4 ms·

In this particular case, the government could also just not spend my own tax dollars on authoritarian propaganda.

kbenson 3y ago
If by government you mean local agencies staffed by local people using this tech to make their job easier for what to them is the small concession of reigning in how they speak of it, then sure, I guess people can can just go against what they see as their best interests. Easy.
- ofslidingfeet 3y ago
  The entities I pay to carry guns under the pretense that they're defending and not violating my civil rights, yes. It is not the free market's job to prevent corruption among such entities, and it's certainly not my fault that they're spreading propaganda.
  - dmoy 3y ago
    Cops in the US are not paid to defend the public. There are Supreme Court cases ruling that e.g. they can in fact just hide behind a door while you're actively being murdered.
  - kbenson 3y ago
    I'm not making an argument for or against thr free market, I'm making a an argument about human nature. If we want people not not do something that they see as beneficial for themselves (and the negative effects are not necessarily obvious or are spread enough that they're easy enough to rationalize away), we need to make it so it's not longer so easy to see as purely beneficial. In this case that's likely either policies or laws that prevent it. The government is just a bunch of people much of the time, and emergent behavior is rampant, so I don't think it's useful to complain about the government doing things we expect them not to when those expectations haven't been clearly communicated through laws or policies. If they have been communicated, then we're looking at corruption, or at best incompetence, both of which we have ways to deal with.
    - vimax 3y ago
      The ways we have to deal with corruption are often insufficient.
oldnetguy 3y ago
They do and not just in this case but in others as well and that's why a lot of people decided to homeschool their children

If by government you mean local agencies staffed by local people using this tech to make their job easier for what to them is the small concession of reigning in how they speak of it, then sure, I guess people can can just go against what they see as their best interests. Easy.

ofslidingfeet 3y ago
The entities I pay to carry guns under the pretense that they're defending and not violating my civil rights, yes. It is not the free market's job to prevent corruption among such entities, and it's certainly not my fault that they're spreading propaganda.
- dmoy 3y ago
  Cops in the US are not paid to defend the public. There are Supreme Court cases ruling that e.g. they can in fact just hide behind a door while you're actively being murdered.
- kbenson 3y ago
  I'm not making an argument for or against thr free market, I'm making a an argument about human nature. If we want people not not do something that they see as beneficial for themselves (and the negative effects are not necessarily obvious or are spread enough that they're easy enough to rationalize away), we need to make it so it's not longer so easy to see as purely beneficial. In this case that's likely either policies or laws that prevent it. The government is just a bunch of people much of the time, and emergent behavior is rampant, so I don't think it's useful to complain about the government doing things we expect them not to when those expectations haven't been clearly communicated through laws or policies. If they have been communicated, then we're looking at corruption, or at best incompetence, both of which we have ways to deal with.
  - vimax 3y ago
    The ways we have to deal with corruption are often insufficient.

oldnetguy 3y ago

They do and not just in this case but in others as well and that's why a lot of people decided to homeschool their children