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Comment by 2OEH8eoCRo0 | Hacker News Reader

>I get the sense that most HN commenters are against having police surveil this kind of event in the U.S.

Look to your left and right. The people building this dystopia are right here on this site.

"Notably, Epstein, who was known for his interest in obtaining blackmail through the sexual abuse of the underaged girls he exploited, also claimed to have “damaging information” on prominent figures in Silicon Valley. In a conversation last year with New York Times reporter James Stewart, Epstein claimed to have “potentially damaging or embarrassing” information on Silicon Valley’s elite and told Stewart that these top figures in the American tech industry “were hedonistic and regular users of recreational drugs.” Epstein also told Stewart that he had “witnessed prominent tech figures taking drugs and arranging for sex” and claimed to know “details about their supposed sexual proclivities.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/12/business/jeffrey-epstein-...

I hope we’ve reached a point where aside from pedophilia or coercive sex practices, sexual proclivities and drug use would not be enough to blackmail anyone today. The religious right and their “moral majority” have been hamstrung both through the courts and through culture moving on.

Prior to the first tech boom wider society also believed not wearing a suit was a reliable indicator that a person was stupid. We’ve progressed past these ridiculous ideas. I know plenty of exceptional performing individuals who both like sex and occasionally use drugs. If we’re backsliding into the right’s moral majority tyranny again, someone let me know as my filter bubbles may have me blinded.

Either way, none of the high profile Silicon Valley people I know would care that someone knows they have sexual desires.

I would agree, but it's rather interesting to see how the evolution of social acceptance has changed the blackmail game.

So in intelligence circles, just being gay int he mid-20th century was enough to blackmail a person, but because most people, even conservatives, have adjusted to it, it no longer serves as enough of a blackmail. This is why in the blackmail world it moves progressively towards more repulsive actions.

Honestly an analysis of Epstein shows he was more trying to get his foot in the door in SV (as his backing of a few tech ventures confirms) but it lends me to believe he didn't have "the real dirt" on SV.

When you look at which intelligence agencies were running Epstein though, it becomes more clear that they certainly already have a huge presence in SV, and they are certain to have deployed the blackmail networks for quite some time.

So yes, aside from those things you mention, we should be relatively ok with whatever... but the problem is the blackmail system will move towards those things if they know that, and they do so.

I've tried to explain this progression to others, and it applies across the board to politicians, businessmen, etc. Bribery comes first. Then comes blackmail. It starts with the after-after party, and the target is in the back room doing drugs. Got it on video. Next it's a prostitute. Next it's an underage prostitute. Next is abuse... and it progresses into places most people on HN wouldn't want to know. If you do want to know more, lookup the Dutroux scandal, aka the Belgian X-files.

I would venture most of SV doesn't have to progress past the bribery stage, and that includes manipulations of national identity (national security).

it’s more of a "surveillance for thee, not for me" sort of deal on HN.

HNers only object to surveillance on themselves?

I think it's more that human nature lets you justify a lot in the act of self-preservation. When it advances your career, it's so easy to say "if I wasn't writing this code, then it would just be the next programmer in line behind me."

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