5 ms·

> I've heard quite a lot of people that talk about post-privacy, and they talk about it in terms of feeling like, you know, it's too late, we're done for, there

> I've heard quite a lot of people that talk about post-privacy, and they talk about it in terms of feeling like, you know, it's too late, we're done for, there's just no possibility for privacy left anymore and we just have to get used to it. And this is a pretty fascinating thing, because it seems to me that you never hear a feminist say that we're post-consent because there is rape. And why is that? The reason is that it's bullshit. > We can't have a post-privacy world until we're post-privilege. So when we cave in our autonomy, then we can sort of say, "well, okay, we don't need privacy anymore, in fact we don't have privacy anymore, and I'm okay with that." Realistically though people are not comfortable with that. Because, if you only look at it from a position of privilege, like, say, white man on a stage, then yeah, maybe post-privacy works out okay for those people. But if you have ever not been, or if you are currently not, a white man with a passport from one of the five good nations in the world, it might not really work out well for you, and in fact it might be designed specifically such that it will continue to not work out well for you, because the structures themselves produce these inequalities. > So when you hear someone talk about post-privacy, I think it's really important to engage them about their own privilege in the system and what it is they are actually arguing for. -- Jacob Appelbaum ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3h46EbqhPo&t=7m46s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3h46EbqhPo&t=7m46s )

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
Post-privilege is impossible by definition in any society where scarcity exists. Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance, the term "privilege" will simply be shifted to more nebulous concepts. Finally, the conclusion that reaching post-privilege will result in a feasible post-privacy does not follow at all. What, is the implication here that white men "on stages" have nothing to hide? I don't get it. Leave it to some people to turn a human rights issue into an identity politics issue.
- PavlovsCat 11y ago
  > Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance, the term "privilege" will simply be shifted to more nebulous concepts. Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. > Finally, the conclusion that reaching post-privilege will result in a feasible post-privacy does not follow at all. From the claim that a post-privacy society would have to be post-privilege does not follow that all post privilege societes have to be post-privacy. Right now, when people say "no privacy", that in practice means zero privacy for some or most people, and total opaqueness for others (e.g. the NSA, or people who can make things go away with bribes, etc.). It doesn't actually mean "no privacy for anyone". For that to be the case, society would have to be actually egalitarian, e.g. post-privilege. > What, is the implication here that white men "on stages" have nothing to hide? They don't get killed by drones for starters. Appelbaum lives in Berlin because he feels safer there than in the US IIRC, it's not like he doesn't have spook pressure in his life; but he still considers himself privileged, imagine that. If someone says homeless alcoholics should be rounded up and put into camps, then the fact that they aren't that, and don't have a friend in that situation, is their "privilege" they may not be aware of. That has nothing to do with "identitiy politics" to me. And I don't see how that is nebulous either? "Privilege" is not a complicated word, it means what it means in context and is perfectly fine to use.
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. We have. The question of how to eliminate "class privilege" has remained open for quite a while and will for as long as the optimal distribution of scarce resources is still an active field of study. It doesn't actually mean "no privacy for anyone". For that to be the case, society would have to be actually egalitarian, e.g. post-privilege. You're delving into Foucault territory here, which is fine but also somewhat tangential. Of course the people doing the spying and the people who fund it will be less affected (but maybe not with the bad state of infosec), that's a given where any power structure is involved. How would egalitarianism fix this? I think you're operating under a wholly different definition of egalitarianism than is commonly accepted. The only way to solve your dilemma is through a stateless society with a totally flat hierarchy with a method of economic exchange that doesn't involve a market system, or any mechanism that awards having more information. They don't get killed by drones for starters. Not yet. If someone says homeless alcoholics should be rounded up and put into camps, then the fact that they aren't that, and don't have a friend in that situation, is their "privilege" they may not be aware of. That's just asymmetry. You can just as easily have it be an oppressed group calling for the internment of a dominant group, which by definition they will not be a part of, and may not even be in contact with if there are factors like apartheid put into play. Calling it "privilege" makes no sense. "Privilege" is not a complicated word, it means what it means in context and is perfectly fine to use. The sociological concept of privilege is in fact an inversion of what we generally call a privilege. Sociological privilege often refers to constant and immutable characteristics that cannot be taken away, and moreover makes the value judgment that the group with privilege is bad, and that said privilege must be abolished. This is totally ass-backwards: it should be that the disadvantaged group is elevated to the same level of privilege, because more often than not (excluding class) "privilege" simply refers to the baseline that preferably all groups should be held to.
