I think the fight against mass surveillance needs first to be lost in order to even start. Right now the average citizen has not witnessed an impact on his life and there's no shortage of other problems he has to deal with.
I'm not saying techies should just stay passive though. Special cases - journalists, activists, politically involved - need to be protected right now, and when the problem will be generally understood we need to have solutions ready for the average person: information, software, proposed legislation, etc.
We already live in a world where surveillance changed the way people think and act, causing us to suppress non-conformist opinions.
It is why mass surveillance exist in the first place, to foster collective conformity.
Unfortunately we are prone to accept authoritarianism these days. The more economical and ecological uncertainties there are the more we desire order and stability, no matter the cost. For many having to look the other way is a small price to pay.
> We already live in a world where surveillance changed the way people think and act, causing us to suppress non-conformist opinions.
I don't see many people suppressing non-conformist opinions anywhere. Rather, I see people defiantly shouting their non-conformist opinions from the rooftops at every opportunity. Spend an hour on Twitter or Facebook and tell me anyone is suppressing any of their radical hot takes on anything.
Disinformation and propaganda don't yield democratic resilience, usually there is an authority figure behind them and believers who conform for the certainty, stability, simplicity. These opinions don't require privacy, on the contrary they depend on the network effect.
I'm talking about things like how the ethic of responsibility and academic freedom is in decline. For example when it comes to mass surveillance computer scientists and cryptographers are culpable.
"A creeping surveillance that grows organically in the public and private sectors, that becomes increasingly comprehensive, entwined, and predictive, that becomes an instrument for assasination, political control, and the maintenance of power - well, this vision doesn't merely seem possible, it seems to be happening before our eyes."
> Spend an hour on Twitter or Facebook and tell me anyone is suppressing any of their radical hot takes on anything.
Just because the street corner is still populated by the crazies shouting about the end times, doesn't meant ordinary people aren't suppressing their own opinions around the water cooler.
Chances are any non-conformist beliefs you have (assuming they're legal,) have their own subreddits, Twitter tags, Facebook groups, Youtube videos, etc, so that's probably just you.
Most of these are anonymous platforms where people are unafraid to speak their mind due to that anonymity. Also the existence of loud people on these platforms isn't evidence that the number of people self-censoring hasn't increased. A small, loud group of people is enough to create the effect that you see.
Polling suggests that the number of people self-censoring has increased. It's especially common among college educated conservatives, who are in tune with what they're supposed to think and also aware that their thoughts do not line up with that, and so decide to keep quiet on political questions, probably because they have more to lose career-wise.
It is circumstantial evidence, but I wouldn't expect an increase in radical activity on social media to occur in a society in which most people are afraid to express their views due to fear of omnipresent surveillance. Some people are self-suppressing, a lot of people aren't.
And what is it that people are afraid to say? That they only believe in two genders, or innate gender roles? That the US should return to the gold standard? That they don't trust the consensus on COVID vaccinations? Most people's "radical" beliefs aren't that radical, and the truly radical beliefs (white supremacy, anti-semitism, violent revolutionary ideology, pro-pedophilia) have always been suppressed by society, so the existence of the surveillance state changes nothing in those cases.
>It's especially common among college educated conservatives, who are in tune with what they're supposed to think and also aware that their thoughts do not line up with that, and so decide to keep quiet on political questions, probably because they have more to lose career-wise.
I'm not aware of any mainstream Conservative beliefs that are suppressed in general discourse, or that would lead someone to lose their job. I don't think many people have ever been fired for believing in limited government or the free market. Conservatives have an entire political party and half a country that supports and welcomes their beliefs, and plenty of businesses that would hire them because of those beliefs.
The danger of surveillance is that it changes the power dynamics, which creates a risk of discrimination, blackmail and persuasion. It also interferes with our intellectial freedom. It hinders us at experimenting with new or controversial ideas. It can cause us to not exercise our civil liberties.
Not exactly a wonder that autocratic regimes are among the worst offenders of state surveillance. The recurrent purpose of surveillance is to control behavior.
