If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear • Hacker News Board

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#191

Post by polymatter » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 9:57 PM UTC

oneloop wrote: post #53

michaelpinto wrote: post #8

Something that people in silicon valley just don't get is that that the above argument also applies to tech corporations like Google who collect personal data for living and then say "trust us, we'll do no evil". The industry is upset about Snowden because it cost them sales in China, but for the most part while it talks the talk it doesn't walk the walk. * If we're going to talk about WWII a good example would be IB…

I was gonna say that at least in the tech world if you don't like a company you can just not use their products. But then it occurred to me that if you don't like a country you can just move...

> if you don't like a country you can just move...

you know many many people risk their lives under extreme conditions to do exactly that. See Latin Americans trying to get to US or Africans into Europe.

Hell I am in the process of emigrating from one Western country to another, and its an incredibly stressful process with no guarantee of success for me.

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#192

Post by aaronem » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:00 PM UTC

joonoro wrote: post #93

jliptzin wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't understand about it is that the right to bear arms was rooted in the desire to allow citizens to arm themselves against an oppressive government so they could organize an effective overthrow if the need ever arose again (after the revolutionary war). Today, the government's military is so advanced that they'd quickly squash any kind of uprising even if you somehow managed to obtain every legally purchase…

>Today, the government's military is so advanced that they'd quickly squash any kind of uprising even if you somehow managed to obtain every legally purchased firearm in the country. You'd be surprised at how effective guerrilla warfare is.

Only against an occupier unwilling to meet it with measures harsh enough to be effective. Historically speaking, I'd say it is more likely for US military forces to employ such measures against Americans, than against occupied foreign polities; as far as I can think of, we've actually never done the latter, while US history exhibits at least two instances of the former -- the Indian relocation, on the one hand, demonstrating the effectiveness of mass resettlement, and Sherman's March to the Sea, on the other, doing likewise for "scorched earth" techniques and reprisal killings of civilian hostages in response to guerrilla attacks.

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#193

Post by sp332 » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:02 PM UTC

pekk wrote: post #130

crazy1van wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've both bought a gun and gotten married. It definitely took much more government paperwork and time to buy the gun. However, I'm not sure the bureaucracy surrounding either really comes close to "persecution".

Buying a gun really only requires filling out a tiny slip, it took me less than 5 minutes and was not invasive in the least. Maybe this varies between states.

This varies a lot between states. Your description sun's like NH?

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#194

Post by raarts » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:02 PM UTC

higherpurpose wrote: post #12

Something important to note in the OPM data breach: 1.1 million fingerprints were stolen [1], and it would've been a lot more if say this happened 10 years later, and the US, just like Estonia, India and I think a few other countries, started asking their citizens for their fingerprints and stored them in their own databases. When the governments start telling people "Hey, you already love using your fingerprint on t…

> Don't let companies or governments lure you into asking for your fingerprint and storing it for you on their servers "for your convenience".

This is hard. Any entry to the USA for example requires every alien to have their fingerprints taken, and if more and more countries require this there isn't anywhere to go. Another way is needed to stop this practice.

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#195

Post by JoshTriplett » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:04 PM UTC

joshuak wrote: post #92

dmvaldman wrote: post #3

"When you say I don't care about the right to privacy because I have nothing to hide, that is no different than saying I don't care about freedom of speech because I have nothing to say or freedom of the press because I have nothing to write." - Edward Snowden

Also the argument is framed backwards. The question isn't, 'why do I need my privacy'. The question is, 'why do you need to take it'.

That's unfortunately a question they have an answer to. It's a bad answer, and one that needs dismissing as quickly and decisively as possible, but there are people who think some concern they have trumps other people's rights.

The more important question is, "what gives you the right to try to take it, no matter what concern you're professing?".

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#196

Post by jwatte » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:15 PM UTC

Privacy is gone; it's a chimera. Let's focus on building a society where we use openness for the common good instead! E.g. don't let some people still try to hide because they consider themselves "special." Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#197

Post by DanBC » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:24 PM UTC

aaronem wrote: post #188

DanBC wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a man break into my home when I was there. He got in through the roof, going up scaffolding on a derelict building next door. I offered him a cup of tea, and told him it would probably be safer for him to leave via my front door and down the stairs rather than back down the scaffolding. He declined the tea, but I went and made one for myself and called the police. He went back out the way he'd come in. The poli…

That's nice, especially since he didn't have one of the very many knives which are, I gather from the news, such a perennial problem in your neck of the woods. Here's hoping you stay lucky!

Knife crime is rare in UK. Stats are skewed by gang violence in Glasgow, some parts of Manchester, and London.

I never fear knife crime in my small town (pop approx 100,000).

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#198

Post by alan_cx » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:32 PM UTC

The title alone is misleading. It presupposes that its wrong to have something to hide. I have plenty I'd prefer to be hidden, none of it illegal.

Whats so damned wrong with having things to hide? Discretion used to be a virtue. What happened?

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#199

Post by matroosberg » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:47 PM UTC

67726e wrote: post #77

rorykoehler wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't understand about the want to have freedom to bare arms (aside from moral arguments about what high levels of gun ownership does to society, but let's not go there) is that the only time I can imagine needing a gun in life is during a time of civil war or some similar sort of uprising. It would not make any difference to me what the law was in this regard if lawlessness had already broken out and I feared…

Or when someone breaks into your apartment and the police have an average response time of, what, 10 minutes or so? How about when you pull over to assist a crashed motorcyclist and it turns out he's a DUI-case and attempts to car-jack you? How about when you see someone waltz into your neighbors backyard and kick in the door? All things that have happened to either myself, or a coworker in the past year. Is it unrea…

Yes, it is unreasonable to want a gun for this situation because you only escalate the situation with a gun present.

Carrying a gun increases your risk to get shot: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17922-carrying-a-gun-i... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2759797/

Saying that the cat is out of the bag so you need a gun is cold war logic were you need to be able to kill the other more times. So you rather want to escalate the situation further instead of trying e.g., what Australia did by implementing gun control?

Re: If you've nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear

#200

Post by innguest » Sat, Jul 11, 2015, 10:54 PM UTC

rorykoehler wrote: post #148

67726e wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or when someone breaks into your apartment and the police have an average response time of, what, 10 minutes or so? How about when you pull over to assist a crashed motorcyclist and it turns out he's a DUI-case and attempts to car-jack you? How about when you see someone waltz into your neighbors backyard and kick in the door? All things that have happened to either myself, or a coworker in the past year. Is it unrea…

My personal experiences in some of the cases you have mentioned. 2 times house break, both times I confronted the burglars with a kitchen knife and gave them an avenue to escape which they took. I would never want to kill someone because they tried take my property. It's just stuff and quite frankly I value human life much higher, even if it is the life of a criminal who is taking my things. The fact that there are s…

Is that the advice you'd give to a 5'5" woman who lives alone? "When the attacker gets in your house, grab a kitchen knife"?

'Cause I'd say, grab a shotgun and shoot in their general direction.

Good for you that as a brave man called Rory it's easy to get rid of invaders with a kitchen knife. You'll probably have the same results with a fake knife.