
They Live - dchest
https://whispersystems.org/blog/they-live/
======
grandalf
Have been thinking of something similar lately: A fictitious newspaper with
headlines that illustrate the propaganda aspect of our news orgs. Headlines
like:

\- Foreign leader lacks dignity

\- US institutions solid

\- Life in the 3rd world is horrible

\- Life in the 3rd world is meaningless/scary

\- Something some politician said was important.

\- Politician's legacy is important

\- Foreign institutions/economy shaky

\- Foreign unemployment soars

\- Life in foreign city dangerous

\- Election in foreign country rigged

\- Arcane details about silly political spat matter

\- US institutions beyond reproach

\- Firms are not beyond reproach

\- Sports matter

\- Storm with name nears

\- Three cheers for successful US company

\- You know buzzwords so you are informed about science

\- You know buzzwords so you are informed about technology

\- Token story about the EU

~~~
karmacondon
Isn't that called "The Onion"?

As they say about programming, the best way to complain about software is to
write software. If you don't like what the media is reporting then start your
own news organization of whatever kind, including satire. To complete the
exercise, put years of your life into building circulation, attracting
talented writers, dealing with technology costs and issues, creating and
maintaining relationships and generally doing the things necessary to scale a
business. Then after all of that investment, make the decision between
"listening to your customers and giving them what they want" and "sticking it
to the man".

The majority of media organizations don't select stories on the basis of what
will be the most effective form of propaganda, but based on what they think
people want to read about and discuss. Any business that has the mindset of
telling it's customers what they want instead of listening to them and
responding to their needs is going to have a rough go of it, including media
businesses. You may not like the results, but any fault that you perceive lies
more with your fellow citizens than it does with the organizations that
deliver news to them.

~~~
coldtea
> _As they say about programming, the best way to complain about software is
> to write software. If you don 't like what the media is reporting then start
> your own news organization of whatever kind, including satire. To complete
> the exercise, put years of your life into building circulation, attracting
> talented writers, dealing with technology costs and issues, creating and
> maintaining relationships and generally doing the things necessary to scale
> a business. Then after all of that investment, make the decision between
> "listening to your customers and giving them what they want" and "sticking
> it to the man"._

This seems to me like a very American conception of the issue (culturally I
mean).

The "continental" idea is that the Press (news) is not supposed to be a
business first and foremost, but a kind of service to the republic first, and
a business second.

The business aspect (ads, etc) is tolerated in the degree that the Press is
independent, informative, helps decocracy and transparency, etc.

If a news outlet owner can't make money off of it, he can always not do it.
Doing it badly, untruthfully, link-baity etc, is not something that's really
OK (e.g. because "they have to make money" \-- pimps have to make money too,
that's no excuse), but something that is an example of a sick Press.

> _The majority of media organizations don 't select stories on the basis of
> what will be the most effective form of propaganda, but based on what they
> think people want to read about and discuss._

That's also not 100% accurate. Will a lot of stores are run like that, other
aspects (like their stance in foreign politic issues, bills etc) are more
often than not based on the interests of the owner or sponsors of the outlet,
and in lots of cases downright propaganda (from the crude Operation Mockinbird
ways onwards to today:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird)
).

~~~
cbd1984
> The "continental" idea is that the Press (news) is not supposed to be a
> business first and foremost, but a kind of service to the republic first,
> and a business second.

This is dangerous because it is a lie. If the newspaper can't sell itself as a
business, it can't buy ink and paper, and it shuts its doors. The business
aspect is inescapable unless it's owned and run by the government, which is
even more dangerous to press freedom. If you deny the business aspect, you
can't analyze it, and you can't see if it biases coverage.

> If a news outlet owner can't make money off of it, he can always not do it.
> Doing it badly, untruthfully, link-baity etc, is not something that's really
> OK (e.g. because "they have to make money" \-- pimps have to make money too,
> that's no excuse), but something that is an example of a sick Press.

Except they _do_ have to make money. If you think of that as a sickness, all
Press is sick.

~~~
johnchristopher
>> The "continental" idea is that the Press (news) is not supposed to be a
business first and foremost, but a kind of service to the republic first, and
a business second.

> This is dangerous because it is a lie. If the newspaper can't sell itself as
> a business, it can't buy ink and paper, and it shuts its doors. The business
> aspect is inescapable unless it's owned and run by the government, which is
> even more dangerous to press freedom. If you deny the business aspect, you
> can't analyze it, and you can't see if it biases coverage.

