A Message Regarding ICE in Minnesota and the USA

Announcements
21

Including bias in an official statement does not bode well for the mission of privacy rights for all.

While I agree with the concern over the riots being a justification for increased surveillance, the statement released often misrepresents the actions of ICE, exposing a political bias which should be absent from a statement by a privacy group.

For instance, ICE are not “terrorizing my neighbors and country”. To the majority of the American public, ICE are enforcing the American law to deport criminals. Additionally, the protestors who were killed were not “protesting” in a non-violent, patriotic sense, they were documented as aggressively and consciously preventing law enforcement from doing their jobs, in very visible bad faith. Further, calling the protestors “patriots” indicates a political position against ICE workers, who by most are doing patriotic work in the face of increasing harassment and hostility from protestors. Lastly, you say ICE workers are “pitted against taxpayers and citizens they are intended to serve”, misrepresenting the fact that the primary targets have always been - with some unlawful exceptions - the illegal immigrants.

The bias this statement takes is fully seen in the final remark, where “protection of our neighbors” (as opposed to, or in conjunction with, “protection of our ICE workers”) is conjoined with “protection of our rights”. The two are distinct and one is not expected to be spoken by a privacy group.

I mean, hell… on a personal level I align with PG, and also have no stake in American politics. Yet this statement even makes me want to support a surveillance state! The comment comes with good faith:

Making privacy a partisan issue like this will greatly cost your mission on advancing digital rights for all.

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22

I don’t know how you’ve reached those conclusions but I recommend you watch the recordings of the murders committed by ICE. Furthermore, they’re recruiting people without training. Immigrants fleeing poverty are not automatically criminals. And if there were criminal immigrants, they don’t deserve to be executed out of pure hatred or fear, like any PERSON they deserve a fair trial. Human Rights are being violated. “Illegal” immigrants cannot be deported in just any way, hastily and separating them from their families. What’s happening is an absolute atrocity.

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23

My larger concern is over the politicization of privacy on this forum. My purpose was to rebuke the notion that the statement was apolitical. I am not interested in engaging in discussions specifically around ICE. It doesn’t matter how right you think you are, representing only one side of an issue will alienate people and hinder an overall effort. Cheers.

24

News flash, privacy is politics. How often do we talk about laws on this forum? Why do you think we do that? Because many laws limit our freedoms to exercise privacy. It’s the gateway to plenty of other freedoms and liberties that can be removed by bad actors to include state entities which is inevitably a political discussion.

Your definition of politicization here sounds more like you want to avoid being partisan. This is generally a good precident, as we don’t want peoples values and political affiliations to determine if they too get to engage in privacy discussions. However, when you reach the point that you are no longer able to discuss violations of privacy and related notions of human rights just because it is being carried out by one political party or the other, you’re taking that concern of partisanship too far.

By that definition, we would avoid discussing the privacy violation laws like KOSA if only members of one party were endorsing it. Despite it having clear violation of our human rights, we would have to avoid that topic in the to avoid polarialization in our forum. You see how that wouldn’t really make sense?

To the majority of the American public, ICE are enforcing the American law to deport criminals.

Hi majority of the American public, oh wait that’s not your name? Oh you think that is true? Cite any study not conducted or paid for by the White House.

As an American who’s seen the rise in the largest numbers of overwhelmingly peaceful protests, I think there is visible evidence that this is not the case of all the Americans attending ICE OUT protests.

Also, nobody is upset that they are deporting criminals just like nobody would be upset of the KOSA laws were somehow effective at helping kids not see porn before their brains were ready to see it, but it’s the inneffectove and violent ways we’ve seen them violete state and federal laws to harm AMERICAN CITIZENS!!

So, yeah it’s justified for PG and anyone who lives in the exact place where these attrocotie are happening like Jonah, to express their grievences with the privacy and related violations of human rights.

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25

Ur right, but it certainly matters how right you actually are. It actually is the case that ICE is being unlawful. The only thing that is politicized here is ICE’s activities, right…? One political side thinks ICE is being lawful, another political side thinks otherwise. The belief that ICE is lawful or unlawful is what has precisely been given a political tone.

When you escape that politicization, you realize it really is true that ICE is being unlawful. This is not a political opinion, it’s a factual statement. Siding over the legality of this does not mean Jonah and anyone who agrees with him is being political. It means you think Jonah is being political because you think having an opinion on ICE’s activities is political (in the politicization sense). But in this case, it is not. When we criticize ICE, we are not being political in the sense of politicization. We are being factual. The only thing being politicized is ICE’s activities, not privacy.

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26

… ok, I guess. cool

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27

If it makes you want to support a surveillance state, maybe you should have the guts to use your real name to express any and all views too. It only makes you a hypocrite if you don’t. Or perhaps you are one anyway.

You seem to be a seriously misguided individual. I hope you read more and develop better critical thinking skills.

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28

@bitsondatadev

Your definition of politicization here sounds more like you want to avoid being partisan.

Correct.

However, when you reach the point that you are no longer able to discuss violations of privacy and related notions of human rights just because it is being carried out by one political party or the other, you’re taking that concern of partisanship too far.

