[everyday7732]

Your assumption that "criminals" are doing something morally wrong is fundamentally flawed. Civil rights activists were criminals, as were suffragettes, and the people who protected Jews in Nazi Germany, and gay or trans people just existing in countries where that isn't allowed. All criminals. Law enforcement isn't even always carrying out the law, as we've seen with ICE arresting, assaulting, searching, deporting people on no other basis than their skin color.

Democracy dies when people can't protest. When they are under constant surveillance, afraid of being singled out by the government intelligence gathering mechanisms. Unable to speak out about injustice, organise and engage in healthy counter culture.

Look at Russia, look at China. Don't imagine that giving your own government and law enforcement the same tools of surveillance and oppression will have a different outcome.

[budsniffer952]

You do realize there's another side to it, right? There are morally good examples where privacy is needed, and morally bad examples where not being able to access data is harmful.

I personally agree with you, but for most people it's not black or white. They want privacy when it suits them, but would take yours away in a heartbeat.

[everyday7732]

I agree that privacy is not always a force for good. I think that when we remove privacy we normally lose much more than we gain.

People easily focus on negative consequences of privacy (dangerous people being able to communicate secretly) and don't notice the benefits they enjoy because of privacy.

[izacus]

Yes, exactly, but if you actually follow all of those groups, none of them changed things by building bunkers into which police couldn't ever enter and any crime could happen there.

As someone who grew up on the other side of the iron curtain, I find this idea that you'll make your own government an enemy and shield criminals against it utterly naive, since that's not what actually changes society. It's a form of techno-cowardice, where people hide behind technology to avoid doing the hard stuff.

[everyday7732]

It's not cowardice. It's a standard defence against tyranny. Governments can change quickly so even if you think your present government is democratic and healthy it still pays to keep the tools to defend against it if it changes.

If your government is seeking to remove those tools from you then that is a warning sign.

[HybridStatAnim8]

Thats... exactly what they did. They relied on secrecy and hidden locations to aid their cause.

Like... this is how the entire underground railroad and many other examples worked out.

[izacus]

Not in my part of the world, which is both safer and more democratic than the US approach you're defending.

There were also other groups hiding away and doing interesting things - killing, maiming murdering. It took access to private communication and files to take those down - you may have have heard of some [0].

[0]: https://www.npr.org/transcripts/138889467

[tenuousemphasis]

Critical thinking isn't exactly your strong suit, clearly.