

Students Question the NSA at Recruiting Session [audio] - martin_k
https://soundcloud.com/madiha-1/students-question-the-nsa-at

======
nugget
As Federal employees, the men and women who work at the NSA swear an oath
which dates back to 1884:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the
Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic;
that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this
obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and
that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I
am about to enter: So help me God."

Rather than instantly pass the buck about the scope, context and impact of
their domestic surveillance work, perhaps the recruiters on this clip should
re-read this oath and think about what it really means; what their
responsibilities are to the citizens of the United States; and what kind of
country they want their children and their children's children to live in.

~~~
ajuc
Even atheists must do the part with God?

~~~
colanderman
I'd be surprised if the three-letter agencies don't screen out atheists. They
screen _in_ Mormons [1].

[1] [http://www.businessinsider.com/11-surprising-things-you-
didn...](http://www.businessinsider.com/11-surprising-things-you-didnt-know-
about-mormons-2011-6?op=1)

~~~
rhizome
Then again, "Business Insider," and a number-of-things article.

~~~
colanderman
Sorry, I just picked the first result on Google. I learned this tidbit from a
previous posting on HN; apparently the CIA (or NSA?) recruits heavily from
Brigham Young University.

~~~
pyre
It was the CIA.

There is the possibility that they trend towards Mormons due to some
belief/statistic that they are more likely to respect authority, or
unquestioningly follow orders.

On the other hand, Mormons do a lot of missionary work where they learn the
local language, in addition to customs, etc. This is also something extremely
valuable to intelligence organizations.

~~~
phaus
There's a reserve/guard unit (can't remember which) in Utah that is comprised
largely of Mormons who became linguists for the Army. Supposedly, it's the
most talented and diverse group of linguists ever assembled, and they have
people who speak languages that no other person in the Western world knows.

------
malandrew
Posted in the other thread about this[0]:

    
    
        "This was a fun read and it seams like many people could 
        just DDoS the recruiting efforts of the NSA and CIA by 
        showing up to recruiting sessions and playing devil's 
        advocates. If you are well informed and good at internet 
        arguing, you are well equipped to attend these recruiting 
        sessions.
    
        At the very least it would plant the seeds of cognitive 
        dissonance in the minds of everyone recruiting for the NSA 
        and CIA. e.g. "Why do so many of the citizens we are 
        trying to protect not agree with our decision to do a job 
        where we trade liberty for security?"
    

To be clear, my suggestion here is not meant to prevent either the CIA or NSA
from doing their jobs, but to help them remember that their job is clearly
spelled out in the US Uniformed Services Oath of office, which AFAIK the CIA
and NSA also swear to.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5983709](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5983709)

~~~
rbanffy
> my suggestion here is not meant to prevent either the CIA or NSA from doing
> their jobs

Quite the contrary. The conclusion of your suggestion is the CIA and the NSA
actually doing the job they need to do rather than making more enemies to a
country that has already amassed an impressive amount of them.

------
hkmurakami
I have some sympathy for the recruiters since they really have no say in the
high level decision making in the organization. They may not even be involved
with domestic spying of citizens.

But on the other hand they continue to stay at the organization so while I do
feel some sympathy for their predicament,I guess it's really just up to each
person to figure out whether they're really okay with staying there, given all
the pros and cons involved.

~~~
mikeash
I have no sympathy. They willingly represent the organization. Nobody is
forcing them to stay. They could leave, but they don't, thus implicitly
accepting it.

~~~
Kylekramer
I imagine the fear of not being able to provide for you or your family takes
precedence over privacy concerns for the vast majority of people. There was a
news report about how 76% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck last week.
I'd argue saying "they could leave" assumes a lot.

~~~
electic
You do not have to sell your soul to feed your family. Trust me, they can get
another job. The reality is the pay is good and these people do not care what
their organization does.

~~~
Kylekramer
You saying "trust me" doesn't feed their family. Looking at my Facebook page,
there are dozen of people I personally know desperate for jobs. Even their
belief that working for the NSA was selling their soul was taken for granted,
most of them would take it.

~~~
griffordson
Anyone you know from FB who is unemployed probably isn't eligible to work at
the NSA. We aren't talking about WPA jobs after all. I understand your point,
lots of people can't be choosy about where they work. But those aren't the
people we're talking about here. We're talking about people who currently work
at the NSA and I assure you they have skills that are highly sought after in
many industries. They definitely don't need their NSA jobs to feed their
families.

~~~
mjn
I don't get the impression that there are a lot of jobs out there for pure
mathematicians. The conventional wisdom, at least, is that you have three
options: tenured professor, NSA, or abandon pure math entirely. And it's not
too easy to get a tenured professorship.

