SIATD v2 wrote:You're missing the point - why pick 'snow' in the first place?
Because it's part of their sinister plan to spy on people from Minnesota. I don't know, YOU tell ME. In reality, it's for some reason that would make total and complete sense if you had the facts. Which you don't. Which is why this is nothing to get worked up about.
Again, this is just playing at prejudice. If you're the type of person who's already deeply paranoid about Government intelligence, this will fuel your fire. If you're on the fence or ambivalent, there's no data here to move you to a change of position.
So unless something is truly 'news' in the sense of being new, you don't care about it?
New or exciting, I suppose.
That's an EXTREMELY odd position for someone who proudly labels himself a 'conservative' to take. Let alone a Christian conservative, someone whose morality derives from some ancient text. I think you should reconsider what motivated you to say 'meh, who cares?', i.e. why you cared enough to say that.
Reason, I'd like to think. My motivation is that this just seems like a bunch of sensationalist trash designed to work people up and play to their suspicions without actually providing any information. That sort of thing bugs me.
That's exactly how they want you to think - don't fundamentally question whether an open forum where you are limited to 140 characters and where people are frightened into only saying what is deemed acceptable is a tool for social control, just point out that since it's in public it isn't really spying.
Of course Twitter is a tool for social control, and Facebook, and Myspace before it.
That's why I never use them and never will. But for the people who have addicted themselves to telling the entire fucking universe about every waking moment of their lives (and submitting themselves to the review and approval of strangers and near-strangers for it all), it should come as no surprise that 'the entire fucking universe' includes people who work for the FBI, NSA, Coca-Cola, and so on. That's a purely 'have your cake and eat it too' attitude to think otherwise.
This isn't about invasion of privacy, it's about an atmosphere and mentality that will lead to self-censorship, it is about breeding compliant citizens.
Social media was about those things long before the Government got involved (if there was such a time). Self-censorship and complacency comes about just fine by the very nature of the media itself. Which is why you ought not do it if such things concern you.
It is several different factors. This isn't about stopping people from using the word 'snow', it's about making people think 'maybe I shouldn't write 'snow' because they might be watching',
Anyone who wasn't already thinking that way was insanely naive to begin with.
it is about replacing the ethereal omniscient, omnipresent God of your tradition with a technocratic God, but with the same implications of damnation, fire and brimstone and all that crap. One tool of social control being replaced by another.
Yes, the internet in a nutshell. With or without the Government. How many massive political movements have sprung up recently because people were shamed/manipulated into it through a semantic contagion spreading through their social media? Can you even count them on your fingers anymore? Think what you want, but by posting what I am the way I am, I'm actually
resisting the effects of social media that you are trying to capitalize on this thread, and arguing for reason rather than 'movement'.
Why, what do you expect they will find? The vast, vast majority of people talking about this stuff are the security services themselves.
The vast majority of people talking about pork and snow? And besides, if you're right about the above, then what's the problem? Let the spies spy on each other.
Seriously- what's the alternative? That we decide it's evil or unconstitutional or a violation of human rights for the Government to read what people publicly post on the internet?
And this is why the American Christian mentality and style of argument is such a waste of time -
It would have been quicker to answer the question. Do you think Governments should be prohibited from monitoring social media? Look, just tell me what you want- You want an open social networking forum where everybody in the world can say things to everybody else in the world that comes with a guarantee that entities you don't trust will never see or take advantage of the information you give? No. That's not even coherent. So tell me what you
really want- just to bitch? OK fine- which is why this is nothing exciting.
