I grew up in that tradition, so I can shed some light: The fear of a national ID isn’t just about tracking and privacy, but that an individual cannot participate in society or survive if the government decides to revoke the id.
Meaning, I can’t buy food; rent or buy a home; or hold any sort of job and earn and save.
What we have today isn’t better, but until recently I was hard pressed to see how such fears were even warranted.
> Exactly. You do not want to hand the US government the ability to “turn off” someone’s daily life at the press of a button.
If you're within the borders of the US, this ability already exists, they have a monopoly on violence in the country, something the government is very eager to demonstrate this year.
There’s a lot of room between violence and financial isolation. The government has shown multiple times that it is willing to go after otherwise law-abiding citizens who take up disfavored careers, whether it’s gun dealers and payday lenders in Operation Choke Point, cannabis dispensaries in states where it was legal, or online cam girls. In all of these cases, going to cash or using alternatives to the banking system was possible and even necessary for them to survive.
And none of those examples you use, involve SSNs, these are all 100% paperless people/companies? Makes me wonder how they got bank accounts in the first place if they're so disconnected from society.
The individuals had SSNs, but did not have a hypothetical national ID connected to systems that could have been used to fully isolate them. As long as backchannels exist in the system to accommodate those without SSNs/DLs, it is possible to get by even if the system tries to cut you off.
> As long as backchannels exist in the system to accommodate those without SSNs/DLs, it is possible to get by even if the system tries to cut you off
And again, as long as backchannels exists in the system to accommodate those without a Government ID, it is possible to get by even if the system tries to cut you off.
Don't you see and understand you already have government ID? You're just calling it by another name...
> Once the official ID exists, those backchannels will be cut off,
Do you seriously not get it yet? You have IDs now, and you claim those backchannels exists now, and haven't been cut off. Why would calling something something else suddenly make those backchannels be cut off? How come they exists today in the first place then?
Official IDs don’t exist now. The “surrogate” IDs (SSN, DLs) are not universal nor mandatory, and there are legal barriers to using them as an official national ID.
"Monopoly on violence" isn't some new concept I just invented here, it's a established concept about "legal use of force", which the government typically is the sole arbiter of. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence
Of course many engage in "violence", or "provide it", that is not in doubt.
I know it’s not new, thus why I said I’ve never seen a definition that is both true and useful.
In the U.S. I can lawfully use violence in many ways under many circumstances. I.E. if you’re in my house and I didn’t invite you there, I can slay you lawfully.
In the U.S. the federal government is not the only institution responsible for law making or law enforcement. It is not only entity that can lawfully use violence. Etc.
Not to mention the increasing use of private security and even private police, and the increasing use of military PMCs and privately owned/controlled “kill chain” components like Palantir and Starlink/Starshield.
> In the U.S. I can lawfully use violence in many ways under many circumstances. I.E. if you’re in my house and I didn’t invite you there, I can slay you lawfully.
Yes, and you can do so, because the government and state says it's OK to do so. If they didn't, it wouldn't. This is the core idea.
> In the U.S. the federal government is not the only institution responsible for law making or law enforcement. It is not only entity that can lawfully use violence. Etc.
Hence the whole "sole arbiter of" and last paragraph in my last comment. All those entities are "allowed to use violence" because your government says it's OK.
All those entities are "allowed to use violence" because your government says it's OK.
I don't know if you're in the US, but that's simply not how our Constitution works. "Monopoly on violence" is just something some people made up. It's meaningless, just some empty words on paper.
(Which is also true for the Constitution itself, of course. But if you're talking about the theoretical and philosophical basis for lawmaking in the US, that's what determines both. Theoretically.)
It’s funny because the whole notion of a monopoly on violence is very traditional and tightly coupled to the Westphalian notion of statehood, yet I often see that the first people to cite the monopoly on violence are also the ones undermining the Westphalian state model.
In any case all the old gods are dead or dying, including old ideas of statehood, so enjoy the ride, everyone.
If you define the entity as “all institutions that are allowed to create and enforce laws” and then say “that entity has a monopoly on creating and enforcing laws” you’ve created a tautology.
There are clear counter examples to your statement in the U.S.
States are not “allowed” to use violence because the Federal government says it’s okay. States have a right to create and enforce laws.
> The fear of a national ID isn’t just about tracking and privacy, but that an individual cannot participate in society or survive if the government decides to revoke the id.
This is because the US made a critical flaw by tying the authentication and authorization tokens into one single token - your driving license/ID. They should be separate things. Your authentication token (who are you?) should have your picture and be forgery resistant. Your authorization token (what can you do?) should be a piece of plastic with zero pictures (like your insurance card). Did you get stopped for DUI? The officer takes your authorization token, instead, the officer confiscates both tokens and hands you a paper receipt.
The FAA does it the smart way, your authorization token (pilot's license) has no photo. You do something stupid, the ATC tells you to "call this number" and if it is really badly stupid, then the local FAA person confiscates your authorization token.
> but that an individual cannot participate in society or survive if the government decides to revoke the id
What would happen today if your government revokes a SSN which is your de facto "personal identification number" today? Can you still rent/buy a home? Can you have a job?
Isn't all of those cases then also proof that if the SSN was a government ID instead, all of those things would have been the same? The ID wouldn't "impossible to make transactions and survive", just an impediment, just like not having a SSN is today.
Point is, the US already basically have a de facto "ID card", they just don't call it as such (yet?), so claiming somehow correctly labeling this thing would make things worse or more difficult, doesn't make much sense.
You can't really identify someone by their SSN. My card is literally just a piece of cardstock paper with a name and number, and no one has ever asked to see it. There is no photo. There is no security.
Is it generally considered that The Amish "participates in society"? I thought the whole point for them was that they're "outside of modern society", to some degree at least.
They participate in their own society, which allows them to survive in their own way. In other countries, national IDs have often been followed by mandatory registration requirements for renting or owning property, employment, etc. At present there are ways to get around using ID for many things, and it should stay that way.
Meaning, I can’t buy food; rent or buy a home; or hold any sort of job and earn and save.
What we have today isn’t better, but until recently I was hard pressed to see how such fears were even warranted.