~~~
hkmurakami
do some branches of finance use pure math? (or is it only applied math)

------
martin_k
Some background on the event and recording:
[http://mobandmultitude.com/2013/07/02/the-nsa-comes-
recruiti...](http://mobandmultitude.com/2013/07/02/the-nsa-comes-recruiting/)

edit: Cached version
[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://mobandmultitude.com/2013/07/02/the-
nsa-comes-recruiting/&rlz=2C5CHFA_enDE0538DE0538&strip=1)

------
droopyEyelids
I have a trick I feel would make a confrontation like this better.

Always speak under the assumption that the other person is 'good'. That means
not calling them a liar. Instead, ask the questions that you feel would expose
the inconsistency. That way they show everyone the point you're trying to
make. Also it prevents personal animosity from obscuring the real content you
might discover.

Furthermore, it allows a 3rd party who hears the discourse more freedom to
make up their mind, whereas they might naturally go against your point of view
because it's being pushed down their throat.

~~~
B0Z
In a sanitized or controlled scenario, this makes sense. Passion and emotion,
however, are impossible to strip from opinions in the context of the Snowden
revelations that started all of this. Having the scab ripped off the NSA has
altered the perspective of entire generations. Frankly I think the students
handled themselves remarkably well.

~~~
phaus
They handled themselves pretty well for the first half of that conversation,
with some intelligently phrased questions. Unfortunately, during the second
half of the clip, the conversation degenerated into petty childishness.

------
dlss
Can we organize a list of time + locations for NSA recruiting sessions, maybe
with GPS based email alerts?

1\. I think that if this kind of questioning become the norm, we'd have a
significant impact on their ability to recruit.

2\. Maybe some startup founders in the area could go poach the talent :p

------
gmisra
It's rarely actually impressive to observe somebody attack lesser proponents
of the ideas they disagree with. Sure, none of the actual decision makers will
come within ten miles of an open forum, but this comes off mostly as just
bullying.

~~~
jlgreco
They are publicly _(mis)_ representing their organization, the line of
questioning is more than fair. They are not somehow entitled to only receive
questions that they planned for.

------
c0ur7n3y
I have to imagine their recruiting is going to suffer greatly due to the
recent revelations. Very few smart people are going to want to join an
organization that spies on their fellow citizens. Plus, the NSA is going to
have to be even more skeptical of anyone they do recruit.

~~~
DanBC
A lot of people just don't care. They want a job with other smart people and
neat technology where they can do math in peace and quiet.

See also "You don't need to worry if you don't have anything to hide" etc.

~~~
angersock
Truly it is a wonderful thing that the most anti-social and introverted people
get to deploy technology affecting the common man.

~~~
mjn
I mostly blame the common man for that.

Introverted people focused on a specific subject, such as pure-math research,
tend to go where society deems it beneficial for them to go. So you are good
at math, but you need to eat. Where does society think it's useful for a
mathematician to apply his or her skills? Well, our society gives the NSA
substantial funding, which it devotes in part to hiring mathematicians. The
rest of society does _not_ fund pure-math research much at all.

And yet somehow society is _surprised_ that many pure mathematicians end up
working for the NSA. Maybe if you cheap bastards were willing to pay for math
research through a different mechanism, the mathematicians would work
somewhere else.

~~~
PavlovsCat
_So you are good at math, but you need to eat._

I'm good at cunnilingus, and yet I need to eat, too! What to do, what do do...

Do you know the story by Thoreau in "Walden" about the basket weaving indian?
Also, while I agree that something like math research is ultimately
benefitting all, this doesn't really apply when it's done for spooks, since
those tend to sit on it. So if math is _all_ you're good at, and if you
positively can't wait tables or learn anything else, so you can use your math
skills for non-profit and the commons or teaching math on the side, then you
might be screwed. And if you just go work for the NSA, you're not exactly
beating a path out of that situation for future mathematicians either.

~~~
mjn
My point was that if there is a structural problem, looking for structural
solutions is a better angle than moralizing. If mathematicians are working for
the NSA, instead of yelling at mathematicians, I'd want to ask, what is
causing mathematicians to work for the NSA, and what would change that?

