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Comment by sinak | Hacker News Reader

Hey everyone, author here.

The petition to the White House still needs 40k more signatures to get a response. If you haven't done so, please sign it:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/make-unlocking-cel...

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I signed it, and called my parents and asked them to, but unfortunately, they said, "It doesn't affect me, why should I sign it? Besides, if it's illegal, it should stay illegal."

This kind of apathy is exactly what got us here in the first place. Ridiculous how everyone will simply bend over backwards to get their rights taken away from them.

No wonder real reformers like Gary Johnson never get a chance.

>if it's illegal, it should stay illegal

This is the worst kind of authoritarian-enabling apathy around. It's not even a justification for the law, just an excuse to never question it.

Have any examples of a single online petition of any kind producing any useful result of any kind? You know, in the history of online petitions?

Didn't an author from Penny Arcade successfully get a visa or something like that to enter the US because of an online petition. IIRC he was trying to enter for business purposes but the US Gov't doesn't consider an online comic to be a viable business.

It was Dave from Cynanide & Happiness[0] who wanted to move from Northern Ireland to the US in order to work on their animated cartoons. He filed to get a work visa but the office didn't believe C&H worthy of it.

[0]: http://forums.explosm.net/showthread.php?t=67947

Just registered and signed it. This is my first White House signature.

Awesome - thank you Hawkee. I think the biggest barrier to signing is probably registering, thank you for taking the time to do that.

The biggest barrier for me is that I am fearful of the executive branch of the government having my directly-given opinions about subjects which may be controversial. How long before some analyst starts saying, "I bet people that care deeply about closing Gitmo, legalizing X, and dismantling Y are more likely to be domestic terrorists!" -- and then I end up on a no-fly list or something.

If it comes to that (and granted, it may), not being able to fly easily would be pretty low on my list of worries.

Great, only 40K more until they can ignore another petition! I'm guessing if 40 of Obama's corporate owners filed a petition the results would be slightly different.

Yes we've had online petitions in the UK for years of this kind and absolutely nothing at all gets done. Its the equivalent of sitting down and doing fuck all and making you feel happy doing it. Its another form of quelling dissidence from the lazy portion of the population.

Direct activism and martyrdom is about the only way to get a result unfortunately.

And don't go on about a vote - the population is by majority moronic dross unfit for breathing let alone voting. Don't expect miracles from monkeys.

Perhaps a natural disaster may redress the balance.

I signed, and for the first time ever clicked on a facebook icon embedded in a web page. Maybe it'll at least help the conversation along.

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