereas an attempt of rule of law is actually made in the USA, even if it is far from perfect. Ironically, we are debating Singapore in parent, which has extremely strong rule of law, but the laws are such that security is prioritized.
        pjmlp 4y ago
        I bet the guys taken blindfolded by CIA, questioned in the middle of somewhere, and then brought back, will fully agree how much better the US system happens to be. Naturally the ones that survived the question process.
  - theteapot 4y ago
    I think the point was, we can't use the fact US (or China, or state X) is a corrupt basket case to lazily dismiss any valid criticism here. That's like dismissing the teachers criticism of an A grade student's English Literature exam question by saying "Yeah well, Ralph's answer was 'boobs'". Ralph exists. The A grade student wants to improve. These are separate concerns.
themitigating 4y ago
What is the value of this comment? The US government, privacy in the US, and the like is already discussed frequently here. People are also aware of it so you aren't bringing it to light.
- saghm 4y ago
  I think it's fair, given that GP mentioned "There is no constitutional right to privacy in Singapore so they did not actually break any laws". There's a long history to the debate of whether there's a constitutional right to privacy in the US; it's not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution but it's a fairly common interpretation nowadays, so whether or not the courts in the US would consider it legal if the US government did this is not a sure thing either way.
  - pxeger1 4y ago
    lgvln wasn't comparing it to the US. quinnjh was the one who brought up the US.
    - noobermin 4y ago
      Looked at a wiki article, and it looks like not many states have a "right to privacy" in their constitution but rather have it specified by various other laws. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_privacy
      - saghm 4y ago
        My point was that there's disagreement about whether the US has a right to privacy, compared to in Singapore which, at least based on the comments in the thread, it seems like there's consensus that there isn't one.

Good thing the United States has a constitutional amendment that totally protects us from having our location data harvested sold and deanonymized by thousands of data brokers!

tdhz77 4y ago

This practice should extend to the private sector in my opinion. Protection of location data should fall under the 14th amendment.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

xeromal 4y ago

My favorite comment. Let's ignore any valid criticism and complain about something else instead.

noobermin 4y ago
The unfortunate reality is a lot of people post comments like GP but do so reflexively to deride non-US governments then play defense for posts critical of the US. Some do it for China, and so on. It would help in general if people are reasonably (emphasis on reasonably) skeptical of all states.
- jolux 4y ago
  Let’s not pretend that China’s laws and norms are comparable to those of the US here, though. Yes, it’s reasonable to be skeptical of all states, but there’s definitely a difference of degree in state overreach.
  - pphysch 4y ago
    Simply not true. For every (actual, not just FLG disinfo) overreach of Beijing you can find one for Washington You are more likely to be permanently incarcerated in America than China
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - ms4720 4y ago
      That is right, hard to survive a firing squad
      - shapefrog 4y ago
        A firing squad is just another form of lethal injection.
  - roenxi 4y ago
    They are comparable. China is still worse, but: 1) I fully expect to see the US government make up most of the US economy by spending in my lifetime (I'd argue they are already there, but that involves an argument I don't feel like typing). 2) COVID shows us that the US government also sees their role as deploying an invasive level of social control for The Greater Good. COVID level threats aren't going to be that rare, we'll see another one in our lifetimes. 3) The US government pioneered using phones to support a global surveillance apparatus (probably military too, I expect more than one missile has been targeted on an iPhone). So to repeat myself, although I'd still rather take the Americans than the Chinese, these are not categorically different things. They see their roles as the same and their methods are converging. Especially on the subject of surveillance and the risks it poses to ordinary people.
    - jolux 4y ago
      2) is a weird objection to level given as almost all restrictions have been lifted in the US and China remains a repressive nightmare on this issue as it has been since 2020. The US did not come anywhere near what China did with regards to lockdowns. And it’s a core responsibility of all states to protect their citizens. Overall our response was bad but we developed effective vaccines that have mostly saved us now while China refuses to use them for nationalistic reasons. Very different situations.
    - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
      China lacks rule of law, or even an attempt at it: the Chinese government has stated that the notion of rule of law is just western imperialism. This is why, China having a constitution that guarantees freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and so on, is completely meaningless (no independent judiciary means the law is whatever officials claim it is) whereas an attempt of rule of law is actually made in the USA, even if it is far from perfect. Ironically, we are debating Singapore in parent, which has extremely strong rule of law, but the laws are such that security is prioritized.
      - pjmlp 4y ago
        I bet the guys taken blindfolded by CIA, questioned in the middle of somewhere, and then brought back, will fully agree how much better the US system happens to be. Naturally the ones that survived the question process.
- theteapot 4y ago
  I think the point was, we can't use the fact US (or China, or state X) is a corrupt basket case to lazily dismiss any valid criticism here. That's like dismissing the teachers criticism of an A grade student's English Literature exam question by saying "Yeah well, Ralph's answer was 'boobs'". Ralph exists. The A grade student wants to improve. These are separate concerns.

themitigating 4y ago

What is the value of this comment? The US government, privacy in the US, and the like is already discussed frequently here. People are also aware of it so you aren't bringing it to light.

saghm 4y ago
I think it's fair, given that GP mentioned "There is no constitutional right to privacy in Singapore so they did not actually break any laws". There's a long history to the debate of whether there's a constitutional right to privacy in the US; it's not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution but it's a fairly common interpretation nowadays, so whether or not the courts in the US would consider it legal if the US government did this is not a sure thing either way.
- pxeger1 4y ago
  lgvln wasn't comparing it to the US. quinnjh was the one who brought up the US.
  - noobermin 4y ago
    Looked at a wiki article, and it looks like not many states have a "right to privacy" in their constitution but rather have it specified by various other laws. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_privacy
    - saghm 4y ago
      My point was that there's disagreement about whether the US has a right to privacy, compared to in Singapore which, at least based on the comments in the thread, it seems like there's consensus that there isn't one.