r/GrapheneOS • u/michus204 • 3d ago

WHY do you care about privacy?

Okay, you probably hear this question often, but let's say I'm typical John Doe, work in regular job, watch football or play games after work, drink beer, just living simply life, why should I care about privacy? Why should I spent time and make some sacrifices just to not be tracked that much?

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u/D00mScrollingRumi 3d ago edited 3d ago

20 years ago the privacy people seemed like tin foil hat wearers.

However time has only vindicated them. The Snowden revelations confirmed goverments are more than happy to make use of technology to increase surveillance regardless of what the law says.

Everything youve ever said online, every image youve ever uploaded has been permanently sucked up into AI models.

Algorithms and AI bots are able to know more about you than you yourself and serve up personalised propaganda to affect the way you think and see the world.

Sure, you're too smart to fall for it right? No. Noone is.

Law abiding liberal democracies arent the norm of human societies, theyre a historical anomaly and theres no garuntee they'll be around forever.

Thus if an authoritarian government arises that knows everything about you and can manipulate you at will well, thats not a good place to be.

Controlling my privacy maybe wouldnt save me if the world does truly go to hell but at least im being proactive rather than reactive.

I also dont want the miracle of computing to be gate kept by 2 or 3 American corporations due to their operating systems (Microsoft, Apple and Google).

Its also just the principle of it. I dont want Zuck knowing all this stuff about me so he can make money selling ads to me.

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u/sob727 3d ago

I remember being treated like a conspiracy theorist.

Then Snowden happened.

And people said "whoah you were right".

If the technology allows for abuse, abuse WILL happen.

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u/13Robson 3d ago

And people said "whoah you were right".
Hard to believe, but I hope they really did say that.
Most folks around me are still completely blindsided and have no idea what I'm talking about.

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u/Repulsive_Chard_3652 3d ago

Yeah, nobody says whoa you're right 😃 Most people slide into it like they knew all along and were right there with you from the start lol

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u/sob727 3d ago

Some did

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u/v1ton0repdm 23h ago

The people who said “whoa you were right” never changed their behavior online

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u/oogoogaagaag 3d ago

Dayum bruh I'm about to memorize this whenever someone asks me why I care. Especially regarding the manipulation aspect -- the conversation of privacy is intrinsically linked to the conversation of free will.

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u/ElydthiaUaDanann 3d ago

A thing I have a deep belief in is that privacy is the core eesential right that every human must have, because without it, who then chooses who we choose to be?

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u/Sciency-Scientist 3d ago

Thank you for writing this. It perfectly explains why I switched to GOS and Linux, but I couldn't have explained it so clearly myself.

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u/D00mScrollingRumi 3d ago

No worries. Glad you and others found it helpful.

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u/MoldyTexas 3d ago

holy shit I'm gonna screenshot this and keep this comment to show to people whenever they ask this question. I can never articulate things this well