Same reason that, if you think gentrification is problematic, yelling "die
yuppie scum!" at the poor schmucks trying to find a decent apartment in an
overpriced area isn't either an effective or an intellectually sound strategy.
Instead, one ought to look at the structural forces producing gentrification,
i.e. the developers and capital movements.

An article on that subject: [http://jacobinmag.com/2013/05/the-fucking-
hipster-show/](http://jacobinmag.com/2013/05/the-fucking-hipster-show/)

~~~
PavlovsCat
If you look for causes for what "makes" people do something, how can you not
also look at the people themselves?

------
HSO
This is brilliant. Instead of that less than half-assed interview Charlie Rose
did with Obama, we should have had those students go at it.

~~~
Sven7
Students can ask all the questions they want (of Facebook and Goldman Sachs
too). At the end of the day the only question that matters is who is going to
pay off those little student loans.

~~~
jlgreco
> _" little student loans."_

You are correct on the "little" front. While it may seem astronomical to
people in countries with different educational systems and people without
career prospects, the median and mean student loan debt is under $30k.

So long as they are in a field with more than one major employer, then the NSA
is hardly has significant power over them.

~~~
Sven7
And what is the mean and median savings rate?

~~~
jlgreco
Good enough that if these students seek employment and take their loans
seriously, they are in no dire danger.

Student loan discussion is dominated by the few fools who wrack up massively
debt then think that they can make the minimum required payment for 10 years
and have everything turn out okay. The mean debt is also slewed _upwards_ by
people who acquire very large amounts of debt that is not an unusual amount
for their field (doctors, particularly).

Those who don't actually graduate are another obvious cause of the perception
that student loan debt is crippling (and for them it certainly is), but of
course they are not being considered in _this_ discussion unless the NSA is
making a habit of hiring college dropouts.

------
calebhc
That was fantastic! Thanks for sharing this. Hope to see more stuff like this
arising.

------
blantonl
NSA Recruiting sessions are staffed by NSA recruiters - i.e. sales people.
There might be the token engineer on hand to answer in very generic terms
about technology etc, but to think that any questions would be met with useful
responses is like asking the President's press secretary information on
details of classified operations.

You'll get nothing more than spin at best.

~~~
PavlovsCat
You'll still get "the requirements are handed down to us" though, which is the
classic Eichmann defense.

------
zachrose
Is this at University of Wisconsin-Madison? The image in the SoundCloud
sidebar suggests this happened at Ingraham Hall.

~~~
RDeckard
Yes. See [http://mobandmultitude.com/2013/07/02/the-nsa-comes-
recruiti...](http://mobandmultitude.com/2013/07/02/the-nsa-comes-recruiting/)

------
leke
I was watching a documentary last night on youtube about the lulzsec hackers
that got caught. A British woman with some government credentials made the
point that the hacking of companies and organisations had real knock on
effects that affected the jobs and careers of people in those targeted areas.
This is why it was wrong, and this is why hackers must be punished fro their
crimes.

Now, if the NSA are spying for US global corporations, the intelligence
gathered is to benefit the US corporations and negatively effect the
corporations being spied on. This means people affiliated with those
corporations/organisations targeted by the spying will be negatively affected
by the hacking/spying.

Of course, nobody will prosecute NSA affiliated hackers (or those in charge)
that destroy or affect the livelihoods of people they have targeted.

------
fvrghl
Why are they doing student recruiting right now? I imagine all sessions would
go like this.

~~~
DanBC
Sales of horse meat rose after food contamination scares in UK.

Also, we want ethical people working for them, because then there's more
people to say "Is this legal?" when an order for intelligence comes in.

~~~
jlgreco
Horse meat was not the issue; the issue was mislabeled cow meat. What did cow
meat sales do after the cow meat contamination news in the UK?

I don't buy the classic "change the organization from within" line. If that
were the proper thing to encourage then we should all be running out looking
for the most despicable corporations to work for and the most horrendous
governments to pay taxes to.

~~~
DanBC
While many people avoided cheap cow meat products there were a few people
intrigued by the idea of horse meat.

I agree the "change the organisation from within" line is weak.

But I also think that there are many people who still think "You only need to
worry if you have something to hide" and who don't see a problem with what NSA
does. I guess those people will believe the NSA obeys the law.

I could understand people thinking the GCHQ box is "just a cache". Collecting
the data isn't a problem; looking through the data for targeted information
(grepping the specific name of a terrorist, for example) is ok; it's only a
problem if they start to look at everything. And those people won't think that
collection is the same as looking. It's not something I believe myself, but I
can see how others might.

