June 10, 2013

They aren't mining data to get the "terrorists". They are mining data to get the DATA.

Why?

It makes their lives easier.

They like having the information up front so they don't have to ask you for it. That's it.

The question is, where does that leave you?

It's true that at the moment they have no real interest in you. They are not "coming for you". At least, not yet. It depends on who "they" turn out to be in the future. The future isn't going to go away and it's going to be long. Did any of you anticipate the bullshit distortions to world politics that Bush proved was possible with just a small amount of ignorance, thwarting, deception, goal-post shifting, spin and outright lies?

The idea that there is a "baseline" of common decency underlying political procedures that somehow guarantees your future safety no matter who holds the cards is reaching for explanations of the world that make you feel comfortable.

The simple fact of the matter is you DON'T KNOW who will have access to this personal information in the future.

June 8, 2013

If there are any of you left that STILL can't see that the object here is nothing more than control

then I really don't know what to say to you.

They aren't establishing data networks about you for anything other than GETTING THE DATA. It's nothing to do with terrorists. they are doing it because it provides them with a generalised advantage OVER YOU.

They want to mould the populace into something more docile and easily manipulated. That's it. Why?

It makes life easier for them.

There's nothing particularly sinister about it from their point of view. They have no particular intention to cause any disturbance for YOU. They wan't to make their own lives simpler, that's all.

The question isn't whether or not your are "safe" or "unsafe", that's a fricken chimera. The likelihood of any particular person being killed violently by a nasty creepy "terrorist" or a nasty creepy "criminal" or, (GASP!) a nasty creepy GOVERNMENT SPONSORED GOON in ANY of the Western democracies has remained ROUGHLY THE SAME through the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st.

The question is whether you are in a position that satisfies YOU or a position that satisfies SOMEONE ELSE.

It doesn't MATTER whether or not some other person has some "reasonable cause" to do things with your personal information - it ISN'T THEIRS. It's YOUR PROPERTY.

June 8, 2013

If anyone EVER uses the word "terrorist" in any kind of communication with you

... distrust them and their motives.

The term is a movable feast.

It is used by whichever agency employs it to mean whatever said agency wants it to mean so long as the appropriate emotional charge is applied to the subject of the sentence in which it is used. It isn't a descriptor, it's tone device.

It is not an invitation to discuss or consider, it is not a term that explains or clarifies, it is an invitation (when not a covert instruction) to react emotionally to the individual/s to whom the term is applied.

Some years ago on DU, the vast majority of posters here seemed to know this. ("TERRA, TERRA, TERRA!!!&quot . There are now a large number of extremely confused people here who seem genuinely to believe that the term has some value beyond simple propaganda.

It is disheartening.

June 5, 2013

I was in a relationship with an ex-prostitute.

He had also been a heroin addict.

He had lots to say about heroin and very little to say about prostitution other than how often guys came to him and paid for him to just sit and listen to them talk about their lives and how awful they felt, which pissed him off.

He didn't particularly regret doing it. He was much more cut up about the heroin.

He got out of both and eventually moved to the UK and managed to get a job and a steady life. This would very probably never have happened if he had ever been arrested for heroin addiction or prostitution.

I do not know whether this can be considered "symmetrical" with the experience of women as prostitutes. I suspect not.

June 5, 2013

Bradley Manning is not as consequential as what he revealed.

Descriptions of him and arguments regarding how we should "perceive" him are of even less consequence and serve only to obfuscate and misdirect, to re-prioritise and designify.

Any conversation about Wikileaks that bends mysteriously towards the personal qualities of Bradley Manning does so to the continued benefit of those wishing to perpetuate the ignorance of what he brought to light and no-one else.