    - PavlovsCat 11y ago
      > We have. No; you said "Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance", I say, let's do that first, even though it may never be perfect. Unless you're saying "acceptance" itself is some kind of scarce resource? Of course, it's not a great consolation to say "everybody should have access to clean drinking water", but it's a start, kind of the pre-requisite to do anything about it. > Of course the people doing the spying and the people who fund it will be less affected (but maybe not with the bad state of infosec), that's a given where any power structure is involved. Call it privilege or structure of power, does it really make a crucial difference? > How would egalitarianism fix this? I think you're operating under a wholly different definition of egalitarianism than is commonly accepted. Yeah, mine is the one a Kindergarten child might have: people striving to be fair to one another. Doesn't make everyone the same, doesn't change genetics, but it's still a neat concept. > Not yet. Doesn't change the point. > That's just asymmetry. You can just as easily have it be an oppressed group calling for the internment of a dominant group, which by definition they will not be a part of, and may not even be in contact with if there are factors like apartheid put into play. Calling it "privilege" makes no sense. Look, whatever. It's still just a word. Call it asymmetry or inequality or structures of power or privilege. It means what it means in the context of people arguing for mass surveillance because they themselves either aren't or think they aren't affected negatively. If you want to talk about some abstract unrelated stuff I'm not interested. > This is totally ass-backwards: it should be that the disadvantaged group is elevated to the same level of privilege, because more often than not (excluding class) "privilege" simply refers to the baseline that preferably all groups should be held to. ... and because everybody has it ass-backwards, feminists are clamouring for men to be groped all the time? I'm of a mind to just delete my comments to get out of this, this is leading nowhere and adding nothing.
zxcvcxz 11y ago
What are his ideas to 'fix' the system?
- PavlovsCat 11y ago
  That's a big question about someone who gives a lot of talks: https://www.youtube.com/results?filters=long&search_query=jacob+appelbaum https://www.youtube.com/results?filters=long&search_query=ja...
lookbothways 11y ago
Man, if there ever was an instance of alienating a sympathetic audience, this would be it. How does one take a golden argument like "privacy is an inalienable right," turn it into a tired "you should be ashamed for being white, check your privilege shitlord" flamebait, and still get taken seriously?
- glesica 11y ago
  > you should be ashamed for being white, check your privilege shitlord You had to work pretty damn hard to get this out of that quote. His point was that a lot of people who say they (and by extension society, this part is important) don't need privacy probably don't need privacy because their privilege protects them. So then the goal has to be to convince them that their privileged position makes them a special case, and that they should care about the unprivileged. It isn't just white people who have privilege, that's just an example. This general idea really isn't controversial, but the terminology elicits very strong negative reactions in people for some reason (I honestly don't understand it). If I pointed out that the TSA screens darker-skinned people with extra vigor, often inconveniencing those people, most people would agree with me. If I then said that I don't care about this issue because I'm white, so I breeze through TSA checkpoints without any problems, many people would tell me I should be a little more considerate of others. But if I call myself "privileged" in this instance then all of a sudden people would be whining about social justice warriors or something like that. Very strange.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - aaronem 11y ago
    > But if I call myself "privileged" in this instance then all of a sudden people would be whining about social justice warriors or something like that No one has ever managed successfully to divorce the concept of privilege from the implication of blame, so saying that someone has privilege (or, worse in this context, is privileged), is tantamount to saying that they're a bad person and they should feel bad. Is it any wonder there's pushback? Whether privilege and blame should be so inextricably linked is a separate discussion, and one I've seen from time to time in progressive circles. But, to people who aren't deeply enough immersed in such circles to be familiar with all the theory around the concept, that's how it comes across.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago

