Yes, there are a lot of things wrong with the world. Yes, powerful people are doing bad things to us normal folk, sometimes in secret, just to make money and/or gain power. So I’d like to ask everyone: how bad is it, really?
For example, threads have been started here challenging why public cameras, such as those in Tampa and in England, scanning for criminals with face-recognition technology, are so bad. I’ve seen arguments that the government could use it to track, then eliminate, those they consider subversive without raising a fuss and without having to send out operatives, using information gained to embarass or discredit enemies of the state. I’m still not sure what I think of this.
Then there’s stuff like that described in this link:
(derived from a story on slashdot.org, which I swing by occasionally, mostly for the political stories)
Yeah, we all know that the government doesn’t always do what’s in our best interest. If slashdot.org’s users, and plenty of other people, are to be believed, for example, there will be armed revolution, or at least mass immigration to Canada or Europe, as the government quickly strips away so many rights that the country will be a police state, since the “common man” doesn’t know or care about the issues they care about, some of which are pretty serious.
So I toss out this question: what do you all think of the state of the nation and world today, in general? When someone on a message board or Web site starts ranting about this kind of thing, what’s your reaction? Do you trust the police, or do you fear and hate them as bringers of oppression? In short, do you think we NEED to be paranoid?