Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us • Hacker News Board

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#131

Post by vacri » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 2:54 PM UTC

anon1385 wrote: post #9

brador wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people now feel patriotic to ideals than imaginary lines drawn thousands of years ago. It's an interesting shift, and in some ways was started by the US having a constitution (set of ideals) as it's foundation rather than a particular leader, king, or ruler.

Nationalism is a relatively modern phenomenon. The founding of the US was part of the rise of Nationalism. The idea that your nation (I assume you are american?) represents 'higher ideals' than others is rather nationalistic don't you think? From wikipedia: With the emergence of a public sphere and integrated economy in the 18th century, a broader sense of identification with one's country began to permeate society.…

Nationalism is a relatively modern phenomenon.

How do the ancient Spartans not count as a prime example of nationalism? They had a very clear self-identity aligning with their nation.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#132

Post by philwelch » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 2:56 PM UTC

uxp wrote: post #126

philwelch wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Its all "USA, USA, USA". (Which, BTW, sounds to many non Americans like "Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil". We even see the the fist punching the air, which again looks a bit like a Nazi salute. If Americans reading this can change one single thing, please stop that. It a very scary thing to see. Or do average Americans know this already, and like it as much as the Germans did?) I hardly ever hear the "USA" chant ou…

> I hardly ever hear the "USA" chant outside of sporting competitions Watch some of the videos from gatherings and rallies leading up to last years presidential election. Anytime any single heckler tried to make a scene, they were immediately drowned out with the "USA!" chant. As a US citizen it's embarrassing and frankly, idiotic.

I guess I don't watch enough political rallies. Ugh.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#133

Post by crusso » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 2:56 PM UTC

sounds wrote: post #60

obviouslygreen wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We, the people, chose leaders and were betrayed. That doesn't just apply to the US... Absolutely true. Unfortunately, in my opinion, one of the things that simply does not work in modern democracy is the election system, two-party death march or otherwise: Candidates play to emotion and often outright lie or intentionally overpromise solely for the purpose of attaining office. And it works, every damn time. They then…

No, the ability to choose the outcome is still well and truly in our hands. I didn't say when or where, but I do believe that the power to govern invariably flows from the people themselves.

Nah, it's too late. The USA is no longer what it was relative to the rest of the world. It still has the same flag, but the understanding of the importance of Liberty is largely gone.

200+ years ago, a large portion of the population would rather die than be dictated to by an implacable and uncaring confiscatory government. Today the population doesn't even realize what they're missing because they have really good cable television, video games, and reality shows.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#134

Post by andrewcooke » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:00 PM UTC

obviouslygreen wrote: post #50

This outrage at American reactions is terribly hypocritical. Yes, people -- regardless of nationality -- should be upset when they realize their privacy is being grossly violated without cause, by any government. However, people seem to think Americans should be more concerned about other people's rights than their own, when the real problem is the violation of everyone's rights. Despite this, all anyone is really in…

what you're missing (are you american?) is that most countries generally don't make the distinction between their own people and others. laws typically apply to everyone.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#135

Post by vacri » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:00 PM UTC

throwit1979 wrote: post #96

This is going to be a little inflammatory but it's true. Why I will never take seriously foreigners' reactions to our wars, surveillance, human rights violations, etc: You people, and the governments and central banks who represent you, keep buying our debt and financing all of this. The US Government would be incapable of funding these programs and wars at low cost without YOU stepping up to the plate every single a…

I can't ever recall seeing 'buy US debt' pitched as an election issue, though it's nice of you to shift the blame to people who generally wouldn't understand what you're even talking about, let alone be aware of it going on.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#136

Post by uxp » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:00 PM UTC

TimJRobinson wrote: post #102

Derbasti wrote: post #59

The sad thing is, we don't have international law for these things. Thus, it is usually easier to ask a foreign intelligence agency if they could spy on a domestic suspect than to deal with it within the country. And this hurts so much, because the internet is perceived to not be bound by countries and borders, while still residing mostly on US soil. But the rules for spying are most certainly governed by borders; Th…

Some kind of peer to peer encrypted data storage system (think bitcoin for data) would go a long way towards solving this. You could give sub keys to sites that want to access some of this data and because it's encrypted, distributed and peer to peer no one owns it and you control your data. Yes this would be crazy with todays infrastructure but in 10 - 20 years when internet is as previlent as electricity and everyo…

How is this any different than hosting your own federated OpenID service? Hell, I'm basically doing this already with XMPP, Email and a blog, but not OpenID because it's not as prevalent as it could be. This is already a solved problem that doesn't take terabytes of storage space. Though, like any common service or protocol, it could be more secure.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#137

Post by nnq » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:02 PM UTC

Nothing will change until all Americans get it once and for all that the attitude of being at war with the world and planning to win at all cost is actually opposite to being competitive and fighting hard to be the best in the world.

