When the US inevitably does turn into an authoritarian dictatorship, I think people would be happy if there wasn't copious amounts of proof they were on the streets protesting.
I should add: In all of the streams and pictures I've seen, all (most?) the looters or violent people were wearing masks, ensuring their anonymity. If anybody's being protected by measures like this, it's your average peaceful protestor.
that is precisely the sort of group i was protesting with, hence why i was attacked, and i had no need to hide my face because we were not doing anything illegal
and the US is not nazi germany or the ccp. if it were, face blur filters would be the least of your concerns. this only makes sense in the context of conducting illegal activity in a lawful democracy
Why do protesters have an expectation of privacy? You go out in public and someone might see you there. If you're a peaceful protester, it shouldn't matter. If you're performing criminal acts while protesting, you should be stopped.
I see a lot of people saying that it's terrible that protesters might be identified. I think at least some of these people are secretly upset that people can't break windows and burn cars with impunity.
Those protests, and the political activism generally, are just a symptom.
Every single person in the US has seen multiple videos of police violence, lies, and various other abuses. A mix of widespread cameras, and the police being increasingly flagrant with some abuses, has radically reshaped people's opinions.
Even if no one protested, seeing trust crater is to be expected.
You can protest and people do, at least in larger cities streets become full. Protesters are selectively detained, but there is no mass murder or vanishing of people unlike what I imagine would happen in China (or Hong Kong now) so not sure if 'totalitarian prison' is entirely descriptive.
Blocking is a trade-off. Take Google access as another instance. On one hand, it lets sane people not be limited to just state propaganda by watching live the destruction their government is enacting, as well as communicate to the outside world that they do not support it by protesting and sharing photos of protests. OTOH, it lets bots mass-report YT livestream watchers, causing automated ban waves. If we block access, we address the latter, but also eliminate the former.
You mean the illegal protest where people turned up without masks, defying public health orders? I doubt that captures the majority of us concerned about mass surveillance.
On the contrary. It is times like these in which citizens need protections from those that may not have their best interests in mind. People have every right to protest and should not be surveilled in doing so.
Media coverage of these protests is vastly negative. I remember only a few years ago (2020) when protests were undoubtedly violent across the United States. Video evidence of this violence as well as mass crowd driven theft was widely documented and distributed. I have yet to see video evidence of any violence from freedom convoys, and the ground based video evidence I have seen appears vastly peaceful. This does not mean there isn’t violence. Indeed, blockading roads could be construed as violence based on an argument for different definitions of the word. Yet, from my personal observations, it seems that the protests are essentially peaceful, citizens living in these cities are in support in large numbers, and this is running counter to the narrative being espoused in mainstream media sources, with the possible exception of Fox News. More or less it seems as though media sources are mischaracterizing these protests overall. Furthermore, it can be effectively argued that forcing workers to get vaccinated or lose their jobs is inherently discriminatory and perhaps even anti-freedom. But these are only my personal observations and conclusions, be what they are, a single individuals insight into the times occurring around him, debate as you will.
As a matter of policy I would be pretty sure about it. If you weren’t looting or setting fires there will be no organized attempt to find you. Individuals within the government may take on personal vendettas from this but the risk of that to the average protest attendee is so low due to sheer numbers.
Maybe there's an argument for making masks illegal at protests (even though it doesn't feel right) - but 10 years in prison just for showing up at a protest with a mask?! What's the penalty for actually vandalizing a store with a mask during a protest then? 30 years?
This penalty makes me think that it's just the government really not wanting people to protest, and trying to restrict protests as much as possible. The "western" governments are seeing what's happening in other countries and how easily revolutions could start now, so they are working on ways to limit protests and drastically punish protesters as soon as they show up for one, to try and prevent future such protests in their countries, too.
Too bad they don't realize that this will only make people increasingly angrier with their governments over time, and they're just asking for a violent revolution if they do that. The more they deny their citizens peaceful protests, and the more they back them into a corner, the more the citizens will feel like they have no choice but respond with violence at a mass protest (especially if there's police brutality). They're asking for it. Good democracies allow protests for a reason, but I think when certain politicians get to power, they forget why.
Once authoritarian methods are in place, the easiest approaches get used, no matter how draconian. I'm completely willing to believe that the protests have created a massive public disturbance due to the use of heavy equipment, horns, etc. But the right answer there is to enforce the straightforward laws against such things, arrest the perpetrators, and tow the illegally-used equipment. But of course that takes a lot of work, so government falls back on the easy but totalitarian approach of trying to control communication and organization instead.
This is not exclusive to USA. Since democracies can't indiscriminately arrest dissidents without appearing totalitarian, their workaround is disrupting those movements to criminalize them.
In Mexico, gasoline prices became unregulated in 2017. Historically, governments have made oil a very sensitive national issue, so strong nation-wide opposition was expected. Except it didn't happen. The strategy was simple:
1. Organized looting began almost immediately. Looters were organized by Whatsapp, being told the time and place of the next looting.
2. Police stayed put, and some even participated in looting.
3. The press equated the looters with gasoline price hike protestors. In their narrative, looters were protestors, and vice-versa.
4. Public opinion disapproved of looting, and consequently disapproved of protestors.
It would be even better if the tool could make a difference between legitimate protesters and those who are there to riot, loot, pillage and burn since I see no reason to mask their faces.
Interesting to contrast this with popular demonstrations in US or France. No windows broken? Burnt city infrastructure? No beaten up police? All so quiet.
I see hundreds if not thousands people protesting and those of them who do not engage in acts of violence and property destruction have no problems. In fact, a lot of those who do engage in acts of violence and property destruction have no problems either - even if those are arrested, which happens very rarely, they are frequently released on the spot, and the charges are dropped. Only a handful of hardcore repeated offenders are even detained and charged. And with conviction and prosecution it remains to be seen if it ever happens even for most prominent and well-documented cases.
perhaps if i saw protesters actively stopping violence and looting instead of just spectating and filming and cheering, as well as comments supporting violence getting flagged on hn
otherwise, plenty of people may not be personally willing to risk themselves by being violent, but are happy to stand by as others are violent
anyways, i hope the protesters look forward to trump 2020, because that is the current trajectory they are pushing
And I completely feel where the protesters are coming from. They have every right to be angry and every right to protest. But when there are gangs of looters roving the streets, sometimes our rights have to be temporarily restricted to stop them.
I should add: In all of the streams and pictures I've seen, all (most?) the looters or violent people were wearing masks, ensuring their anonymity. If anybody's being protected by measures like this, it's your average peaceful protestor.
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