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[Lord Shonus]

So apparently the new head of CIA thinks that using encryption is a red flag in and of itself

That's really stupid on several levels, not least the fact that some of the most popular encryption and privacy setups available were created by US intelligence agencies and opened to the public to help disguise their traffic.

[TheBiggerFish]

So apparently the new head of CIA thinks that using encryption is a red flag in and of itself

Oh god why.

[wierd]

because if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear, citizen!  Why do you not trust the seasoned and and professional opinions of your government?  Are you planning seditious activities, citizen?

/s

if you want the real reason(s), it (they) are because incompetent people cannot accurately evaluate competence, in addition to their having paranoid fears about average citizens not being in absolute terror of their government. Citizens that can freely communicate without being spied on are able to discuss any topic, including any topic the government finds disfavorable. That frightens power hungry morons like the people running our government.

The actual reasons why we truly, honestly, and without question NEED good encryption, is because the average cyber criminal is sophisticated enough to steal thousands, if not millions of passwords, credit account credential sets, and whole user identities, and do so *trivially*, without it.  The average user is naturally a little untrusting of government, but is MUCH LESS trusting of the "Nigerian Prince", and for demonstrable reasons. (Yes, people still fall for that old yarn, I know. PT Barnum put it succinctly I think.)

The idiots in government apparently dont grok how encryption works, and think it is analogous to physical security, when in reality it is just really complicated math problems.  As a consequence, they talk of absurdities like "back doors" and other moronic things, when suggesting purposefully useless encryption that is trivial to break. Naturally, they have yet to address the reality that if it is trivial for them to break, it is trivial for criminals to break too-- but that detracts from the narrative that "good guys need a way in to stop the bad guys!"  Maybe if they were better at reducing the activity of those bad guys we already have, and NO, not fucking ISIS, I mean the damned Nigerian Prince, and those idiots that steal credit card numbers, people would be more willing use weaker encryption-- but no, they are simply too incompetent for that.

[Sergarr]

So apparently the new head of CIA thinks that using encryption is a red flag in and of itself

I've also heard that he approves of executing dissidents people who leak information about government's illegal activities, like Snowden.

Soooo yeah.

At this rate, I wonder if there are going to be any liberal countries left in the world by the end of this decade. Hopefully France will stop this de-liberalization trend by not electing Le Pen, but... it would rely on French people to not give in to nationalism... very iffy.

I've heard that their two-stage election system is well suited to block extremists from taking power by ultimately requiring them to win a majority of voters, so at least that's an advantage in our favor.

[apiks]

-snip-

[wierd]

Many people get confused by what the opposite of nationalism is.

The opposite of liberalism is conservatism.

The opposite of nationalism is cosmopolitanism.

There is usually a nice hand-holding, and passionate public makeout scene between Liberalism and Cosmopolitanism, but that does not make them the same entity.

Stay sharp kids!

[Sergarr]

I've yet to see any country that's both nationalistic and liberal at the same time. Same about cosmopolitan and conservative.

I'm having a hard time imagining how such countries would even look like.

[wierd]

Conservative + Cosmopolitan: Early roman empire, in the heavy expansion era. Many different people, nearly all slaves to the "clearly superior" Roman elite.

Rights were tightly controlled by an in-crowd. Women were second class citizens. Gay people were killed in gruesome ways. Only wealthy roman men could vote. The official polytheistic state religion was RIGOROUSLY enforced.

But lots of different cultures and peoples, all living together in one place!


Liberal + Nationalistic:  The US just 4 years ago. Did America ever stop being "NUMBER ONE!!!!1!!!!!!11!" ?  No, it did not. But it did enact a kind of socialized healthcare, legalize cannabis in many states, and reform its opinion of alternative marriages. Very liberal.

[Sergarr]

I'm. Uh. Rome was nationalistic as fuck, Romans thought themselves to be the chosen nation that was destined to rule over the world by the gods, and were ready to go en-masse on suicide marches hundreds and thousands of kilometers away from Rome in order to kill their enemies for the glory of Rome.

That's not very cosmopolitan.

[Criptfeind]

I think it's more complex then just two axis that people are along, the issue is that words change and have complex meaning, like, Liberal can mean the specific set of values that it currently embodies, which includes in most cases includes being cosmopolitan or just a general acceptance and willing to try new values, which would mean if you had a country that's always been traditionally cosmopolitan in theory nationalism would be a "liberal" belief. Although of course that totally depends... On how you use the word.

I don't think enslaving other nations and forcing their population to serve you really counts as Cosmopolitan though, I think you need a core of acceptance and... For lack of a better word "mixing" of the cultures outside the nation. Just squashing a bunch of foreigners into your slavery culture doesn't count.

I don't think you can totally mix being totally cosmopolitan and being totally liberal, since the differences in the cultures making up the cosmopolitan society need at least acceptance of their existence, but stuff like, say, parts of the US have a lot of mixes of cultures and can be quite cosmopolitan, even if it's not without stress and importantly doesn't have acceptance of other cultures outside the mix, so it ways, liberal, in other ways, conservative. Basically, too complex to really say.

[wierd]

Webster on Cosmopolitan:

cosmopolitan
adjective cos·mo·pol·i·tan
Simple Definition of cosmopolitan

    : showing an interest in different cultures, ideas, etc.

    : having people from many different parts of the world

Rome was VERY interested in other cultures and ideas. It was SO interested in fact, that it sent huge armies to take them by force.

Rome was also full of people from all over the known world. As slaves.

It was VERY cosmopolitan.

[Criptfeind]

Er. No. It depends on if you actually care about the culture and the differences between the people. Maybe Rome did, I'm not sure about their culture. But just conquering places to own them and not giving a shit and squashing all their people together into your culture, and making them your own people, doesn't really count.

Now, slave culture was probably pretty cosmopolitan, but that doesn't make Roman society as a whole so.

Like, this makes American Conservatives count under your rules, since most people are mix of different ethnicity (even if no one cares or knows their whole history) and we sure do interact with a lot of different cultures via conquering and warfare.

[DJ]

They cared a lot about Greek culture at least.

[wierd]

The slave culture was a part of Rome.  The roman elite benefited from the cultural cross-pollination of its slave caste. New foods, new products, new garments, exotic forms of art (including exotic forms of martial combat. Romans LOVED their arenas.)

The Roman elite prized such increases in wealth. Arena champions were slaves, but really good ones were well respected in their own way. See for instance, Spartacus.

[Criptfeind]

Yeah, that sounds a bit more cosmopolitan then just sorta enslaving people and taking their lands...