the biggest lies come from within. we are all complicit everyday.

On 01/01/14 17:37, Thomas Hartman wrote:
> I realize this is satire post, but I actually agree with the content,
> taken mostly literally.
>
> If you turn it around, don't a lot of "litlle people" have the
> potential to behave like a monster if they achieve power?
>
> People will always misbehave, and since the misbehavior is distributed
> on a normal curve the extremes will be pretty bad, whether the people
> are big or small. Hitler just had more reach.
>
> So, we shouldn't let any of this bother or scare us too much.
>
> Things aren't that different now than a thousand years ago.
>
> Fortunately most people are boringly non-extreme, so we should just
> encourage them... big and small.
>
> (But that's so boring!)
>
> On Wed, Jan 1, 2014 at 8:51 AM, Amir Taaki <genjix@???> wrote:
>> but dude the police are nice in my country. at least they don't need to
>> carry guns. why can't people behave? if nobody broke the laws then we
>> wouldn't need the police.
>>
>> we have experts in charge. they know best. do you want some smelly hippy
>> running your corporation? no, you want the best most-expensive
>> professional in charge. our rulers have degrees and qualifications from
>> the state. they have legitimacy. what do you know? could you run a
>> country? it's difficult work. obama's a great guy. he's just in a
>> difficult position. cut him some slack yo. he probably wants to legalise
>> marijuana and close guantanamo (in secret). it's not him who's
>> assassinating dear americans or ruining young kids lives. just because
>> they're his friends, doesn't mean he's a bad person.
>>
>> and donald rumsfeld is a good guy at heart. he had to be friends with
>> saddam eventhough he knew he was gassing his own people. it was his job
>> and we can't judge him for kissing a dictator (who was our friend). and
>> then later he wanted to spread american freedum and democracy, but
>> because the people wouldn't follow, he told some lies about saddam being
>> a monster gassing his own people. look, he's just a good guy. trust me
>> on this. they're not so bad people, just a bit misguided. even hitler
>> wasn't that bad - he liked kids and was a vegetarian. he was just a
>> little misguided (bad judgement).
>>
>> On 01/01/14 16:37, Thomas Hartman wrote:
>>> The object isn't really to control people, it's to get people to control themselves.
>>>
>>> Making stuff people will only piss people off.
>>>
>>> Telling the truth is scarier, because it invokes shame, which is internal.
>>>
>>> Cooties I tell you.
>>>
>>> We're all five years and it's a big, scary world.
>>>
>>> On Jan 1, 2014, at 7:02 AM, Luke-Jr wrote:
>>>
>>>> Meh, they have nothing to blackmail me with at least. That being said, what
>>>> stops them from making stuff up? Nothing...
>>>>
>>>> Luke
>>>>
>>>> On Wednesday, January 01, 2014 2:59:14 PM Thomas Hartman wrote:
>>>>> Not only is there the NSA, there is whoever is spying on the NSA.
>>>>>
>>>>> Even if the NSA dissolves, whoever that is will persist. Concretely, I
>>>>> guess that means the army of contractors / outsourcers that currently run
>>>>> a lot of the infrastructure for… well, everything, government and not.
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, blackmail is on the table. I think that makes people squeamish. You're
>>>>> thinking about encryption keys and hardware security, and suddenly it
>>>>> turns sexual and what could you survive being public information that
>>>>> everyone knows about you, or if you're a woman naked pictures of you
>>>>> splashed everywhere, or so on.
>>>>>
>>>>> That's what it means to be a high profile government or private person in
>>>>> 2013. The persistent knowledge that at any time, everything about your sex
>>>>> life and thoughts (google cache) could become public. If you step out of
>>>>> line, BAM.
>>>>>
>>>>> I think it's interesting that as a society, as a result of ubiquitous porn
>>>>> and maybe other things, we have actually become a lot less sexually
>>>>> squeamish in the last twenty years.
>>>>>
>>>>> On the one hand, there's a lot more blackmail material out there but on the
>>>>> other hand… can this really be used to maintain control? Is the threat
>>>>> really effective?
>>>>>
>>>>> It seems to me sort of like the opposite of the nuclear threat. The more
>>>>> you use it, the less effective it gets.
>>>>>
>>>>> Of course that's not the only blackmail vector, but it's a big one.
>>>>>
>>>>> So anyway, I'll say it.
>>>>>
>>>>> Part of de-clawing the NSA (and the even murkier powers that are being it)
>>>>> is continuing to evolve the global societal narrative about sex.
>>>>>
>>>>> In polite society, it's industrial espionage this and network analysis
>>>>> that, but when you strip all that away and look at it in the raw it's just
>>>>> on the level of how do the kindergarten bullies control people. Cooties,
>>>>> is how.
>>>>>
>>>>> Cooties is not an unassailable weapon.
>>>>>
>>>>> That is why I am not ultimately afraid of the NSA.
>>>>>
>>>>> On Jan 1, 2014, at 3:24 AM, Wendell wrote:
>>>>>> I think the answer, as seemingly always, is to strive for openness and
>>>>>> decentralization in everything we do, minimizing the risk of systemic
>>>>>> failure by a kind of biomimicry.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> That said, if we really have to rebuild everything from the integrated
>>>>>> circuit on up, it's going to be a long, hard slog indeed. I'm afraid
>>>>>> that advanced at-home fabrication won't save us in time.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> -wendell
>>>>>>
>>>>>> hivewallet.com | twitter.com/hivewallet | pgp: B7179FA88C498718
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Jan 1, 2014, at 5:28 AM, Manfred Karrer wrote:
>>>>>>> I agree with all your points. To put energy to fight NSA via
>>>>>>> governmental control is a lost fight from the start. Fight in the
>>>>>>> technological level seems unfortunately also hopeless. What else could
>>>>>>> we do?
>>>>>>
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