10 ms·

What is truly a scary thought is if the vast, mindless mass of people easily swayed by consumerism, advertisement and buzz, talk about this for about two weeks

by kunai 13y ago

rayiner 13y ago
> What is truly a scary thought is if the vast, mindless mass of people... This is why privacy advocates (and libertarians more generally), can't get more popular traction: the incredibly derisive and arrogant tone with which they address their fellow citizens, and their flippant, dismissive attitude towards democracy. Why should I listen to the opinions of someone who calls my parents, most of my friends, my in-laws, my wife, etc, "mindless"? Just because they have different priorities and care about different issues, or (gasp!) have different ideas about the appropriate boundaries of police surveillance?
- kiba 13y ago
  Why should I listen to the opinions of someone who calls my parents, most of my friends, my in-laws, my wife, etc, "mindless"? Just because they have different priorities and care about different issues, or (gasp!) have different ideas about the appropriate boundaries of police surveillance? It is not that you are mindless, it is that we are too dumb to contain the sums of human knowledge within our head. Individually, we can be great at disciplines that we specialize in. But expecting us to decide competent government officials to represent us? That's impossible.
- kunai 13y ago
  Mindless with respect to political issues, is quite appropriate, I think. When my mom or my dad or my grandma says, "I have nothing to hide" (and they do, whenever I call them about some privacy concern), my respect for them with regards to political issues, drastically drops. Perhaps "mindless" is harsh, but they certainly aren't being insightful or politically educated. I'm not trying to launch ad hominem attacks on you or your relatives. I'm trying to get people to wake up.
  - youngerdryas 13y ago
    Hyperventilating nerd rage is not helpful, but it will get you a lot of upvotes.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    My parents are extremely politically educated, as is my wife. My dad has traveled the world extensively (80+ different countries) and seen nearly every kind of government under the sun. He was very involved politically when Bangladesh was seeking its independence. My wife, for her part, lived in east Germany after high school and observed the political situation in a city where many people still remembered life under communist rule. Yet, none of them care about your pet issue. Fact is not everyone sees life in terms of slippery slope fallacies. The status quo is really pretty good, and it's perfectly rational to think there are more pressing political concerns than the NSA knowing how often you call your mom. My dad has his pet issue (he's anti-war), and my wife has her's (she's an adherent feminist). People aren't mindless or irrational because they don't share your political beliefs or your priorities with respect to political issues.
    - brymaster 13y ago
      > Yet, none of them care about your pet issue. Actual former East Germans still remember the Stasi and Germany itself has fought for privacy (see Germany v. Facebook).
  - groby_b 13y ago
    I can guarantee you that you won't get people to wake up by insulting them. At least I can't recall a single case that's ever worked.
- waffle_ss 13y ago
  I think you're generalizing and/or hanging out in the wrong places. For instance, on Reddit's [libertarian sub-reddit][1] I've found "sheeple" comments get downvoted pretty quickly. edit: I'd also add that I've never felt this elitism from libertarian figureheads either. I can clearly recall Milton Friedman saying that libertarianism should never be forced on people, and if it isn't taken up freely then it wasn't meant to be. [1]: http://www.reddit.com/r/libertarian http://www.reddit.com/r/libertarian
  - rayiner 13y ago
    Just look at how much "oh my god I can't believe the public doesn't care about this" angst has bubbled up in the HN threads on the NSA's actions. Amusingly, you see the same sort of rejection of democratic consensus from some extremist feminists ("women can't be trusted to know what they want because they've been brainwashed by the patriarchy.")
    - tossedaside57 13y ago
      Geeks internalize the network. It's like an extension of their mind and body. Intrude into their online activities and you might as well be touching them in their no-touchy zone. You sound like a bleeding "blame the victim" sexual harassment apologist. All the other secretaries are okay with the bosses' constant groping, what's the big deal? Maybe they like being touched. You were asking for it by dressing that way (putting your data on the cloud) anyway. Well, it's not their fucking decision whether the abused secretary should put up with the boss's wandering hands!
      - rayiner 13y ago
        It's interesting that you mention groping. The tort of battery is evaluated according to an objective standard: would a reasonable person consider the contact offensive? It is defined by social norms: grabbing someone's ass is offensive, bumping into someone on a crowded subway is not. So your point fails even within the four corners of your analogy. That secretary will have a pretty tough time arguing that her boss's handshake was sexual battery, even if she belongs to an obscure religion that considers hands to be sexual objects.
- idontthinkso 13y ago
  "This is why..." Are you sure? Can you prove it? Perhaps the traction is absent because the people are in fact "mindless" about such issues. And your comment begs the question: Why should I listen to (i.e. read and take seriously) the opinions of someone who consistently belittles his fellow hackers on HN? Or who consistently takes an arrogant tone in every comment he makes, day in and day out, on HN? Or who consistently exhibits a dissmissive attitude toward the opinions of other hackers? Give it a rest, rayiner. I, as an older hacker unlike most of your targets, am tired of reading your argumentative gibberish.
