OP stated, verbatim, that smartphones are "becoming legally required".
I understand the slippery slope argument, even if I think it's kind of alarmist, but... I mean, come on. Present tense?!?! We are sooooo far off from a legal mandate to carry a smartphone that I'm not even sure how to politely react to this statement.
> it's not unreasonable to think we might end up in a situation like this.
This is perhaps a good use of the double negative, because it's certainly not reasonable either.
It doesn't have to be written law passed by a government for something to be "legally required".
Just like the government doesn't have to pass laws or implement systems for surveillance when they can just rely on FANG to do all the data collection for them.
I understand the slippery slope argument, even if I think it's kind of alarmist, but... I mean, come on. Present tense?!?! We are sooooo far off from a legal mandate to carry a smartphone that I'm not even sure how to politely react to this statement.
> it's not unreasonable to think we might end up in a situation like this.
This is perhaps a good use of the double negative, because it's certainly not reasonable either.