I see this argument repeated over and over on HN, with 0 evidence for it. Any
"evidence" people cite is usually of the "politicians are evil, so this should be obvious by definition" kind, sometimes of the "they tried x in the past, so surely some unrelated y they're trying to pass in the future is also about x" kind.
I haven't seen a single leak, a single admission from somebody trying to pass a law like this, that surveillance is actually the goal here. There are far too many politicians trying to pass laws like these, in very different countries across the world, for some kind of giant global conspiracy to stay undetected.
> There are far too many politicians trying to pass laws like these, in very different countries across the world, for some kind of giant global conspiracy to stay undetected.
This is today's top agrument! "There are far too many gangsters each operating in their own district for some kind of notion of organized crime to be credible".
You don't need conspiracy, you need the incentives.
The state always thinks of self-preservation. Any bureaucrat is aligned to this goal by getting the benefits from the state. So, the more power it has over its citizens, which is the first threat it, the more safe it is and the less opinions of citizens matter.
Understanding this, every citizen must think carefully about giving away more power to the state.
I see this argument repeated over and over on HN, with 0 evidence for it. Any "evidence" people cite is usually of the "politicians are evil, so this should be obvious by definition" kind, sometimes of the "they tried x in the past, so surely some unrelated y they're trying to pass in the future is also about x" kind.
I haven't seen a single leak, a single admission from somebody trying to pass a law like this, that surveillance is actually the goal here. There are far too many politicians trying to pass laws like these, in very different countries across the world, for some kind of giant global conspiracy to stay undetected.
Plain ignorance seems far easier to believe.