"Continental" press is highly subsidized.

------
mrxd
I liked the documentary version of this post better:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBOINEXp0B8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBOINEXp0B8)

~~~
tylermauthe
Agreed -- no attribution given to Žižek either.

~~~
zevyoura
Attribution for the premise of They Live?

~~~
ad_hominem
First line of Moxie's post: " _The 1988 film They Live is one of the last
great masterpieces to come out of the hollywood left._ "

First sentence spoken in Zizek video: " _They Live from 1988 is definitely one
of the forgotten masterpieces of the Hollywood left._ "

------
getdavidhiggins
One of the great advantages of having supreme mastery of any field is - you
gain the ability to not partake in that field of your own volition. Others
still in the apprenticeship stages don't have that luxury, because they need
to learn - they need to absorb as much information as possible, and they can't
afford to simply opt out of learning more.

In terms of a specific symbol that identifies hacker/privacycare types there
is things like the glider symbol. Also, loose and informal groups like
Telecomix, and Anonymous are usually a sign someone has opted out of the
matrix and knows the game is rigged.

Cory Doctory makes the analogy that general purpose computers are going to get
inadvertently infected/compromised no matter how hard you try. Once a computer
is connected to the public Internet - it is a sitting duck, and exposed. We
can lock it down, but it is still speaking to the packet switched net, which,
by design - is going to be toxic.

I don't know how to protect my devices. A lot of the problems are too
systemic, and need massive changes in policy and law to get systems trusted
again.

Worth reading/watching:

Everything is broken:[https://medium.com/message/everything-is-
broken-81e5f33a24e1](https://medium.com/message/everything-is-
broken-81e5f33a24e1)

Telecomix: [http://telecomix.org/](http://telecomix.org/)

Redesigning a Broken Internet:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J_9EFGFR-Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J_9EFGFR-Y)

Hacker Emblem: [http://www.catb.org/hacker-
emblem/](http://www.catb.org/hacker-emblem/)

~~~
nickik
Its a economic war. Sitting on the switch and sniffing cleartext is easy and
cheap. Compromising every enduser point and the aggregating all the data is
much, much harder. More risk of detection, less reliablity and it needs
constant uptake because of software and hardware updates.

The NSA is not able to do this at the moment and they do everything they can
to avoid having to do it thatway. Keep with the words of Snowden "Secure
crypto properly developed", if we can make that happen we can increase
worrying about end user devices.

-Prio 1: Secure Crypt

-Prio 2: Good secure, crypto code

-Prio 3: Secure Enduser devices

------
nickik
I love whispersystems and use there products. This post gives a real inside
into the mind of of many hackers, specially in the last couple of years. You
spend so much time with Alice and Bob and because its intresting you think
about it even when talking to normal people and this might be a harmful way to
think when actually trying to build a relationship.

Moxie has probebly felt this more then most, and I want to take this change to
thank him and the rest of the people working on these systems.

I hope that we do meet on that beach and that classical liberals are equally
welcome even if we do support global capitalism :)

------
javajosh
"They Live" is a fun movie, and like Marxism, it certainly taps inot the
vague, nearly universal "everything is wrong" vibe that affects nearly
everyone but especially young adults. Other examples: The Matrix. Philip Dick
and Stanislaw Lem (perhaps the most underrated SF author ever) made careers
out of this emotion. For a modern incarnation on Netflix, check out Black
Mirror, particular "15 Million Merits"[1]. Powerful stuff.

When I step back and look at the world, for all of our terrible mistakes, we
(the western capitalist states) really _are_ the good guys, because personally
and politically, overwhelmingly, we really do despise the despots, and the
racists, and the needless violence and barbarism that rises to power in too
many places in the world. More than once we've spilled blood and spent money
not to benefit ourselves, but to stop something evil from happening to others.
And no, this doesn't excuse the fact that we've spilled _even more_ blood for
our own selfish ends, be they resources or the assertion of misguided
idealism.

Consumerism, unlike unjust war, is a trickier beast to slay. Why? Because it's
good in one important way! Consumption really _does_ drive an economy, which
is good for people's bellies, and well-fed people are pretty happy (watch
Triumph of the Will[2] and notice how often Riefenstahl shows food and people
eating). The urge to consume, and all the messaging that goes into it, are
manipulative, but it manipulates us into wealth. (Heaven help us all when even
the elite can't ignore the externalities of this approach, particularly WRT
climate!) We will soon see if virtual goods can thread this needle.