We the foreigners that buy into the american dream always think of the latter as the "american attitude" whereas US gov and corporations always go for the first. And they only coincide in very restricted contexts, basically in fewer and fewer contexts as the world changes and becomes more homogeneous. To "win the war" when you're well above everyone else tends to equate to playing fair most of the time, you just use what you have and what you have is always better so you always win, but when the economical and cultural ground levels, if your goal is still to "win the war", you end up playing dirty and forgetting about human rights and values.

...the USA's attitude will only change when they wake tf up and realize that there is now war to be won, it's just about competing in a healthy "jungle". The current US gov's attitude to everything seems to us foreigners similar to your classical story of the PTSDd Vietnam war veteran that gets home after the war and keeps fighting imaginary wars, butchering his family and blowing up the neighborhood in the process, just because that's all he's good at.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#138

Post by UVB-76 » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:05 PM UTC

Roritharr wrote: post #49

UVB-76 wrote: post #39

I was going to write a comment to this effect on one of the many threads related to this subject, but figured it would fall on deaf ears. Americans should not underestimate the damage this scandal has done to the American 'brand'. Growing up, I was the Americophile of my friends. I loved American culture, I aspired to live the American dream, I fully intended to pursue American citizenship later in life. This is only…

Without wanting to sound alarmist, but I feel exactly the same way. I've abandoned my intentions of living in the US, or even just visiting there solely because of this scandal. Not because of some deeply hurt morale or feeling, but because i simply wouldn't feel safe in the US anymore. I've been on the web for a very long time now, have read all kinds of chemistry, pyrotechnics and bomb-making newsgroups and website…

> I've abandoned my intentions of living in the US, or even just visiting there solely because of this scandal. Not because of some deeply hurt morale or feeling, but because i simply wouldn't feel safe in the US anymore.

This is more a case of the straw that broke the camel's back for me, but I consider it a watershed moment nonetheless.

Privacy is a fundamental human right, enshrined in Article 8 of the ECHR, and one that I value dearly. Now it emerges the United States has been willingly violating my right to privacy for years.

Rather than rectifying the matter, officials are saying it's okay because I'm not a US citizen — non-citizens obviously aren't entitled to human rights — and focusing their attention on punishing the person responsible for bringing this to my attention.

That is unforgivable in my eyes.

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#139

Post by crusso » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:06 PM UTC

philwelch wrote: post #130

crusso wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It demonstrated that they had the right ideals but were unable to put them into practice in one fell swoop. As Lincoln pointed out - the framework of the Declaration was an ideal to be pursued. The Founders' wisdom in what they put into motion necessitated the eventual end of slavery. There's a big difference between moving toward the Declaration as an ideal as we still were in the time from the Founding until the ea…

Some of the Founders more than others. While many of them came from the North, where there were no slaves and slavery was generally unpopular, and some of the others like Washington and Jefferson held slaves but felt bad about it, there was a large enough contingent of Southern politicians who just plain favored slavery and had to be politically negotiated with. If you define "the Founders" as "everyone who attended…

Agreed. There will never be 100% admirable behavior in any person or political body.

The amazing thing about the Founders, though, was that the admirable forces were able to write the documents.

Compare that to today's "gang of eight" senators who created the immigration bill. That thing was a disaster before they had their first meeting. They had a unique chance to create solid immigration law, but have f'd it up beyond all reasoning.

The Founding documents were philosophical and political works of art. Where are works such as they coming form in today's society? Where are they being enacted into law?

Re: Why discussions on cyber snooping have been so painful for us

#140

Post by dasil003 » Sat, Jun 29, 2013, 3:13 PM UTC

cpursley wrote: post #115

dasil003 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure I see how this is germane. Are you saying your geography is good, but your statistics are absolute shite?

I'm saying from general interactions with American neighbors, people on the street and my own family, they don't know geography. Mine's not great - pretty elementary compared to the rest of the world.

Okay obviously my reply went right over your head so I'll give it to you straight: neither you nor the GP has any basis to make that claim. In another reply actual data was presented showing that American ignorance of basic geographical facts is nowhere near 95%.