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by kstrauser 122 days ago
Police states are great at solving major crimes. And when those are sufficiently solved, to justify their continued existence, they have to solve lesser crimes, repeating until you need enough surveillance to ensure no one's flushing their toilet improperly.

Police states are like autoimmune diseases under the hygiene hypothesis. They'll keep ramping up their sensitivity until they're attacking everything, even when it's benign.
1 comments
steviedotboston 122 days ago
Flock cameras can be helpful in all sorts of crimes. They've been used to solve everything from kidnappings to minor property damage.

There obviously isn't a future without crime. This is just a tool to make it easier for police to do their job and deter criminals somewhat, but that is probably marginal.

There will always be kidnappings, there will always be property damage. Having technology available to make it easier to solve those crimes seems obvious to me.

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kstrauser 122 days ago
Yes, I can see how they would be helpful in solving crimes down to minor property damage.

I do not want to live in a society where police are watching everything I do in the name of solving minor property damage. "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" is bullshit. I don't do anything illegal in my bathroom, but I do not wish to have a camera in there, even if it could solve a hypothetical crime.

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steviedotboston 122 days ago
They aren't watching you in the bathroom. They are recording cars on public streets and analyzing the footage.
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pesus 121 days ago
Why not? Don't you want to stop all the crimes happening in bathrooms too? That would be a logical step if privacy is always an acceptable tradeoff for security (or at least the illusion thereof).
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cg5280 121 days ago
The difference is that public streets are public spaces. You necessarily have a limited expectation of privacy in public spaces. The government likewise already deploys cameras in public places to maintain a reasonable level of order on them.

If you want to put a camera in your personal toilet you absolutely can.

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DangitBobby 121 days ago
"Public" is not a blanket excuse for constant surveillance in a space. I do not have an expectation of being surveilled in public and it's not acceptable to normalize it.
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