Theresa May says the internet must now be regulated following London Bridge [W:42]

Chomsky said:

Hate to admit it, but this scourge of authoritarian conservatism sweeping the world with the likes of May, Duterte, Trump, Erdoğan, etc., is becoming a worldwide threat to freedom, liberty, and democratic principles.

Let's hope this is a quickly ending phase. Macron's ascendancy may be a positive sign that at least one 1st world nation still values freedom and liberty, and is willing to assume the cost. I hope!

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Chomsky said:

That's the problem; people like May and Trump are not talking about using warrants. They're talking about accomplishing this crap through administrative or legislative actions!

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Surrealistik said:

Just be careful not to get too smitten by the man; he's certainly better than Le Penn, and has his moments, but he's fundamentally the French equivalent of a Clinton style neo-liberal.

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Hawkeye10 said:

Be nice if we had not let Congress rot so wouldn't you say?

And take a ****ing look at SCOTUS, all politics now.

Take this as a wake-up call and move on Sir.

That's my advice.

:lamo

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Chomsky said:

Two wrongs don't make a right, and Trump is wrong.

That's what I'm saying.

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Hawkeye10 said:

And I am saying that would be zero problem had we done things right in fact there would be no Trump had we done things right so put the kibosh on the Pity Party.

MKay?

The theme of the day is BE BETTER!

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Chomsky said:

Pity party?

I strongly and loudly proclaim Trump an a-hole and the scourge of liberty and democracy. No pity needed here.

But you can try to justify your not dealing with the truth anyway you want.

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Hawkeye10 said:

And he was better than ALL the Champs.......THAT's where your brain should be, and while you claim to know it I dont see you acting up to it enough.

On how much of what we have sucks, and that we need to start doing better LIKE PRONTO MAN!

Be Better Friend.

:kissy:

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Chomsky said:

You just don't get it.

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Hawkeye10 said:

"OH POOR US, THAT BASTARD TRUMP AND THE TENS OF MILLIONS OF MY FELLOW AMERICANS WHO LIKE HIM ARE RUINING MY LIFE!"

Give me a ****ing break, that is tripe from brains ruined by that mother****ing VICTIM CULTURE that needs to go away ASAP.

WORK ON AND FIX THE GOD DAMN PROBLEMS!

OH Ya, I said "work"

So Sorry.

:screwy

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Angelus said:

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Hawkeye10 said:

The work of idiots for sure.

I assume that was your intended point.

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Angelus said:

If the shoe fits...Trumpflakes.

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A free internet means we can call them as we see them. If Trump and the Republican Congress would stop whining and having tantrums, maybe they would get something accomplished.

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Hawkeye10 said:

Trump is getting a lot done, more than he has a right to with so much of the elite class on strike.

He's my hero!

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jamesrage said:

I don't think they care if it is or isn't going to solve the problem.Its most likely just an excuse to get more control over the internet.

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sanman said:

Shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic

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ttwtt78640 said:

Yep, I have nothing to hide and never had any expectation of privacy online. If the feds think my tool purchases are suspicious then get a warrant and drop by to check them out.

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CaptainCourtesy said:

Moderator's Warning:

Next person who posts a stupid meme, or a response to a stupid meme will find themselves on the wrong end of consequences.

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ttwtt78640 said:

Yep, I have nothing to hide and never had any expectation of privacy online. If the feds think my tool purchases are suspicious then get a warrant and drop by to check them out.

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I live in a country generally assumed to be a dictatorship. One of the Arab spring countries. I have lived through curfews and have seen the outcomes of the sort of surveillance now being revealed in the US. People here talking about curfews aren't realizing what that actually FEELS like. It isn't about having to go inside, and the practicality of that. It's about creating the feeling that everyone, everything is watching. A few points:

1) the purpose of this surveillance from the governments point of view is to control enemies of the state. Not terrorists. People who are coalescing around ideas that would destabilize the status quo. These could be religious ideas. These could be groups like anon who are too good with tech for the governments liking. It makes it very easy to know who these people are. It also makes it very simple to control these people.

Lets say you are a college student and you get in with some people who want to stop farming practices that hurt animals. So you make a plan and go to protest these practices. You get there, and wow, the protest is huge. You never expected this, you were just goofing off. Well now everyone who was there is suspect. Even though you technically had the right to protest, you're now considered a dangerous person.
With this tech in place, the government doesn't have to put you in jail. They can do something more sinister. They can just email you a sexy picture you took with a girlfriend. Or they can email you a note saying that they can prove your dad is cheating on his taxes. Or they can threaten to get your dad fired. All you have to do, the email says, is help them catch your friends in the group. You have to report back every week, or you dad might lose his job. So you do. You turn in your friends and even though they try to keep meetings off grid, you're reporting on them to protect your dad.

2) Let's say number one goes on. The country is a weird place now. Really weird. Pretty soon, a movement springs up like occupy, except its bigger this time. People are really serious, and they are saying they want a government without this power. I guess people are realizing that it is a serious deal. You see on the news that tear gas was fired. Your friend calls you, frantic. They're shooting people. Oh my god. you never signed up for this. You say, **** it. My dad might lose his job but I won't be responsible for anyone dying. That's going too far. You refuse to report anymore. You just stop going to meetings. You stay at home, and try not to watch the news. Three days later, police come to your door and arrest you. They confiscate your computer and phones, and they beat you up a bit. No one can help you so they all just sit quietly. They know if they say anything they're next. This happened in the country I live in. It is not a joke.