Post-privilege is impossible by definition in any society where scarcity exists. Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance, the term "privilege" will simply be shifted to more nebulous concepts. Finally, the conclusion that reaching post-privilege will result in a feasible post-privacy does not follow at all. What, is the implication here that white men "on stages" have nothing to hide? I don't get it. Leave it to some people to turn a human rights issue into an identity politics issue.

PavlovsCat 11y ago
> Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance, the term "privilege" will simply be shifted to more nebulous concepts. Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. > Finally, the conclusion that reaching post-privilege will result in a feasible post-privacy does not follow at all. From the claim that a post-privacy society would have to be post-privilege does not follow that all post privilege societes have to be post-privacy. Right now, when people say "no privacy", that in practice means zero privacy for some or most people, and total opaqueness for others (e.g. the NSA, or people who can make things go away with bribes, etc.). It doesn't actually mean "no privacy for anyone". For that to be the case, society would have to be actually egalitarian, e.g. post-privilege. > What, is the implication here that white men "on stages" have nothing to hide? They don't get killed by drones for starters. Appelbaum lives in Berlin because he feels safer there than in the US IIRC, it's not like he doesn't have spook pressure in his life; but he still considers himself privileged, imagine that. If someone says homeless alcoholics should be rounded up and put into camps, then the fact that they aren't that, and don't have a friend in that situation, is their "privilege" they may not be aware of. That has nothing to do with "identitiy politics" to me. And I don't see how that is nebulous either? "Privilege" is not a complicated word, it means what it means in context and is perfectly fine to use.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. We have. The question of how to eliminate "class privilege" has remained open for quite a while and will for as long as the optimal distribution of scarce resources is still an active field of study. It doesn't actually mean "no privacy for anyone". For that to be the case, society would have to be actually egalitarian, e.g. post-privilege. You're delving into Foucault territory here, which is fine but also somewhat tangential. Of course the people doing the spying and the people who fund it will be less affected (but maybe not with the bad state of infosec), that's a given where any power structure is involved. How would egalitarianism fix this? I think you're operating under a wholly different definition of egalitarianism than is commonly accepted. The only way to solve your dilemma is through a stateless society with a totally flat hierarchy with a method of economic exchange that doesn't involve a market system, or any mechanism that awards having more information. They don't get killed by drones for starters. Not yet. If someone says homeless alcoholics should be rounded up and put into camps, then the fact that they aren't that, and don't have a friend in that situation, is their "privilege" they may not be aware of. That's just asymmetry. You can just as easily have it be an oppressed group calling for the internment of a dominant group, which by definition they will not be a part of, and may not even be in contact with if there are factors like apartheid put into play. Calling it "privilege" makes no sense. "Privilege" is not a complicated word, it means what it means in context and is perfectly fine to use. The sociological concept of privilege is in fact an inversion of what we generally call a privilege. Sociological privilege often refers to constant and immutable characteristics that cannot be taken away, and moreover makes the value judgment that the group with privilege is bad, and that said privilege must be abolished. This is totally ass-backwards: it should be that the disadvantaged group is elevated to the same level of privilege, because more often than not (excluding class) "privilege" simply refers to the baseline that preferably all groups should be held to.
  - PavlovsCat 11y ago
    > We have. No; you said "Even if various identities are all elevated to an equal level of acceptance", I say, let's do that first, even though it may never be perfect. Unless you're saying "acceptance" itself is some kind of scarce resource? Of course, it's not a great consolation to say "everybody should have access to clean drinking water", but it's a start, kind of the pre-requisite to do anything about it. > Of course the people doing the spying and the people who fund it will be less affected (but maybe not with the bad state of infosec), that's a given where any power structure is involved. Call it privilege or structure of power, does it really make a crucial difference? > How would egalitarianism fix this? I think you're operating under a wholly different definition of egalitarianism than is commonly accepted. Yeah, mine is the one a Kindergarten child might have: people striving to be fair to one another. Doesn't make everyone the same, doesn't change genetics, but it's still a neat concept. > Not yet. Doesn't change the point. > That's just asymmetry. You can just as easily have it be an oppressed group calling for the internment of a dominant group, which by definition they will not be a part of, and may not even be in contact with if there are factors like apartheid put into play. Calling it "privilege" makes no sense. Look, whatever. It's still just a word. Call it asymmetry or inequality or structures of power or privilege. It means what it means in the context of people arguing for mass surveillance because they themselves either aren't or think they aren't affected negatively. If you want to talk about some abstract unrelated stuff I'm not interested. > This is totally ass-backwards: it should be that the disadvantaged group is elevated to the same level of privilege, because more often than not (excluding class) "privilege" simply refers to the baseline that preferably all groups should be held to. ... and because everybody has it ass-backwards, feminists are clamouring for men to be groped all the time? I'm of a mind to just delete my comments to get out of this, this is leading nowhere and adding nothing.

zxcvcxz 11y ago

What are his ideas to 'fix' the system?

PavlovsCat 11y ago
That's a big question about someone who gives a lot of talks: https://www.youtube.com/results?filters=long&search_query=jacob+appelbaum https://www.youtube.com/results?filters=long&search_query=ja...

lookbothways 11y ago

Man, if there ever was an instance of alienating a sympathetic audience, this would be it. How does one take a golden argument like "privacy is an inalienable right," turn it into a tired "you should be ashamed for being white, check your privilege shitlord" flamebait, and still get taken seriously?

glesica 11y ago
> you should be ashamed for being white, check your privilege shitlord You had to work pretty damn hard to get this out of that quote. His point was that a lot of people who say they (and by extension society, this part is important) don't need privacy probably don't need privacy because their privilege protects them. So then the goal has to be to convince them that their privileged position makes them a special case, and that they should care about the unprivileged. It isn't just white people who have privilege, that's just an example. This general idea really isn't controversial, but the terminology elicits very strong negative reactions in people for some reason (I honestly don't understand it). If I pointed out that the TSA screens darker-skinned people with extra vigor, often inconveniencing those people, most people would agree with me. If I then said that I don't care about this issue because I'm white, so I breeze through TSA checkpoints without any problems, many people would tell me I should be a little more considerate of others. But if I call myself "privileged" in this instance then all of a sudden people would be whining about social justice warriors or something like that. Very strange.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- aaronem 11y ago
  > But if I call myself "privileged" in this instance then all of a sudden people would be whining about social justice warriors or something like that No one has ever managed successfully to divorce the concept of privilege from the implication of blame, so saying that someone has privilege (or, worse in this context, is privileged), is tantamount to saying that they're a bad person and they should feel bad. Is it any wonder there's pushback? Whether privilege and blame should be so inextricably linked is a separate discussion, and one I've seen from time to time in progressive circles. But, to people who aren't deeply enough immersed in such circles to be familiar with all the theory around the concept, that's how it comes across.