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We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

thenexus.media

671–680 of 727 posts

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#671
post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but its a boiling frog with cancer. Certain states made choices to skew far right and other states mde choices to "keep business open" and others made choices to remain ignorant. This becomes diffusion of responsibility because every cycle maybe 1% were directly embracing far white religious authoritarian. The consistency of those choices were sticky because the oligarchy spent decades ensuring. The point being…

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The current difference in the US context is bureaucratic authoritarianism vs autocratic authoritarianism. They're both authoritarian, and they're both oppressive and stifling. But their actual specific dynamics/mechanisms/effects can be quite different. For example autocratic authoritarianism has a much higher variance (for better and for worse) - look at the current autocrat in the White House coming up with idiotic ideas by the week/month, It's done in the name of unchaining greatness, and it would be nice if that were indeed the outcome. But in reality the chaos from the unrestrained terrible ideas is actually quite stifling. Whereas bureaucratic authoritarianism is more of a beige tyranny of the mediocre, which creates a drag on greatness, but at least provides a stable foundation for building on (as long as you can outrun the bureaucrats)

(disclaimer: I've gotten more conservative as I've gotten older. It will happen to you, too)

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#673

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you not use a browser to access banking services? If not, you should vehemently complain and/or move to another bank. And while cash is better for privacy, you can always use a credit card instead of your phone.

You may be able to at the moment, but web banking is being increasingly phased out in a lot of countries.

If nothing else works, my suggestion would then be to buy a cheap Android phone just for that indispensable banking app. Just leave it home in a drawer powered off when not in use, and use your a degoogled phone for your daily business.

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#674

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> afraid something will happen to them Because of what, the decrease in crime?

Crime stats, especially for violent crime, are relevant to us, not them. Their wealth, status, and/or insurance policies generally require security details and precautions that insulate most “public” activity from random acts of violent crime. However, the former UHC CEO’s death is an example of the sort of singular, and targeted, crime that does strike fear. However, the comment you’re replying to is alluding to the…

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Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#675

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can always move to new town and start again. The problem with all these social credit systems is that they're designed to follow you wherever you go forever. There is also zero recourse if a mistake was made; at least you can try and smooth things over with a bartender.

The bartender also doesn't sell your behavioral profile to every other bar in town. I mean, unless you're a total asshole and it's a small town, but then they tend to volunteer it.

but the Stripe or Square credit card reader you use to pay for drinks does ["but I use Apple Pay ...."].

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#676

The issue is that American media/discourse paints a very distorted view of what life under authoritarian rule is like. The truth is in many countries, unless you’re some kind of minority, politically active, or in legal trouble, day-to-day life is mostly similar to life in the west. But people don’t want to hear that, because we want to feel better than them. Like we wouldn’t tolerate that kind of life. Of course the…

> The truth is in many countries...day-to-day life is mostly similar to life in the west. That's true right up until your infallible dear leader invades your neighboring country, fails, and rapidly starts ratcheting down social controls in a desperate attempt to preserve political stability. I don't think Russians would describe day-to-day life as "mostly similar to the west" anymore. China could be next.

Russians support Putin on average.

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#677

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may be able to at the moment, but web banking is being increasingly phased out in a lot of countries.

If nothing else works, my suggestion would then be to buy a cheap Android phone just for that indispensable banking app. Just leave it home in a drawer powered off when not in use, and use your a degoogled phone for your daily business.

My bank recently asked me to "re-identify" due to regulations about fraud and me being a customer for more than five years.

Rather than asking me to come into a building in real life, the asked me to:

- download yet another app

- make a picture of my id card (front and back)

- hold my id card to bank of phone

- show my face in the front camera

This process got stuck in step 3, because my phone has no RFC support.

The morale? So much for using a cheap Android phone just for that indispensable banking app.

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#678

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You seem to think awfully highly of your ability to reason about the world, but I find your claim to be fairly lacking. This all reads like the ramblings of a 19 year old who just discovered Chomsky. Address the argument rather than engaging in ad hominem.

Show me the Americans stuck in a black hole where nobody processes their payment, banks won't handle their money, they can't vote, they can't travel, etc. because of their deviations? There are total nutjobs of all walks that are living just fine. There are actual Nazis and commies living just fine. It's a big country. If our whole society already has dystopian social credit it should be easy to find examples.

Banks talk to each other via ChexSystems/EWS and stick Americans in a black hole where nobody processes their payments and banks won't handle their money. Felons don't have voting rights in 48 states. As far as travel is concerned, being imprisoned makes that hard, but no, we don't (yet) have internal border checks that prevent people from moving from place to place, other than the fact that it's expensive.

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#679
post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> getting up in a public square in the US and yelling that Trump is a terrible person who should be removed from power I think lot of people I know would feel concerned about what might happen to them if they did that right about now. I don't pretend to know anything about you, but it might be worth examining whether the level of concern you expect people would have about this might vary quite between people with dif…

If I did that, I would expect that I would get some dirty looks. I might get yelled at. I might even get beaten up (by private individuals, not by the authorities). The cops might come by and cite me for disturbing the peace. I would not be disappeared. I would not be charged with a felony. I would not be imprisoned for years or decades. And, where the rubber meets the road for my personal mental health: I can say wh…

In the 90's, DARE got kids to narc on their parents for drug related crimes. You can discount that as being drug related and oh just don't do drugs, but let's not pretend you're not gonna get reported to the unsecret police called the DEA or the FBI if it would be sufficiently to your friends and family's benefit.

Re: We already live in social credit, we just don't call it that

#680
post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is US being a good place to be at if you are in legal trouble? It is super expensive, trial penalty is huge so you are severely motivated to sign plea deal and not push it. The punishments are huge and incarceration rates among highest in the world. Protections seems to be largely theoretical - technically you have them, practically they do not do much but make you pay more money.

"It's super expensive" is still different from "you disappear". Yes, the US system is flawed, but the difference really matters.

People have started being disappeared by ICE. They've been kidnapped off the streets with no access to a lawyer until after. The difference does matter, but it seems we're uncomfortably close to there now.
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