Intellectual privacy is an important part of intellectual diversity and individuality. Basically it allows culture and values to be generated from the bottom up, rather than from the top down. The fear of being watched causes people to act and think differently from the way they might otherwise. Surveillance fails to respect the line between public and private actors as well.
> It is circumstantial evidence, but I wouldn't expect an increase in radical activity on social media to occur in a society in which most people are afraid to express their views due to fear of omnipresent surveillance.
The consistent "haha only serious" taunt I hear on the left is directed towards "Twitter activists" – leftists whose only contribution is to tweet, and who aren't politically active outside of their social media bubble.
I'd almost wonder if taking a hands-off approach to social media benefits the surveillance state: undirected radical energy flows into social media and away from organizations that could try to focus it towards change. Those organizations remain small, which means the people who are actually likely to radicalize are easier to watch. Social media as a "pressure relief valve", I guess.
Someone may point out that sometimes that pressure relief valve gets stuck and we experience stochastic terrorism, which is very true. But I contend that benefits the state as well.
This[1] is a survey of college students. About 25-30% are self-censoring on campus, and rates are higher among conservatives. This is a pretty well established finding across multiple polls of both college-age and working-age people.
> I'm not aware of any mainstream Conservative beliefs that are suppressed in general discourse
Not in "general discourse" (if by that you mean anonymous social media), but if you work for a tech company, many mainstream conservative beliefs are not to be discussed in public. Consider the James Damore memo, which he got fired for and which most conservatives would agree with. Or imagine being a Trump supporter in a tech company, and wanting to put a Trump poster on your wall/cubicle compared to a Biden/Hillary poster. You might not get fired, but there's enough stories of social ostracism that people probably won't want to do that. Or consider having the opinion that gender = sex and therefore pronouns should correspond to sex, which is what most conservatives think, and something that they'd get fired over. Self-censorship is a rational thing to do in such a climate.
A left-leaning person would probably self-censor in a heavily conservative industry (e.g. oil & gas), too. I don't really have a reference point in such industries about how stifling the climate would be for them, but I don't think this is a phenomenon that's unique to one side of the spectrum. It's mostly a consequence of heightened polarization.
So, here's the thing: it's not the beliefs themselves, it's where the political lines are drawn.
Like: let's pick two hot-button political issues in the US. Say, abortion rights and gun control. You can definitely find online spaces that are pro-choice and spaces which are pro-life. You can find spaces which are pro 2nd amendment and pro gun-control. You're going to be much harder pressed to find spaces which are pro-2nd AND pro-choice, or pro-gun-control AND pro-life.
So yes— there are absolutely places where I could express my beliefs that cross political lines. But I couldn't do it as myself. Or at least, I'm not willing to.
This is called accelerationism. It doesn't really work, making something worse just to make it better isn't effective, changing things for the sake of "getting away from the status quo" is silly.
Maybe instead of general accelerationism, it's time for politicians and business leaders to suffer the effects of lack of privacy first.
Let's get some polls going on which politician / billionaire we should "reveal" first... then throw all their private info, backroom deals, what they had for lunch the other day that doesn't match up with their publicly stated diet preference, how many unregistered immigrants they have to take care of their mansions, all the stuff... throw it out in public.
Let's do this to anyone and everyone who's voted for more surveillance powers. Or has sponsored or helped develop them. Like NSO Group employees - especially the CEO.
And maybe if they start to see a problem, and some costs, maybe there will be some change.
The problem isn’t just that the average person hasn’t experienced harm. It’s that privacy advocates often don’t have good examples of average people experiencing harm. Theoretical arguments aren’t going to do it. If you want people to listen, you need stories to tell.
This is an interesting take. My only concern is that people consistently trade security for freedom in modern societies. I wonder how pervasive surveillance has to be to break this trend.
I’ll happily trade some privacy for security. I live in an apartment building which has security cameras in every public space. Sure, technically they could build a record of when I leave and enter, but I can also report people who leave trash bags out and they can be held accountable.
There is a point where it goes too far, but not all surveillance is bad.
I'm not saying techies should just stay passive though. Special cases - journalists, activists, politically involved - need to be protected right now, and when the problem will be generally understood we need to have solutions ready for the average person: information, software, proposed legislation, etc.