3) Its hard to say how long you were in there. What you saw was horrible. Most of the time, you only heard screams. People begging to be killed. Noises you've never heard before. You, you were lucky. You got kicked every day when they threw your moldy food at you, but no one shocked you. No one used sexual violence on you, at least that you remember. There were some times they gave you pills, and you can't say for sure what happened then. To be honest, sometimes the pills were the best part of your day, because at least then you didn't feel anything. You have scars on you from the way you were treated. You learn in prison that torture is now common. But everyone who uploads videos or pictures of this torture is labeled a leaker. Its considered a threat to national security. Pretty soon, a cut you got on your leg is looking really bad. You think it's infected. There were no doctors in prison, and it was so overcrowded, who knows what got in the cut. You go to the doctor, but he refuses to see you. He knows if he does the government can see the records that he treated you. Even you calling his office prompts a visit from the local police.
You decide to go home and see your parents. Maybe they can help. This leg is getting really bad. You get to their house. They aren't home. You can't reach them no matter how hard you try. A neighbor pulls you aside, and he quickly tells you they were arrested three weeks ago and haven't been seen since. You vaguely remember mentioning to them on the phone you were going to that protest. Even your little brother isn't there.

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ttwtt78640 said:

Yep, I have nothing to hide and never had any expectation of privacy online. If the feds think my tool purchases are suspicious then get a warrant and drop by to check them out.

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4) Is this even really happening? You look at the news. Sports scores. Celebrity news. It's like nothing is wrong. What the hell is going on? A stranger smirks at you reading the paper. You lose it. You shout at him "**** you dude what are you laughing at can't you see I've got a ****ing wound on my leg?"
"Sorry," he says. "I just didn't know anyone read the news anymore." There haven't been any real journalists for months. They're all in jail.
Everyone walking around is scared. They can't talk to anyone else because they don't know who is reporting for the government. Hell, at one time YOU were reporting for the government. Maybe they just want their kid to get through school. Maybe they want to keep their job. Maybe they're sick and want to be able to visit the doctor. It's always a simple reason. Good people always do bad things for simple reasons.
You want to protest. You want your family back. You need help for your leg. This is way beyond anything you ever wanted. It started because you just wanted to see fair treatment in farms. Now you're basically considered a terrorist, and everyone around you might be reporting on you. You definitely can't use a phone or email. You can't get a job. You can't even trust people face to face anymore. On every corner, there are people with guns. They are as scared as you are. They just don't want to lose their jobs. They don't want to be labeled as traitors.

This all happened in the country where I live.

You want to know why revolutions happen? Because little by little by little things get worse and worse. But this thing that is happening now is big. This is the key ingredient. This allows them to know everything they need to know to accomplish the above. The fact that they are doing it is proof that they are the sort of people who might use it in the way I described. In the country I live in, they also claimed it was for the safety of the people. Same in Soviet Russia. Same in East Germany. In fact, that is always the excuse that is used to surveil everyone. But it has never ONCE proven to be the reality.

Maybe Obama won't do it. Maybe the next guy won't, or the one after him. Maybe this story isn't about you. Maybe it happens 10 or 20 years from now, when a big war is happening, or after another big attack. Maybe it's about your daughter or your son. We just don't know yet. But what we do know is that right now, in this moment we have a choice. Are we okay with this, or not? Do we want this power to exist, or not?

You know for me, the reason I'm upset is that I grew up in school saying the pledge of allegiance. I was taught that the United States meant "liberty and justice for all." You get older, you learn that in this country we define that phrase based on the constitution. That's what tells us what liberty is and what justice is. Well, the government just violated that ideal. So if they aren't standing for liberty and justice anymore, what are they standing for? Safety?
Ask yourself a question. In the story I told above, does anyone sound safe?

I didn't make anything up. These things happened to people I know. We used to think it couldn't happen in America. But guess what? It's starting to happen.
I actually get really upset when people say "I don't have anything to hide. Let them read everything." People saying that have no idea what they are bringing down on their own heads. They are naive, and we need to listen to people in other countries who are clearly telling us that this is a horrible horrible sign and it is time to stand up and say no.

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Nilly said:

Dumb argument.

"Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say."

Not to mention, just because what you're doing online is not illegal, taboo, or unethical today, doesn't mean the same will be true tomorrow. You just don't know. Once information is gathered about you and it's on file, it's on file. There is absolutely no way to know ahead of time how that information might ever be used. If, after-the-fact, the government decides your favorite brand of alcohol infused energy drink is unsafe for consumers- we all miss you Four Loco- you don't want to face charges for the possession of a controlled substance because of that last six pack you have left in the fridge that you bought online. If, after-the-fact, a company's model predicts that fans of certain types of music or TV shows are less likely to repay their debts, you don't want to be rejected for that mortgage or student loan because of your search and browsing history. If, after-the-fact, anyone connected to a certain protest movement is placed on a government watch list and you wrote a paper about the movement using research from its website, you don't want to be banned from flying to grandma's house for the holidays. What you're doing today might not be anything to hide, but that doesn't mean it can't be used against you in the future. Maybe you don't think it could happen to you. Not in your city or state or province or country. Not for your race, religion, ethnicity, belief, hobby, interest, job, taste, preference or affiliation. Maybe you're right. Maybe not. You just don't know.

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Manc Skipper said:

She cut the police by 25,000, sells arms to Saudi Arabia, but the solution to attacks is to limit freedom. How Trumpish.

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