Hello,
I was with my brother and his group of friends, and one of his friends was talking about various drugs. My brother told him, “Shut up, you’re going to put us on a watchlist,” and he said it in a serious tone. It felt pretty dystopian when he said that; honestly, it was a bit eerie, mostly because he’s being controlled and self-censoring without anyone there, and he seems to be aware of the freedom he’s giving up, yet he continues to act this way. I’ve talked to my brother about privacy and why it’s important many times, but he would rather live this type of controlled life and doesn’t care because “they already know everything about me anyway.” He’s in his early 20s.
Has anyone else had moments like this?
Are you kidding. Does not matter if its measured in decades, years, months, weeks, days. The slide from 80 to 2000 was practically negligable compared to 2000 to 2010 and the last decade has me yearning for those days of optimism. I think it may start feeling hour to hour soon. My neighbor was asking about help for their smart tv. when I was young if you talked about government listening devices in the tv you were likely paranoid schizophrenic. Now people just buy corporate spying devices for their home and pocket and just shrug.
I started thinking my internet comms would get me on a list during W’s term. My political leanings have only traveled Left since then. I’m not going to be on one of the first lists: that honor goes to Trans people, then some others, but I’ll be on one of the “when we get around to it” lists.
But the level of self-censorship and the degree of paranoia (nobody cares about drugs unless you’ve got them or you’re talking about distribution) is concerning. Maybe try to find out why he cares that much. I agree with a sibling comment about possible mental health issues to assess. I was early twenties when my bipolar was diagnosed.
My eighty year-old parents have borrowed my car since April so they can drive for DoorDash, knowing full well if they can’t work this country will do nothing to help them and they’ll end up homeless.
Yay capitalism.
People are surrendering privacy rights every day: alexa, the battle for the internet, accepting NSA surveillance, etc. It’s awful
The goal is not to avoid the watch lists. The goal is to be on so many that they become useless.
Shout out to all the homies on the “eats ice cream with a fork” list.
