Highest Rated Comments


JohnReggae1761 karma

I went to your website and there is a request for me to enter my phone number and email address. Why, in response to surveillance and stolen data, would I trust you with my personal information?

A collection of phone numbers and emails of anti-surveillance dissidents could be exactly the kind of profile-building data that organizations like the NSA are known to backdoor out of organizations like yours. What are your offers of surety against stolen, or backdoored, data?

Are you actually collecting the information of dissidents and radicals for the NSA?

JohnReggae21 karma

I agree: it is a bullshit position to occupy, but a sad necessity given the prevalence of state surveillance.

JohnReggae14 karma

Your position is admirable, yet naive. Totalitarianist governments have a nasty little history of killing dissidents and activists. We don't see the overt effects of this now but given the trajectory of the US autocracy, it is only a matter of time.

It is not about bravery; the metanarrative of "the brave little guy standing up against the evil bad guy" is a type of myth. Despotic and dictatorial governments are not changed by petitions and online activism and phone calls. Propaganda of the deed, only, seems to have an impact. While we are not at the stage of deed propaganda quite yet, it is also only a matter of time. Ideological revolution is a dangerous thing: it is best kept quiet, if serious.

Your position that you are either scared and complicit or brave and bold in the face of rampant state surveillance does not at all account for a third--indeed, multiple--positions. Go ahead and let a murderous and imperialist government know that you stand in objection to their ideology. It is safe for the time being, until the buses and trains are loaded up.