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Comment by komali2 | Hacker News Reader

What if the opposite happened? What if we all suddenly had undeniable confirmation that shitloads of people watch mannequin porn, and so fuck it, why be embarrassed by it?

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It doesn't seem to work that way. When Ashley Madison leaked did people stand up and go "whoa millions of men are trying to cheat on their spouses, maybe we shouldn't be embarrassed about this"? No, they said "whoa there are millions of fucked up men."

What about when all those celebrity nudies leaked? Did people stand up and say "maybe taking and sending nude photos isn't something we should be embarrassed about"? No, they said "look at this crazy photo of <Celebrity>!"

No, we said, "whoa, there are millions more fucked up men."

You have a very optimistic model of people.

Not necessarily. If literally everybody is open to the same level of scrutiny of their lives, how quick will they be to judge others, lest they in turn be judged?

I think its more likely that the judgement will spread in a highly non-uniform manner that reflected existing social biases with some people being vastly more negatively affected by having their secrets exposed than others.

Given equal access to the sources of shame of all three, would we really expect society to apply equal judgement standards to a mother, a billionaire asshole white guy, and a black guy from the inner city?

How is that kind of bias mitigated by privacy though?

My interpretation of the argument was that taking privacy away from those who had it wouldn't necessarily cause harm because in some aggregated way everyone would have something to lose and so people would be tempered against 'throwing the first stone'.

I think that notion is false because the negative effects of the loss of privacy will spread unequally and opportunity created for those to exploit the unequal consequences against their foes.

Very quick, it turns out. Judging others is a deflective tactic against being judged yourself. "People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones" is great spiritual wisdom but most people don't abide by it.

That's sorta my point. If no one had any privacy, then any time you judge others you open yourself to being judged. It's like punching someone in the face, you could do it but they'll probably punch you back.

So yeah, maybe you could make a big deal about congressman so-and-so having a diaper fetish or whatever, but then people will probably want to look into your porn browsing history.

They've just been punched in the face, they can't reasonably punch back. (Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth).

I know it seems like universal surveillance could level the field and make people less likely to judge, but in practice it doesn't work that way. You say "people will probably want into [the judger's] porn browsing history", but in reality, they don't. The preemptive strike generally wins, and counterstrikes generally look like defensive posturing. So removing all privacy just gives more power to the bigger asshole.

Just had a conversation about Amazon facial recognition with a friend last evening.

Imagine ten years in the future: you did something to upset the local police officer. Maybe you didn't pick up a can like he ordered. In any case, imagine he takes a photo of you with his body camera and then using Amazon's machine learning, they're able to find likeness of you doing "illegal" things and immediately write you a ticket. Resist more? Maybe Amazon can dig deeper and find out the faces you are around often and dig out treasure trove about someone.

I agree. Without universal enforcement, universal surveillance is pointless. This is why I was glad to see TSA selecting old women on wheelchairs with oxygen masks for searching while boarding onto airplanes because what we had before that was not random searching at all. It was profiling.

I'm amazed nobody in New York talks about NYPD reflective vests in a car's dash. Clearly, the car owner is communicating that the car belongs to a police officer to avoid a ticket. Anyone who does this does not belong in our police force. However, people just don't care about it.

Look at research into school bullies; it's a somewhat similar phenomenon to what you're envisioning.

---

Lisa: I can't believe I'm jealous of a baby!

Bart: Hey, so am I! When you're a baby, you can just spend all day rolling around on the floor. (sighs) I miss those days.

Nelson: Then roll, baby! (Bart rolls on the bus floor) Ha Ha! Floor Baby!

Lisa: You're laughing at him for something you made him do.

Nelson: Well… you're gay!

Lisa: People who call other people gay are often covering up their own latent homosexuality.

Wait I don't get the point of this story. Is it meant to show that by the story's end, Lisa has become the bully? That's how it reads to me.

Broadly speaking, prejudice can be and often is (much) stronger than family ties, even if the perceived misdeed does not impact the family.

How well do you expect things to go if you move these sorts of situations into a context without any kind of strong, positive emotional bond?

A liberal society works not because things are allowed, but because people don't know. (And are taught to not stick their noise into other people's business).

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