- LowKarmaAccount 13y ago
  Privacy advocates are not a subset of libertarians. Libertarians may be privacy advocates, but there are many privacy advocates that are not libertarians. Privacy advocacy is popular among the upper classes, because they really don't want anyone from the lower classes sticking their noses into their business. Libertarians are unpopular because some of their policies are deeply unpopular. For example, many libertarians oppose the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because they feel it violates their first amendment rights.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    > Privacy advocacy is popular among the upper classes, because they really don't want anyone from the lower classes sticking their noses into their business. That is, in my experience, my friends' only real problem with the TSA (other than the hassle). They hate people with GED's bossing them around.
    - harryh 13y ago
      I think it's also the stupidity. You know you're going through this ordeal that could be easily circumvented by even a moderately clever attacker. It just seems like such a waste.
      - cglace 13y ago
        Just curious. If it could be circumvented by a moderately clever attacker. Why hasn't it been?
        harryh 13y ago
        Schneier wrote about this here: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/05/why_arent_there.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/05/why_arent_ther...
        willismichael 13y ago
        http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/1b-of-nude-body-scanners-made-worthless-by-blog-how-anyone-can-get-anything-past-the-tsas-nude-body-scanners/ http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/1b-of-nude-... and the TSA's response: http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/03/viral-video-about-body-scanners.html http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/03/viral-video-about-body-scanners.... Draw your own conclusions.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- cdwhite 13y ago
  Kemal. http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n17/perry-anderson/kemalism http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n17/perry-anderson/kemalism. I feel that "dictator", while technically accurate, doesn't have quite the right connotation---his rule didn't have the same totalitarian nature that those of Stalin, Hitler, Hussein, Castro, the Kims, etc. do/did to varying extents. (Or maybe I'm being oversensitive to questions of connotation.)
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- garretruh 13y ago
  Ataturk. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atatürk#Establishment_of_the_Republic_of_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atatürk#Establish...
homosaur 13y ago
You're more of an optimist about the state than I am because I think the only POSSIBLE resolution long term is the dissolution of all state power and moving towards enclaved/anarchistic models. Basically I'm talking about the Diamond Age in real life here. Hell, we already have prototype matter compilers. When an enclave all has 3d manufacturing and scanning down and starts to build their own civilization kits, of what use is the state to anyone aside from starting wars?
leephillips 13y ago
It all depends on the quality of your dictator.
matteodepalo 13y ago
"I've got nothing to hide" isn't the only argument that is used to counter privacy advocates, and I agree that this argument is wrong to some extent. A more valid argument might be that when I think of government agencies looking at data from Google I know I'm just a number, unless they want to investigate, in which case they may look at my personal info. But I have to guess the number of investigated people is pretty low and there must be valid reasons to start an investigation, just like they need a warrant to get inside a house. It would simply be impossible to investigate every one of us in detail.
anigbrowl 13y ago
What is truly a scary thought is if the vast, mindless mass of people easily swayed by consumerism, advertisement and buzz, talk about this for about two weeks and then forget the whole thing, screaming "We have NOTHING to hide!" as a logically flawed and incredibly poor excuse. It won't stay at the top of the news for even two weeks. Most people don't care because a) it doesn't actually affect their lives and b) they actually want government to monitor traffic patterns for potentially suspicious activity. As a society, some 25% of our labor force is engaged in some sort of security activity, not counting police and military. This is arguably a consequence of the fetishization of private property in the US compared to other countries: http://tuvalu.santafe.edu/~bowles/GarrisonAmerica2007.pdf http://tuvalu.santafe.edu/~bowles/GarrisonAmerica2007.pdf a good, conservatively Green or Green Libertarian government is the only path to resolution Er...I think you're going to run into some consistency problems there. United States mass public is uneducated and apathetic (unlike how it used to be 300 years ago Highly questionable. Most people in 1713 were not educated at all and even if we look at the revolutionary period we should remember that wealthy landowners whose writings have come down to use were economically exceptional (eg John dickinson, the 'Penmnsylvanian farmer' who was chided by Alexander Hamilton for implicitly arguing for 'free as in beer - http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=690&chapter=102299&layout=html&Itemid=27 http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfi... and http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=2121&chapter=164944&layout=html&Itemid=27 http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfi... ...please excuse my gross oversimplification, but it's a fact that many colonists saw revolution as a means to get out from under state and private debts owed in England).

