> Yes. Security is fiction, the government cannot make you secure. All the government is doing is to make empty promises and spend your money on security theater and surveillance programs that make you less secure [...]
I really can't remember the last time I had to worry about pirates, smallpox, or a nazi invasion. The government cannot make me 100% secure, but they can certainly make me more secure than I would be on my own.
Don't get me wrong, what the NSA is doing is over the line in my opinion, but rhetoric saying that the government is incapable of any sort of security for it's citizens is a bit much.
The government is incapable of providing absolute security. You cannot be "secure" in the sense that sufficiently determined terrorists will always be able to kill you.
The way this issue is repeatedly framed is as a trade off between security and privacy, with the implication that people should always choose security over privacy and therefore have no privacy. Which is utterly ridiculous. Insert any other two things you please: In a trade off between speed and safety, you should always choose safety. It's complete rubbish because if you always choose safety you can never leave your house (or, ultimately, your cell).
Even the trade off itself is a fallacy, because the reason for privacy is security. Loose lips sink ships. The same logic applies to individuals and corporations. Someone who knows everything about you can easily kill you (or rape you or blackmail you or kidnap your children etc.) Creating a huge database of everybody's secrets is an enormous security threat.
I really can't remember the last time I had to worry about pirates, smallpox, or a nazi invasion. The government cannot make me 100% secure, but they can certainly make me more secure than I would be on my own.
Don't get me wrong, what the NSA is doing is over the line in my opinion, but rhetoric saying that the government is incapable of any sort of security for it's citizens is a bit much.