Hacker News Reader

Comment by 29083011397778 | Hacker News Reader

> and it will let the use of encryption be evidence in lawsuits and criminal trials

How long until the comparisons to East Germany start? America is apparently gearing up for "If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear", with many seemingly agreeing with this sentiment.

Perhaps more importantly, how have major journalistic networks not written about this bill in the worst possible light? When your sources want to use encryption, which is reasonable given some stories, this exact excerpt seems likely to bite someone in the ass.

While we're on the subject, I thought I'd heard that American polititians were using Signal? What happens when using encryption becomes ammunition for a lawsuit against them? Do they simply assume they have very, very good lawyers, and it'll all shake out because they don't believe they did (are going to do) anything wrong?

View on HN

That's a good point. Perhaps as well as writing to representatives it could be helpful to write to EG the Washington Post and ask them to cover the issue more extensively.

Journalism is dying each day, between naive both-sideism, lazy PR reproductions and entertainment figures in entertainment channels that have "news" in the name

It should go like this: whoever is in favour of this legislation should have no problem showing their private messages in public. Interesting how nobody presents this angle in congress.

> how have major journalistic networks not written about this bill in the worst possible light?

I was originally going to ponder if it was because today's generation of journalists aren't privacy preserving, freedom of speech maximalists. While there are some that seek to limit freedoms as long as their "side" is on top, I don't think that's it.

The last five years of political discourse has worn us down. We're tired of the back and forth, constant everyday existential crises of democracy. If every day the world is falling apart, then something like this just looks like business as usual.

We're tired. Frankly we wasted energy on stupid things and lost sight of the war. And now they get to ram this horrible, freedom rotting legislation through.

But, if words, hate and disinformation cause what we refer to as harm, don't the ends justify the means?

The collective shout from the new generations is a resounding Yes.

Sadly it's as historically uninformed as it is privileged to believe that words do harm.

I think what `echelon` is trying to say is that regardless of what "side" you're on, this opens the door to be used by both whenever an (arbitrary) precedence presents itself or is "politically expedient".

Of course it is. It's a cynical power play. That's what happens when we spurn universal ideals like freedom of speech, hence "the end justifies the means". My opponents are so harmful, such a threat, that anything must be done, and nothing, including principles, should stand in the way.

We don’t really have journalism in the US anymore. Most of the financially healthy ones are owned by foreigners that are actively trying to sabotage our democracy. The remainder are on life support, and are running with something like 10% the number of reporters they used to have.

Also, Godwin's law was repealed years ago, so you may as well compare to the third reich.

Foreigner or us national, all news sourced ultimately serve the interests of their owners.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com