by kunai 13y ago

rayiner 13y ago

> What is truly a scary thought is if the vast, mindless mass of people... This is why privacy advocates (and libertarians more generally), can't get more popular traction: the incredibly derisive and arrogant tone with which they address their fellow citizens, and their flippant, dismissive attitude towards democracy. Why should I listen to the opinions of someone who calls my parents, most of my friends, my in-laws, my wife, etc, "mindless"? Just because they have different priorities and care about different issues, or (gasp!) have different ideas about the appropriate boundaries of police surveillance?

kiba 13y ago
Why should I listen to the opinions of someone who calls my parents, most of my friends, my in-laws, my wife, etc, "mindless"? Just because they have different priorities and care about different issues, or (gasp!) have different ideas about the appropriate boundaries of police surveillance? It is not that you are mindless, it is that we are too dumb to contain the sums of human knowledge within our head. Individually, we can be great at disciplines that we specialize in. But expecting us to decide competent government officials to represent us? That's impossible.
kunai 13y ago
Mindless with respect to political issues, is quite appropriate, I think. When my mom or my dad or my grandma says, "I have nothing to hide" (and they do, whenever I call them about some privacy concern), my respect for them with regards to political issues, drastically drops. Perhaps "mindless" is harsh, but they certainly aren't being insightful or politically educated. I'm not trying to launch ad hominem attacks on you or your relatives. I'm trying to get people to wake up.
- youngerdryas 13y ago
  Hyperventilating nerd rage is not helpful, but it will get you a lot of upvotes.
- rayiner 13y ago
  My parents are extremely politically educated, as is my wife. My dad has traveled the world extensively (80+ different countries) and seen nearly every kind of government under the sun. He was very involved politically when Bangladesh was seeking its independence. My wife, for her part, lived in east Germany after high school and observed the political situation in a city where many people still remembered life under communist rule. Yet, none of them care about your pet issue. Fact is not everyone sees life in terms of slippery slope fallacies. The status quo is really pretty good, and it's perfectly rational to think there are more pressing political concerns than the NSA knowing how often you call your mom. My dad has his pet issue (he's anti-war), and my wife has her's (she's an adherent feminist). People aren't mindless or irrational because they don't share your political beliefs or your priorities with respect to political issues.
  - brymaster 13y ago
    > Yet, none of them care about your pet issue. Actual former East Germans still remember the Stasi and Germany itself has fought for privacy (see Germany v. Facebook).
- groby_b 13y ago
  I can guarantee you that you won't get people to wake up by insulting them. At least I can't recall a single case that's ever worked.
waffle_ss 13y ago
I think you're generalizing and/or hanging out in the wrong places. For instance, on Reddit's [libertarian sub-reddit][1] I've found "sheeple" comments get downvoted pretty quickly. edit: I'd also add that I've never felt this elitism from libertarian figureheads either. I can clearly recall Milton Friedman saying that libertarianism should never be forced on people, and if it isn't taken up freely then it wasn't meant to be. [1]: http://www.reddit.com/r/libertarian http://www.reddit.com/r/libertarian
- rayiner 13y ago
  Just look at how much "oh my god I can't believe the public doesn't care about this" angst has bubbled up in the HN threads on the NSA's actions. Amusingly, you see the same sort of rejection of democratic consensus from some extremist feminists ("women can't be trusted to know what they want because they've been brainwashed by the patriarchy.")
  - tossedaside57 13y ago
    Geeks internalize the network. It's like an extension of their mind and body. Intrude into their online activities and you might as well be touching them in their no-touchy zone. You sound like a bleeding "blame the victim" sexual harassment apologist. All the other secretaries are okay with the bosses' constant groping, what's the big deal? Maybe they like being touched. You were asking for it by dressing that way (putting your data on the cloud) anyway. Well, it's not their fucking decision whether the abused secretary should put up with the boss's wandering hands!
    - rayiner 13y ago
      It's interesting that you mention groping. The tort of battery is evaluated according to an objective standard: would a reasonable person consider the contact offensive? It is defined by social norms: grabbing someone's ass is offensive, bumping into someone on a crowded subway is not. So your point fails even within the four corners of your analogy. That secretary will have a pretty tough time arguing that her boss's handshake was sexual battery, even if she belongs to an obscure religion that considers hands to be sexual objects.
idontthinkso 13y ago
"This is why..." Are you sure? Can you prove it? Perhaps the traction is absent because the people are in fact "mindless" about such issues. And your comment begs the question: Why should I listen to (i.e. read and take seriously) the opinions of someone who consistently belittles his fellow hackers on HN? Or who consistently takes an arrogant tone in every comment he makes, day in and day out, on HN? Or who consistently exhibits a dissmissive attitude toward the opinions of other hackers? Give it a rest, rayiner. I, as an older hacker unlike most of your targets, am tired of reading your argumentative gibberish.
LowKarmaAccount 13y ago
Privacy advocates are not a subset of libertarians. Libertarians may be privacy advocates, but there are many privacy advocates that are not libertarians. Privacy advocacy is popular among the upper classes, because they really don't want anyone from the lower classes sticking their noses into their business. Libertarians are unpopular because some of their policies are deeply unpopular. For example, many libertarians oppose the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because they feel it violates their first amendment rights.
- rayiner 13y ago
  > Privacy advocacy is popular among the upper classes, because they really don't want anyone from the lower classes sticking their noses into their business. That is, in my experience, my friends' only real problem with the TSA (other than the hassle). They hate people with GED's bossing them around.
  - harryh 13y ago
    I think it's also the stupidity. You know you're going through this ordeal that could be easily circumvented by even a moderately clever attacker. It just seems like such a waste.
    - cglace 13y ago
      Just curious. If it could be circumvented by a moderately clever attacker. Why hasn't it been?
      - harryh 13y ago
        Schneier wrote about this here: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/05/why_arent_there.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/05/why_arent_ther...
      - willismichael 13y ago
        http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/1b-of-nude-body-scanners-made-worthless-by-blog-how-anyone-can-get-anything-past-the-tsas-nude-body-scanners/ http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/1b-of-nude-... and the TSA's response: http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/03/viral-video-about-body-scanners.html http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/03/viral-video-about-body-scanners.... Draw your own conclusions.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

