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by rhizome
4165 days ago
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I understand, but when you say: People make broad statements about how evil and nigh-omnipotent the NSA is, and how deeply they've infiltrated every facet of human life ...is not the reverse case also true? We find ourselves discussing a condition where a lot of information is unknown, on both sides, but nobody upbraids the intelligence communities for exhibiting the same tendencies in the same breath that they castigate those people analyzing the situation with incomplete information. There is ignorance, conclusions based on assumptions and a desire to know more on all sides of the argument. It's the nature of the beast, and if criticism is going to be levelled in this context, it should be pointed at those who withold the transparency required for understanding. |
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Arguably, secrecy exists for a good reason sometimes. But when you begin to treat the rest of the legal system, the government whose job it is to oversee you, and the public as enemies and keep everything as secret as possible, you really give people little to suspect anything but the worst.
I mean, here we are with what appears to be the biggest and most complex global data gathering correlation system in history - possibly a technological achievement to rival the web itself - and two terrorists who posted anti-American rhetoric on their Twitter accounts managed to bomb the Boston Marathon despite having been under surveillance at one point, and the Russians more or less tell us outright to watch these guys. They weren't exactly hiding behind 7 proxies so what the hell are we even doing?
How to interpret the cognitive dissonance in that? Maybe the system isn't as comprehensive as it appears? Maybe bureaucracy got in the way? Maybe the pieces just didn't come together in time? Is there even a Panopticon or not? Who knows.