Brazil debates internet law in wake of NSA scandal
GOOD FOR YOU BRAZIL. We finally have that country that says stop trying to be a policeman and let us handle our own business. Brazil officials describes their feelings towards the NSA scandal as outraged. They should be. I guarantee you if the tides were turned the United States would not be sitting back doing absolutely nothing about a foreign nation stealing the information of our people. There is not a chance that we would ever let that slide. We would preach how our country was founded off of freedom and that privacy needs to be maintained. As soon as things are reversed we are the first ones to say that privacy can only be pushed to a certain limit, and that we are protecting our people.
Many Brazil citizens are talking about taking their web usage away from US infrastructure. I can't blame them. Would we continue to use a Russian internet if we knew that our information was being compromised? No. What is even worse is the fact that our relations with thought to be friendly nations are now on thin ice. You can't steal information from unknowing citizens and expect to get away with it. I also think it is ridiculous that the NSA ever expected this to stay secretive. When a violation of privacy and promise is happening on this large of a scale, a red flag is bound to be raised in someone's mind. But instead the NSA is sitting idly thinking they would've gotten away with it too if it wasn't for that meddling Snowden. In a time when international relations are so important, why would we jeopardize our ties with our allies simply to have "access" to everybody. Everybody isn't your threat.
- David Gerhart
Many Brazil citizens are talking about taking their web usage away from US infrastructure. I can't blame them. Would we continue to use a Russian internet if we knew that our information was being compromised? No. What is even worse is the fact that our relations with thought to be friendly nations are now on thin ice. You can't steal information from unknowing citizens and expect to get away with it. I also think it is ridiculous that the NSA ever expected this to stay secretive. When a violation of privacy and promise is happening on this large of a scale, a red flag is bound to be raised in someone's mind. But instead the NSA is sitting idly thinking they would've gotten away with it too if it wasn't for that meddling Snowden. In a time when international relations are so important, why would we jeopardize our ties with our allies simply to have "access" to everybody. Everybody isn't your threat.
- David Gerhart
After listening to you rant about this the entirety of the block today, I was able to understand more of this situation and I was also able to understand your frustration. I believe that the government has certainly overstepped their boundaries on this one. It is ridiculous to think that we are being anything less than hypocritical in this situation, and I certainly agree that if another nation was doing this to our peoples we would not stand for it and we would certainly not want to buy products from that nation. I don't know why we are willing to risk that for ourselves in the current state of our economy.
ReplyDeleteI think you're deceiving yourself Big Dave. You're giving people a little too much credit. Is getting your info stolen not a good thing? Obviously. But you claim that if the tables were turned the US would stand up for itself. On what grounds? That only AMERICAN companies can steal AMERICANS' info? Please. We'd make a lot of talk, but you and I know we wouldn't do anything. And in a few days, people would be right back to using the same services without giving it a second thought.
ReplyDeleteBasically my point is if we already do this to our own citizens, why do you think the average iPhone-addicted couch potato is suddenly going to care about who is stealing his info, whether its Brazil or his own country?
I'm glad you said that, Alex. In America we will get mad for a few days and do noting because we can't live without our iPhones and our twitter accounts. In other countries, this is not the case. They use other domestic social media sites. In china there is a phone much better than the iPhone available to consumers. You know as well as I do what determines elasticity. Substitutes are huge. In America the culture has showed us that we have no substitutes available to us that can beat the iPhone. In other nations like Brazil, there is an alternative to Facebook that was just recently surpassed in Brazilian membership by Facebook. So, my point is that we as Americans won't do anything because we have no other option. The culture isn't as heavy in other nations, plus, they have substitutes that aren't stealing your information.
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