 _> Once we’ve put on the glasses, what do we do? Where are the aliens, and
how do we start killing them?_

As anti-authoritarian as I am, I still can't get behind killing anyone. Maybe
it's naive, but I really believe in non-violent (not passive) resistance.
Ghandi, MLK, Aung Yung Suu Kyi - they show us the remarkable power of
patience, love, and unyielding persistence.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifteen_Million_Merits](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifteen_Million_Merits)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHs2coAzLJ8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHs2coAzLJ8)

~~~
programmarchy
> When I step back and look at the world, for all of our terrible mistakes, we
> (the western capitalist states) really are the good guys, because personally
> and politically, overwhelmingly, we really do despise the despots, and the
> racists, and the needless violence and barbarism that rises to power in too
> many places in the world.

The history of western capitalist states has largely been one of rampant
colonialism. [1] Post-WW2, the U.S. has overthrown countless governments,
often democratic ones, to install regimes that would carry out U.S. policy,
and serve western national and corporate interests. [2]

> As anti-authoritarian as I am, I still can't get behind killing anyone.

Except for the covert coups and the mass genocides. Those are nothing to worry
about and can be written off as "misguided idealism", since we "really are the
good guys".

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Killing-Hope-Military-Interventions-
Si...](http://www.amazon.com/Killing-Hope-Military-Interventions-
Since/dp/1567510523)

[2]
[http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.pdf](http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.pdf)

~~~
javajosh
I am not a cold war historian. Let's take something more recent, like the 2003
invasion of Iraq. There was a great deal of killing in that war, and all of it
under false pretenses in the service of the neocon idea that overthrowing
Saddam would have a domino effect in the region, and create a democratic,
liberal middle east free of it's oppressive dictatorships.

It was wrong, it was stupid; but the _goal_ was right. The various Arab
Springs proved that. Governments in the middle-east are terrible and
oppressive. And sure, these sick states _exist_ because of historical western
imperialism and the aftermath of WWI, and are more recently maintained by oil
revenue. Fine. The fact remains that democracy is better and ideally there
would be democracy (and yes, capitalism) in the middle east.

Maybe I'm totally wrong. But my personal experience here was good, and it
doesn't seem evil to give other people the same benefits I got. My parents
were poor high school graduates who created a small business that put me
through college and made them wealthy. Western capitalism gave them that
opportunity. It also gave them the ability to worship how they wanted, and
encouraged them to tolerate, and appreciate, people of other races, creeds and
religions. If there's a nation or a system of government that gives those
benefits without any of the drawbacks, then I'm all ears, programmarchy! The
incompetent and frankly evil ways in which we've tried to protect and spread
that system are shameful, but it doesn't undermine the value of the system.

(This assumes, of course, that our goal is to spread our way of life
throughout the world, and not just consolidate control of natural resources
for the Fatherland's inordinate consumption, a la Rome).

------
conformal
they live is one of the best john carpenter films, and that includes the epic
10-minute on-concrete wrestling match before keith david will don the glasses.

being extremely entertained to see a blog entry about they live aside, making
privacy simple is super hard. similarly, making people care about privacy is
super hard. killing the aliens is even harder.

ubiquitous surveillance has a pretty obvious response in the long run:
ubiquitous encryption.

~~~
grecy
I've not seen the movie (yet) but reading the description on the blog was
enlightening for me.

I don't fit into Western Society at all - I couldn't care less for
consumerism, sports, mass media, smartphones, etc. etc. and I've always
thought it's because I can see the truth behind stuff, where other people just
see the glitter on the surface covering up the ugly truth.

Now I know I've just been wearing a pair of these sunglasses my whole life.

~~~
Chlorus
You sure are a special snowflake. Thank you for sharing your insights with the
rest of the world. Do you have a newsletter? I would like to subscribe to it!
Your fresh, humble insights are a beacon to us all, who have to contend with
the dumb sheeple on a daily basis.

~~~
grecy
newsletter? no. Blog about driving around the world following my dreams and
passions? yes. [http://theroadchoseme.com](http://theroadchoseme.com)

(yes, I know you were joking. I'm not :) )

------
zmap01
>years of avoiding products from Google

I found this passage quite confusing as TextSecure is wholly reliant on
proprietary Google services. Is there any chance that will be resolved soon,
Moxie?