Also, as has been mentioned, cognitive dissonance. People rationalise and
justify weird things all the time. I don't see that being different when
they're looking for work.

I'm not saying that not a single person has decided to not work for NSA!
Obviously, there's probably many people who would have been fine with spying
on foreign nations but very uncomfortable with the idea of spying on citizens.

------
downandout
While I happen to agree with her views, I think it was unfair to other
students for her to unleash her rant during a recruiting session. She went
there to intentionally cause conflict, evidenced by the fact that she recorded
it. Everyone in attendance was well aware of the NSA scandal - they didn't
need her to fill them in. While she may have the financial resources to take
the moral high ground on such matters, most college kids need jobs when they
graduate. She took away valuable time that those kids may have wanted to
interact with a potential employer.

------
gasull
This is so great. This is the only thing that has made me feel some hope since
all of this started.

Thank you!

------
sliverstorm
Sounds to me like this girl is doing her best to dig for a confrontation. She
alternates between questions and barely-veiled insults targeted at the
recruiters.

------
DevX101
I don't think they called her back.

------
dmead
i'm having flashbacks to a recruiting session i attended at my school in like
2005/6\. shiver.

------
Camillo
Video:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOZllbNarw](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOZllbNarw)

~~~
codeulike
Its a good speech. I transcribed it a while back:

 _Why shouldn 't I work for the NSA? That's a tough one. But I'll take a shot.
Say I'm working at the NSA, and somebody puts a code on my desk, something no
one else can break. Maybe I take a shot at it and maybe I break it. And I'm
real happy with myself, 'cuz I did my job well. But maybe that code was the
location of some rebel army in North Africa or the Middle East, and once they
have that location, they bomb the village where the rebels are hiding. Fifteen
hundred people that I never met, never had no problem with, get killed. Now
the politicians are saying, "Oh, send in the marines to secure the area", 'cuz
they don't give a shit. It won't be their kid over there, getting shot. Just
like it wasn't them when their number got called, 'cuz they were pulling a
tour in the National Guard. It'll be some kid from Southie over there taking
shrapnel in the ass. He comes back to find that the plant he used to work at
got exported to the country he just got back from. And the guy who put the
shrapnel in his ass got his old job, 'cuz he'll work for fifteen cents a day
and no bathroom breaks. Meanwhile he realizes the only reason he was over
there in the first place was so that we could install a government that would
sell us oil at a good price. And of course the oil companies used the little
skirmish over there to scare up domestic oil prices. A cute little ancillary
benefit for them but it ain't helping my buddy at two-fifty a gallon. They're
taking their sweet time bringing the oil back, of course, maybe even took the
liberty of hiring an alcoholic skipper who likes to drink martinis and fuckin'
play slalom with the icebergs, it ain't too long till he hits one, spills the
oil and kills all the sea life in the North Atlantic. So now my buddy's out of
work. He can't afford to drive, so he's walking to the fuckin' job interviews,
which sucks because the shrapnel in his ass is giving him chronic hemorrhoids.
And meanwhile he's starving 'cuz every time he tries to get a bite to eat the
only blue plate special they're serving is North Atlantic scrod with Quaker
State. So what did I think? I'm holding out for something better. I figure:
fuck it, while I'm at it why not just shoot my buddy, take his job, give it to
his sworn enemy, hike up gas prices, bomb a village, club a baby seal, hit the
hash pipe and join the National Guard? I could be elected President._

------
Gorpus
Wow I bet this girl is real proud of herself. But why is she trying to have
this debate with recruiters? How immature.

I hope NSA switches up their recruitment a little bit, make it easier for
technically qualified people who aren't exactly choir boys to get a job there.
I'd love to work for them.

Surveillance isn't going away, and I bet the technology side of it is
fascinating, full of interesting problems.

~~~
md224
I hate when comments people disagree with get downvoted, because now nobody's
going to see this and we're missing a great opportunity to debate with someone
who shares a drastically different viewpoint than the rest of us.

> "technically qualified people who aren't exactly choir boys"

I'm curious, are you referring dismissively to people with a steadfast
commitment to their own ethical compass? And if so, why?

Edit: I think Gorpus is dead now. I misinterpreted his comment about choir
boys though, he was just saying they only hire people with completely spotless
records, drug testing, etc.

