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'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

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Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#32
post #20

"Give me six lines written by the most honorable of men, and I will find an excuse in them to hang him." -- Cardinal Richelieu

This is a huge problem with a surveillance state. Everyone has something which you can use against them. This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail. Otherwise not. Possible implications to politic balance are astounding.

"This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail."

Except that's not the reality. The reality is that if Obama really really hates someone and wants to make their life miserable, the most he can do it make it hard for him to fly (ie. the no-fly list). The government is constrained in what it can do, surveillance and omniscience doesn't change that.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#33
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a huge problem with a surveillance state. Everyone has something which you can use against them. This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail. Otherwise not. Possible implications to politic balance are astounding.

"This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail." Except that's not the reality. The reality is that if Obama really really hates someone and wants to make their life miserable, the most he can do it make it hard for him to fly (ie. the no-fly list). The government is constrained in what it can do, surveillance and omniscience doesn't change that.

   The government is constrained in what it can do
I'm wondering if you consider the existence of Guantanamo, rendition, etc. to be within or outside these constraints.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#34
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a huge problem with a surveillance state. Everyone has something which you can use against them. This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail. Otherwise not. Possible implications to politic balance are astounding.

"This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail." Except that's not the reality. The reality is that if Obama really really hates someone and wants to make their life miserable, the most he can do it make it hard for him to fly (ie. the no-fly list). The government is constrained in what it can do, surveillance and omniscience doesn't change that.

I don't know what rock you've been hiding under, but that's not even close to accurate. Inspections, vague public statements, IRS audits, being followed everywhere, having all your friends "interviewed", being stopped and having your car searched, all your cash confiscated; these things have been used before by the government. As have being killed by a drone.

The Church of Scientology has quite a record of effective harassment, too. They're worth studying for an excellent example of what an NGO can do. http://www.holysmoke.org/cos/harass2.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Game_%28Scientology%29

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#35
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"This means that if you piss off wrong people you're going to jail." Except that's not the reality. The reality is that if Obama really really hates someone and wants to make their life miserable, the most he can do it make it hard for him to fly (ie. the no-fly list). The government is constrained in what it can do, surveillance and omniscience doesn't change that.

The government is constrained in what it can do I'm wondering if you consider the existence of Guantanamo, rendition, etc. to be within or outside these constraints.

I also wish he would finish the sentence by filling in the blank: "The government is constrained in what it can do by _______."

As soon as you realize that "government" is the only thing filling the blank, you should realize how silly (and scary) the whole scenario is.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#36
post #25
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused, you have a verbal reply right below the manga ellipsis.

I had no immediate verbal reply....

Now that you updated the definition it makes a little more sense, but not a lot more since HN is not a creative writing assignment. It was unclear given your initial reply:

"..." would be a quote, albeit an entirely weird one.

"..." is a convention I first found in manga, which indicates a character has no verbal reply to what was previously just said.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#37

So people are willing to tolerate the infinitesimal personal risk of an invasion of privacy by the government in order to diminish the infinitesimal personal risk of a terrorist attack. Not sure what all the fuss is about.

So you don't recognize the difference between one infinitesimal and another? The fact that they may be orders of magnitude difference, thereby implying that the amount of collateral damage may be significantly higher than any benefit to society?

If you are arguing for more government eavesdropping, I would point out that terrorism is a failed political strategy on the decline even without help from government programs.

If you are arguing for less government eavesdropping, I would need to see evidence, first, that there is some sort of real danger. I don't share the libertarian presumption that government is by definition malicious and incompetent.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#38
post #36
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had no immediate verbal reply....

Now that you updated the definition it makes a little more sense, but not a lot more since HN is not a creative writing assignment. It was unclear given your initial reply: "..." would be a quote, albeit an entirely weird one. "..." is a convention I first found in manga, which indicates a character has no verbal reply to what was previously just said.

Yeah, my initial reply failed in a sense because there's no distinction between italicized and plain periods. The first that you quote above was entered as double quote star dot dot dot star double quote, but rendered the same as the second without the stars (asterisks).

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#39
post #35
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government is constrained in what it can do I'm wondering if you consider the existence of Guantanamo, rendition, etc. to be within or outside these constraints.

I also wish he would finish the sentence by filling in the blank: "The government is constrained in what it can do by _______." As soon as you realize that "government" is the only thing filling the blank, you should realize how silly (and scary) the whole scenario is.

Ah, but you can also fill in the blank with "the well armed populace".

Maybe not anyone you know, but at least half of the nation, 300+ million guns and more every day. Heck, 2/3rds of the nation lives in shall issue concealed carry regimes, with well over 8 million licenses granted.

This puts constraints on a would be out of control government. Let us hope we don't have to file a claim on this insurance policy.

Re: 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy [pdf]

#40
post #17

"Give me six lines written by the most honorable of men, and I will find an excuse in them to hang him." -- Cardinal Richelieu

Do you know where that quote is from? Everything I saw seems to indicate it is from 3 musketeers but I could not find it in the project gutenberg edition or the wikisource version

I also tried to find this some time ago. The older attribution I found is from "Guillaume le taciturne et sa dynastie. Histoire des Pays-Bas" (1852)

It's not exact, it goes like this: "Donnez-moi une ligne, disait-il, la plus indifférente de la main d'un homme, et j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre." and it's attributed to Cardinal de Richelieu. It probably has changed in many ways from quotation to quotation, but that is verbatim as I found it in that old book.

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