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Washington DC's Public Library Will Teach People How To Avoid the NSA
Jason Koebler writes Later this month, the Washington DC Public Library will teach residents how to use Tor as part of a 10 day series designed to shed light on government surveillance, transparency, and personal privacy. The series is called "Orwellian America," and it's quite subversive, considering that it's being held by a publicly funded entity mere minutes from a Congress and administration that allowed the NSA's surveillance programs to spin wildly out of control.
A lot of people don't realize librarians have always been on the forefront of protecting out rights.
From fighting for censorship, to advocating for free speech, to stuff like this ... librarians tend to be people with a real understanding of our liberties, and why it's important to have them.
So, if you enjoy the right to read a book which someone found offensive, of the ability to access stuff without having to pay the publisher, or free and anonymous access to the interwebs ... hug your local librarian.
They or someone like them has probably done as much to maintain your freedoms as anybody else in the last few decades.
Showing the public how to undermine the surveillance crap ... well, that deserves applause in my book.
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Libraries are by design one of the safeguards against tyranny.
And we're only safe once the tools to subvert domestic NSA spying are so ubiquitous that a workshop like this one are no longer newsworthy. But I'm sure some future John McCain/Lyndsey Graham congressional asshat will decry "public funds being used to support terrorism" and the program will be cancelled.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Until such time as they change the Constitution, it is still the highest law of the land. Deciding the 4th amendment (or any other part of it) is optional is not consistent with that.
Ergo, it is, by definition, illegal.
Yes, a lot of scared people have accepted this. That doesn't make it legal. It's expedient, sure. But legal? I don't buy that.
And, since they've given themselves permission to do this in the rest of the world, without the consent of the people they do it to ... I conclude that America has made themselves the enemy of the liberty of everyone on the planet.
In which case what your passive citizenry accept is irrelevant. Because the rest of the world isn't subject to US law, no matter how much you guys believe in manifest destiny.
So, fight or don't fight your your rights, I don't care. But keep your fucking hands off mine. The rest of us haven't consented to this horseshit by the NSA.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.