>>The Edward J. Snowden affair finally raised a chilling question for the whole world: How much privacy do citizens have to give up for the sake of public security? For us Chinese, this question is slightly different: How much privacy do we have to give up for the sake of the government’s security?<p>The thing that most westerns still don't realize is that the reasons we are giving up privacy actually are the same. Our governments are just using the 'terrorism' myth as an excuse. Its amazing how the majority of people believe this type of propaganda and are completely unaware of the global and historical precedents of this type of strategy for suppression of dissent.
One trick I've tried here in China is to talk to myself a lot, about things both true and absurd, using intonations both serious and comical, then sit back and wait to see who knows what I've been saying. The sociopaths running the system have many clueless intermediaries who have an emotional need to show off they're part of the loop.<p>One thing that pissed me off, though, is when foreigners got involved in the surveillance a while back. Many of those in business and the media in the West don't respect the freedoms many Chinese are trying to give their children.
I lived in China for years, and this is not news. Chinese know from day 1 they are potentially being spied on -- the opposite of American thinking.<p>If the Chinese government had a leaker like Edward Snowden, any information from him would not surprise any Chinese person.
<a href="http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/08/13/after_multiple_denials_cia_admits_to_snooping_on_noam_chomsky" rel="nofollow">http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/08/13/after_mul...</a><p>so the title of this news should be "The Transparent American"?
Lol
Frankly I don't mind surveillance and spying when used for preventing terrorism or act of violence the same way as I don't mind when at international airports most of the time I find myself directed to the double security checks. But when its so apparent that the data is being used to target citizens in general and not fight crime it appalling! How do citizens stop a government from exploitation and damage?
<i>For almost a decade, “weiwen,” or “maintaining social stability,” has been the government’s public mantra[...]“Stability” has been deemed more important than education, health care and even national defense.</i><p>Political and social fixity (to use an obnoxious historian term) has been one of the overriding goals of the dominant Chinese polity since before the Great Wall was built. It's something that Westerners have a lot of trouble understanding -- Communism might be a fairly recent addition to China, but the value the Chinese place on stability is a tradition that dates so far back we have trouble measuring its age.
The article finishes with what I presume was supposed to be a rhetorical question:<p><i>The Chinese government talks about building a “harmonious society.” But how can a society become truly harmonious if surveillance cameras are everywhere and everyone has to live with suspicion and fear? What kind of lives can we lead without trust?</i><p>Unfortunately - given recent revelations in the West - it isn't exactly clear that surveillance has <i>anything at all</i> to do with the kind of lives we lead.
Too bad it's not the other way around: "The Transparent Chinese Government". Governments should be the ones that are completely transparent, not its citizens.
One quibble: the article says that the ubiquitous surveillance cameras "have little to do with crime prevention" and cites a single case in which they weren't useful as proof. In fact they're constantly used to bust hit and runs, muggings, etc. I agree with Franklin's "those who would trade..." quote but its dishonest to pretend that this kind of surveillance doesn't help catch a lot of crime.