cdwhite 13y ago
Kemal. http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n17/perry-anderson/kemalism http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n17/perry-anderson/kemalism. I feel that "dictator", while technically accurate, doesn't have quite the right connotation---his rule didn't have the same totalitarian nature that those of Stalin, Hitler, Hussein, Castro, the Kims, etc. do/did to varying extents. (Or maybe I'm being oversensitive to questions of connotation.)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
garretruh 13y ago
Ataturk. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atatürk#Establishment_of_the_Republic_of_Turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atatürk#Establish...

homosaur 13y ago

You're more of an optimist about the state than I am because I think the only POSSIBLE resolution long term is the dissolution of all state power and moving towards enclaved/anarchistic models. Basically I'm talking about the Diamond Age in real life here. Hell, we already have prototype matter compilers. When an enclave all has 3d manufacturing and scanning down and starts to build their own civilization kits, of what use is the state to anyone aside from starting wars?

leephillips 13y ago

It all depends on the quality of your dictator.

matteodepalo 13y ago

"I've got nothing to hide" isn't the only argument that is used to counter privacy advocates, and I agree that this argument is wrong to some extent. A more valid argument might be that when I think of government agencies looking at data from Google I know I'm just a number, unless they want to investigate, in which case they may look at my personal info. But I have to guess the number of investigated people is pretty low and there must be valid reasons to start an investigation, just like they need a warrant to get inside a house. It would simply be impossible to investigate every one of us in detail.

anigbrowl 13y ago

What is truly a scary thought is if the vast, mindless mass of people easily swayed by consumerism, advertisement and buzz, talk about this for about two weeks and then forget the whole thing, screaming "We have NOTHING to hide!" as a logically flawed and incredibly poor excuse. It won't stay at the top of the news for even two weeks. Most people don't care because a) it doesn't actually affect their lives and b) they actually want government to monitor traffic patterns for potentially suspicious activity. As a society, some 25% of our labor force is engaged in some sort of security activity, not counting police and military. This is arguably a consequence of the fetishization of private property in the US compared to other countries: http://tuvalu.santafe.edu/~bowles/GarrisonAmerica2007.pdf http://tuvalu.santafe.edu/~bowles/GarrisonAmerica2007.pdf a good, conservatively Green or Green Libertarian government is the only path to resolution Er...I think you're going to run into some consistency problems there. United States mass public is uneducated and apathetic (unlike how it used to be 300 years ago Highly questionable. Most people in 1713 were not educated at all and even if we look at the revolutionary period we should remember that wealthy landowners whose writings have come down to use were economically exceptional (eg John dickinson, the 'Penmnsylvanian farmer' who was chided by Alexander Hamilton for implicitly arguing for 'free as in beer - http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=690&chapter=102299&layout=html&Itemid=27 http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfi... and http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=2121&chapter=164944&layout=html&Itemid=27 http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfi... ...please excuse my gross oversimplification, but it's a fact that many colonists saw revolution as a means to get out from under state and private debts owed in England).