Well, the beauty of a democratic society is that if a majority agree with you, then you can change the system.
This is technically true, but ignores the fact that it's a totally rigged game. You have a news media that's intent on dividing people over relatively small issues and pushing certain narratives. You have contractors who are paid to do the same online. You have a system of surveillance that could be used to discredit (or worse) promising political figures, and intimidate journalists. You have a large part of your government that operates in secret, under secret laws, preventing any kind of meaningful debate beyond "we need more transparency." All of this makes it incredibly difficult to get a majority to agree with anything that established powers don't approve of. It can be done (like we're seeing with marijuana legalization), but it requires a Herculean effort.
People who disagree with this comment and say it's false would do well to read this book http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104810/ Manufacturing Consent, by Noam Chomsky. It is very well researched, carefully documented. At least look at the information and think about it. The people don't have nearly as much control as it seems.
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle
This is such arrogant bullshit. You're basically saying that if only everyone else were as enlightened as you, they'd care about the objectively important issues like NSA spying, instead of "relatively small issues" like abortion or gay rights, etc. Among my group of friends, DOMA generated far more interest than the NSA news. Are they just misled by the media?
Among my group of friends, DOMA generated far more interest than the NSA news. Are they just misled by the media?
I wouldn't blame anyone for taking more interest in gay rights than the NSA. The emerging widespread acceptance of gays as fellow human beings is probably unique to human history. It is hard to overstate the significance of that. But at the same time, I wouldn't give too much credit to the news media. It was a convenient wedge issue, but I suspect established powers were largely indifferent as to the outcome.
Among my friends, gay rights, abortion, the environment, wrongful convictions (of poor black kids in the inner city, not "patriots" like Snowden), taxes, social security, and healthcare all outrank "privacy" in terms of importance. Are they just brainwashed into this by the "established powers"?
Brainwashed is a strong word, and I've never met your friends. But I would argue that the NSA story is vastly more important than the issues you mentioned, except possibly the environment (and see my comment above about gay rights). My reasoning has more to do with the potential for abuse than the abuse that has already come to light. I think it is best summed up by this NY Times excerpt on Frank Church, the first senator to investigate the NSA:
He added that if a dictator ever took over, the N.S.A. "could enable it to impose total tyranny, and there would be no way to fight back."
You think the NSA story is "vastly more important" based on your calculus of how it might be abused and how likely it is to be abused. Don't you think people are entitled to come to differing conclusions about that without accusations that they are brainwashed by the media? Because that's basically what you're doing when you reject the impact of the democratic process in all this: people can't be trusted to hold their own opinions because they're guided to opinions by the media.
This is not a moral gray area. The NSA is the government breaking its laws, throwing off its checks, and establishing tyranny. The other issues that have been brought up in this thread (gay rights, abortion) are pittances as a people we humbly request of the government.
Or, the NSA program is a targeted intelligence system designed to stay within the wide latitude afforded by the law and the 4th amendment? Not the establishment of tyranny, but a mundane apparatus that ultimately will have little real impact on the lives of ordinary Americans.
I think reasonable minds can differ about which characterization is appropriate.
Someone who sacrifices everything he's got, exposes a bunch of bad things his government is doing at great personal risk to himself has definitely earned the patriot label, Snowden is doing a lot more to improve America than most of the flag waving bumper sticker crowd that happily affix that label onto themselves.
Taxes, social security and healthcare are important, but they are not more or less important than privacy on an absolute scale and they are not on the same axis to begin with. You can have a perfect police state with social security, healthcare and low taxes and 0 privacy.
Privacy is a fundamental human right recognized in the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
What good is it to have the right to abortion, gay marriage, immigration amnesty etc. if tomorrow you can be taken away and locked up for the rest of your life, without any due process, all because of an email you wrote?
The UN Declaration of Human Rights is not law in the United States and recognizes many things that are not recognized as fundamental rights in the United States: right to international travel, right to social security, right to "desirable work" and to join trade unions, right to "rest and leisure", right to education, etc.
Also, your hypothetical is disingenuous. It wraps violations of due process in with monitoring of e-mail. I'd imagine most people would consider the real outrage in your hypothetical to be the "without any due process" part, not the "because of an e-mail" part.
This is technically true, but ignores the fact that it's a totally rigged game. You have a news media that's intent on dividing people over relatively small issues and pushing certain narratives. You have contractors who are paid to do the same online. You have a system of surveillance that could be used to discredit (or worse) promising political figures, and intimidate journalists. You have a large part of your government that operates in secret, under secret laws, preventing any kind of meaningful debate beyond "we need more transparency." All of this makes it incredibly difficult to get a majority to agree with anything that established powers don't approve of. It can be done (like we're seeing with marijuana legalization), but it requires a Herculean effort.