I'm not doing anything wrong, but I still close the door when I take a dump. The idea that someone wanting privacy means it is nefarious or wrong is ridiculous.
(... not saying dumps are advanced noise, but this is on the right track. Don't hide the needle. Produce more haystack)
In our culture we feel deep embarrassment if someone sees us using the toilet, but this is not universal across people and cultures, and honestly, it shouldn't be embarrassing. There's nothing inherently wrong with pooping. We irrationally feel embarrassment when we shouldn't have to.
This argument doesn't show any negative consequences of invasion of privacy. It's also not clear how it extrapolates to situations that don't involve toilets or nudity. If the problem is embarrassment, and people don't feel embarrassed that Facebook collects data, does that make it okay?
Obviously there are other arguments for privacy that do show potential harm. I find these more compelling.
I'm not arguing, I'm just not sure what you mean.
So instead of an ad blocker, we could have background bots in our browser visiting random urls and clicking on every ad in sight (of course it would need to mimic human UI input).
I wonder what affect that would have.
It sounds more respectable if you call it an 'intuition pump'. Whether or not it is rational to want to defecate privately, this point may lead some fraction of those whose mind was previously made up to reconsider their position. In those cases, it can be the beginning of a conversation.
But I don't think it's the strong argument in favour of privacy that we want to make, because:
1. We do give people privacy in the bathroom. The debate is over the data social media companies collect. If people aren't generally embarrassed that Facebook collects data about what they post on Facebook, how does it relate to being embarrassed to be seen on the toilet?
2. Do we always have to accommodate irrational feelings? What about people who are easily offended by things that things that most would consider non-offensive? Is it immoral for a child to dress as a clown on halloween given that some people have coulrophobia? If you're arguing with someone who believes law enforcement should have access to people's social media and you bring up that stuff posted on social media could be embarrassing, the obvious response is, "Well, too bad. Investigating crimes is more important."
But that is precisely the rational reason. In a free society you want people to act freely. To be able to act freely it helps tremendously to not be under constant surveillance by authorities, powerful actors and/or personal and political enemies. If one happens to have the same cultural background or political ideas as all those on the other side and one is generally a careless nature it helps in not feeling threatened by that surveillance.
The new thing digital surveillance brought is the ability to automate and for search things that happened once. Where in communist Germany the state had to have a giant apparatus that would break into your flat and install microphones, have people constantly following you around and listening in on every word you said. The impact this has on a free exchange of ideas is quite obvious, isn't it? These things have become far less resource intensive in the age of the web.
And if you now say: "Yeah but they were communists" — that is the point. If you are hoping those in power will be respectful because your values (currently) align with theirs; or because your information is (currently) more useful to them when not disclosed to your enemies — then this is a very optimistic view of the world. But things can change, and not all have that sense of optimism.
Not having to think about whether somebody will knock your door with state police in a decade because of something you wrote online is the reason why privacy exist. Not having to censor yourself because you are afraid those fringe lunatics on the opposite political side will destroy your life is the reason why privacy exists. Not having to censor yourself because your violent husband reads everything you wrote is the reason why privacy exists.
So maybe you can read this as: Power that sees what you do can (and does) change how you act, even if they don't come after you. Not having them see you is a good way of not having to change.
> But that is precisely the rational reason.
I'm not following your reasoning here. You list several logical reasons why digital privacy is important (it protects us from nefarious governments, it protects us from violent spouses, etc.). What does this have to do with an irrational embarrassment over pooping?
Whether this fear is rational doesn't matter. Whether these intrusions are never actually carried out and always only remain a faint possibility, a story the actors make you believe doesn't matter.
John Oliver used a similar tactic when speaking about Edward Snowden and the Patrioct Act. Instead of framing it about rights, pricacy and stuff, he talkes about dick picks. It kinda worked? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEVlyP4_11M
Otherwise your argument becomes "I don't understand what these things are or why people care about them, and therefore perhaps they don't matter."
And that's not a strong argument.
It's not possible to understand the parent comment without knowing what dignity is.
> Otherwise your argument becomes "I don't understand what these things are or why people care about them, and therefore perhaps they don't matter."
What argument? I literally said, "I'm not arguing, I'm just not sure what you mean." I was just asking for clarification. I haven't denied anything in the parent comment.
Could we perhaps group together embarrassment, loss of dignity and shame and summarize the point as follows?
"Invasions of privacy cause psychological harm."