[webmobdev]

Unfortunately one of the reasons why active and passive advocates of right to privacy are losing this fight is because people don't intrinsically understand how important it is politically for them. The ignorant lightly mock us, asking what do you have to hide. Sure, it is easy to make them think about this by asking them to turn over their email / IM account credentials if they "don't have anything to hide", but it still doesn't really educate them.

People don't understand that our right to privacy protects us from becoming easy and vulnerable political targets. It is essential to provide us a sense of security that is essential for our mental well-being ("life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" as the US constitution puts it very simply). You may be a minority - a gay person or ethnic / religious / linguistic etc - and even if you live in a healthy democracy, you can be subject to light prejudice. Can you really feel secure if a Google search or a facial recognition software reveals everything about your identity to a stranger or a person in authority who can politically abuse it? Obviously, No. And this is not just confined to minorities. Even the majority community does experience anxiety and insecurity in a foreign or multi-cultural environment (a popular political saying in India is that everyone becomes a minority when they step out of their community). That sense of personal security and belonging can only come if you have a right of privacy and are in control of how much of your personal identity you want to reveal to someone. Democracies exist to protect minority rights. And everyone of us, sometime feel like a vulnerable minority because of some part of our identity. Without a right to privacy, our democracy fails us.