Cypherpunks Charter

Tue Sep 6 02:58:54 PDT 2016

On Mon, Sep 05, 2016 at 02:03:18PM -0700, Stephen D. Williams wrote:
> On 9/5/16 1:24 PM, John Young wrote:
> > Also Eric Hughes: A Cypherpunk's Manifesto, 9 March 1993
> >
> > http://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/manifesto.html
> Yes, I should have included that link.  Let's call it [EricCM].  I just reread it a day or two ago.  My short statement is an
> attempt to condense that to its essence.

Let's not leap in on luscious misinterpretations now ... which "short
statement" would you be referring to hear, Stephen?

Inquiring minds...

> > Understanding distinction between privacy and secrecy is essential,
> > for it is secrecy that corrupts in all its forms and is totally hostile to
> > privacy, and true privacy totally hostile to secrecy. Privacy policies are
> > fraudulent because they allow secretkeepers to violate privacy with
> > "lawful" impunity. Which is why Snowden, Tor, media, corporations,
> > NGOs, security experts, dual hatters, lawyers, privileged parties of
> > all stripes, and many others are masterful bullshitters to urge
> > "curation," censorship, withholding, redacting information by
> > which secretkeepers empower themselves against the public by
> > "self-regulated" access, that is self-serving.
> 
> That seems like a nuanced use of 'secrecy'.

So say you.

Evil only thrives in secrecy.

Violation of privacy, in real time, on any level let alone globally, is
evil in action.

> This extends what is in [EricCM].  If you want your own privacy but
> you want to deprive others, whether individual or organization, of
> theirs, I think you need to be specific about what situations you are
> talking about.

Finding it difficult to come up with examples of exactly what you're
asking someone else for (suggesting they "need" to do something no less)
i.e. you can't think of some modern violations of privacy where those
committing the violations are abusing their own power of secrecy?

Tut, tut!

> > It is ridiculous to believe technical crypto by itself will not be
> > subverted for political purposes, that mathematics will provide
> > sufficient protection against wily opponents lawfully empowered to
> > use any methods required to exploit vulnerabilities in people,
> > technology, governance (standards setting, education, contracts,
> > advisory boards, prizes, leaks, bribery, coercion -- partially
> > listed in the troll tools, but far from all).
> 
> Where is the line between "used for efficient and safe functioning of
> government" and "subverted for political purposes"?  Debating that
> line seems off topic.

Wow. Out comes SDW, the great cypherpunks censor, dictating what's on
topic and what's offtopic - to anyone for that matter including Rayzer,
myself or whever, but more so in this case,

you tell John Young, yes, -the- John Young, that his discussion of
privacy and secrecy and how they two are linked, unliked, abused and
reabused,

is offtopic!

That's the funniest thing I've read all week!!!!

Awesome.

Please, next try to justify yourself ... this'll be great :D

OK, ok, let's stay with this folks, what's the next round gonna be:

> > From day one and continuing, cypherpunks warned of the unavoidable
> > corruption of the list by malevolent subscribers, as well as of the
> > Internet and digital technology in general. This malevolence has
> > come to pass worldwide, through a range of treacheries from
> > anonymization to crypto to HTTPS to OTR to leak sites to
> > universities, to whatever tool is funded and promoted as the hot
> > shit latest means to defy authority. Authority always wins. As
> > authority bullshits and honors and hires those too timid to exceed
> > conventional cowardice.
> 
> Authority always wins because, in a healthy system, authority is us.

:)   Predictable start, a reasonable non-existent hypothetical   :)

> You have to

The authority begins to speak ... better listen up close now :)

> first narrow your scope

because without narrowing our scope to your chosen dichotomy, platform
or context, you won't have a hope of destroying your next straw man ...
at least, I suspect this might be coming, let's see shall we:

> to 'abusers' or 'actually corrupt politicians' or similar if you want
> to 'win' against them.  This is the same problem as treating all
> civilians as criminals or thugs or whatever: If you aren't specific,
> you fail.

Aaaaand, there we have it - straw man sliced in two, reduced to a
nothingness, destroyed so all can see how wrong, irrelevant and
impractical, your opponent, John Young, really is!

Well, the plot developed on typically typical typicalities. I guess we
can't ask for a ticket refund since we knew what we were getting :D

oh wait, wait! there's more...

Perhaps we'll get a surprise ending:

> > Few cypherpunks have gone to jail for their convictions, many more
> > have gone on to pretty good paying jobs, start-ups, buy-outs by IBM,
> > MS, Cisco, Google, others in cahoots with authority. But some have
> > seduced others to go to jail, crying ACLU-EFF-Greenwald grade
> > crocodile tears at the injustice (advertising "donate to us" for the
> > poor suckers). Blaming the victim of this seduction is rife as it is
> > in deliberately faulty, highly monetized comsec.
> >
> > If all goes well, cataclismic cyberwar will provide the doomsday
> > climax to persistent cypherpunk screwing. Assange aims at just that
> > having imbibed the cryptoanarchy joy juice here. Tim May will
> > continue to ridicule the fool as he did Jim Bell and CJ. This is the
> > cypherpunk secret charter for being a bullshitting "force for good."
> 
> Playing here and making good life choices are all about critical
> thinking.

Well, a truism I can agree with. Looks like we're setting up for a happy
ending..

> If you have gaps there, they may be amplified here.

Indeed.

> Assange may or may not have had an interesting point in certain past
> situations.  But, at a glance, his preoccupation with
> Hillary-insanity-complex and doing anything to feed it seems terminal.

Ahh, descent into politics. Well, I guess someone's laid that precedent
out pretty firmly on this list  :)

> As noted in an article from the last couple days, Hillary's problems

Oh wait, a final twist - accuse Assange of politics, then dive in head
first, just for the fun of it!!

Well -done- Stephen!  Nice twist!  Even surprised me :)

> really started when she decided to be private about Whitewater
> details.  That attempt at privacy caused everyone to flip out.  Kind

And even a tie-in to your straw man rip down du-jour!!

Bloody well done mate, bloody well done!!!

> of ironic as Eric's Manifesto specifically encourages privacy.

Oh yes - you just, could, not, resist. I knew it would come :)

Now if you diddn't pretend to completely miss John Young's and Eric Holder's
actual words, you might not have utterly conflated privacy with secrecy
and contradicted yourself so appalingly. But hey, don't let me stop you
knocking youself out :D

A fine, fine attempt. Sadly, predictable and rather pathetic all told,
but hey, it was a few minutes of entertainment for the rest of us.

Ladies and gentlemen! We HAVE our ending! "The contradiction, just
completely transparent, so rather dull all told."

So, sdw, back to psych school for -you- me boy! :D :D

> >> [1] <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto-anarchism>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto-anarchism
> >> [2] http://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/crypto-anarchy.html
> >
> 
> sdw