you are legion

i'm now sorry it took me so long to get around to watching we are legion - the story of the hacktivists. i'm glad i read wired's inside anonymous before watching it.

1. hypocrisy
how is it okay for governments to use hacking techniques to spy on their own citizens while simultaneously fighting (and traumatizing) their citizens who actively attempt to defend their rights to freedom of speech and privacy, and especially to protection from governmental abuses, by using those techniques?

i can only understand the greater sentences of hacktivists (in relation to sex offenders and murderers, etc.) as an implicit statement on their perceived threat to their governments. if this is the case, then these governments are most certainly not operating in the interests of their citizens.

2. stupidity
i keep wondering about the absurd attachment some americans have to the literal sense of "the right to bear arms". no amount of personal rifles is going to afford any of them the ability to revolt successfully against a tyrannical government with a modern army.

today, the arms that make a difference are virtual. they are the internet, anonymity, freedom of speech and hacking tools. those are the arms whose right we should fight to bear.