I'll just give the most powerful example for this. So this study shows that there's basically little difference between people searching for privacy tools now and before Snowden, right?
Okay, except pre-Snowden there's no way something like the Patriot Act wouldn't have been renewed again. Why has it failed to be renewed now then? Because many people do care about privacy and have called their Congressmen to act accordingly.
I'm also seeing much more interest in end-to-end encrypted apps. Pre-Snowden few knew about "end-to-end encryption" and what that means. I'm seeing many more comments online with people asking about it.
I think the biggest issue is that people feel "overpowered", so the solution usually becomes inaction. In other words it's not "I don't care about privacy" - it's "I don't care about privacy enough to learn to use complicated new tools or radically change my behavior online...but if you give me easy to use strong encryption, especially in the apps I'm already using, I'm happy to use it."
Let's assume sending (snail) mail wasn't secure, but pigeon messaging was. People wouldn't refuse to use pigeon messaging because "they don't care about privacy". They wouldn't do it because it's too complicated and too much of a hassle.
This is why convincing platforms and service providers to use strong encryption by default is so important.