

How An Israeli Sees The Recent NSA Controversy  - ishener
https://medium.com/p/172f3d8ebb01

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smoyer
"Don’t you think it’s better to damage the entire society in a broad spread,
than having a few individuals taking all the damage? Of course you don’t, you
are hypocrat liberal white people"

No ... but if you write the same exact blog post replacing "terrorism" with
"automobiles", you can make a very good argument for outlawing cars.

~~~
ishener
you're right. "The goal of the NSA’s eavesdropping was to prevent
automobiles".

Wow, now it's clear we need to outlaw cars.

~~~
Zigurd
His point is that the broad argument that damaging all of society a little is
OK falls down when generalized. And, on top of that, even this intrusive,
pervasive, broadly damaging surveillance doesn't actually prevent what it
claims to prevent.

There is a problem with trying to analogize from the Israeli point of view.
Almost no place on Earth is enough like Israel, and is in a sufficiently
similar condition, for those analogies to work. As the TSA's behavioral
screening fiasco shows, it is also, for the same reasons, very difficult to
transplant Israeli practices in security.

~~~
smoyer
I should also point out that the Israeli method of doing airport screening is
to be admired. Highly-trained agents who understand human psychology, body
language, etc. ask the right questions and have a lot better chance of picking
out who needs additional screening than the random algorithm that results in
"SSS" being printed on your boarding pass.

Israel, from its inception has been in dramatically more danger than the U.S.,
so I'm not surprised that their attitudes are different.

~~~
anon1685
"... the Israeli method of doing airport screening is to be admired"

Well that depends on who you ask. Palestinians or even people with distant
Arab roots who are subject to racial profiling, or even people suspected of
being, god forbid, peace activists might tell you otherwise. Some examples:

[http://mondoweiss.net/2012/06/do-you-feel-more-arab-or-
more-...](http://mondoweiss.net/2012/06/do-you-feel-more-arab-or-more-
american-two-arab-american-womens-story-of-being-detained-and-interrogated-at-
ben-gurion.html)

[http://mondoweiss.net/2013/10/big-
hold.html](http://mondoweiss.net/2013/10/big-hold.html)

[http://english.pnn.ps/index.php/politics/6148-palestinian-
at...](http://english.pnn.ps/index.php/politics/6148-palestinian-athlete-
still-waiting-for-belongings-6-days-after-flight-from-ben-gurion)

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CurtHagenlocher
What's hypocritical about not wanting to live in a surveillance state?

------
anon1685
Putting aside the condescending tone of the article, the actual argument
represents the typical Israeli knee-jerk reaction to terrorism, and the
absolutely myopic, black-and-white, I-don't-give-a-shit-about-anyone-
else's-pain-because-we've-been-through-the-holocaust world view so proudly
exhibited by the Israeli mainstream.

I'm also Israeli (although not currently living in Israel), and I can assure
you that there are many Israelis, me included, who are very disturbed by the
recent NSA revelations.

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olgeni
Next time, please put the "white people" at the top, so my Ctrl-W reflex will
trigger before reaching the end.

~~~
ishener
that was on purpose

------
malandrew
The concluding sentence screams "flag me".