You can raise valid points about the invasions of privacy without politicizing the content or the tone of a statement to involve unrelated topics. The two deaths, for example, whether lawful or unlawful, have no direct relation to surveillance practices.

By that definition, we would avoid discussing the privacy violation laws like KOSA if only members of one party were endorsing it.

Untrue. One can precisely detach matters like KOSA from political endorsements or party affiliations. People care more about the integrity of a speaker than the positions held themselves. People are sensitive to the messaging within a statement more than the statement itself. Therefore, any privacy topic is addressable with the appropriate respect.

The rest of your comment is subject to a political framing. Since I have mentioned having no interest in engaging in political discourse, my reply ends here.

@anonymous544

One political side thinks ICE is being lawful, another political side thinks otherwise.

Your statement is reasonably accurate, yes.

The belief that ICE is lawful or unlawful is what has precisely been given a political tone.

Indeed. As we these connect these two statements together, we see why the public statement was divisive. A majority of people understand ICE as operating lawfully. I and many others do not need the political opinions on ICE activity by privacy-minded individuals.

When you escape that politicization, you realize it really is true that ICE is being unlawful. This is not a political opinion, it’s a factual statement.

Whether it is true or not is irrelevant to the purpose of Privacy Guides. Nevertheless, you are presenting this statement as factual when the reality is much more nuanced. Even when the decision was made to speak politically, that nuance was not reflected within the public statement.

@anon80329175

If it makes you want to support a surveillance state, maybe you should have the guts to use your real name to express any and all views too.

“Makes me want to” is not equivalent to “I support”. The actual points raised have been circumvented and instead a bad faith rebuttal has been used.

Furthermore, I did not solicit your advice. But if I may indulge in your practices just once: personal insults and passive-aggressive remarks do not improve your credibility.

/

I disagree with how the statement was handled, but the discourse in this forum is even more ideological and hivemind. From the replies I have experienced, the forum has been shown to improperly handle sensitive issues just like the public statement did. Moreover, reacting with robot emojis to commenters who give feedback, along with striking personal insults by some, is rude and unnecessary. There are plentiful of resources/public forums online that have apolitical stances and thus maintain a polite discourse environment. This forum is not one of said places.

This important reply is my last as the account is being deleted! I will not be made aware of future replies.

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30

I’m not sure if you are @anonymous550 who spoke about the politicization of privacy, but my response to them is the same as my response to you. I will say it again (even though you are gone now, which is unfortunate). The opinions of the recent activities of ICE are not political opinions. They have been politicized, which is precisely what makes people assume it is a political opinion. My point is that standing against ICE is non-partisan, therefore privacy remains non-partisan, counter to what was claimed earlier.

True. It may be irrelevant to Privacy Guides insofar as the message itself does not serve digital privacy at first glance (even though it’s arguable that it does). Jonah himself mentions that the only reason he wanted to bring it up was because he lives in Minneapolis and it affects him directly. The point remains that it is still non-partisan.

And it does matter whether it’s true or not. If it is in fact true that untrained law enforcement are shooting and killing people undeservedly, the issue becomes non-partisan and legal. The realm of discussion goes beyond republican/democratic and towards constitutional/unconstitutional.

This is why politicization is dangerous, because it allows people to have unconstitutional goals and motives under the guise of partisanship, And over time, the Overton window shifts such that partisanship towards one side becomes partisanship towards unconstitutionality, which is what should be avoided. This is why we have “republicans” joking yet not joking about a third Trump term. But the fact is, they are not republicans. Same thing is happening with ICE. It’s not republican or right-leaning to believe that ICE is justified. Neither is it democratic or left-leaning to believe that they are not justified. It only seems that way to people who have fallen victim to the shifting of the Overton window.

Appealing to the small population of people who believe that ICE is justified or lawful is actually the most partial thing ever to do. It’s the same as appealing to the small population of people who somehow believe that women don’t deserve rights. The fact is, what ICE did was illegal. Same as the fact that women do deserve rights. Non-partisan.

I really hope you reconsider. Ignoring all that was brought up about ICE, I do see your main point. Your claim is not that what ICE did was lawful, or that it is partisan to have an opinion about them. I think our conversation went off on a tangent because this is clearly a politically charged topic and it’s a very recent event.

Rather, your main point was that PG voicing an opinion on ICE seemed rather off-topic to privacy, and given its politically charged nature, could imply partisanship or something like that (but this isn’t the primary point, as I understand you). I think this is the best steelman I could make of you. If I for example were to post a news story about ICE gunning down a citizen in the News category, you would be against that post insofar as it has no direct relation to privacy. Understandable.

But given that this is not a news post but instead a general announcement/message on a non-partisan issue, I find the relation plausible. There’s lots of ways ICE is irrelevant to privacy, but there’s also lots of ways in which they are. ICE uses privacy-invasive surveillance techniques to track down immigrants. They routinely ignore the fourth amendment, an amendment that is recognized as a building block for the constitutional right to privacy in the US. Whether this be misapplying warrants to allow breaking into homes, or the more legally gray area of reverse search warrants that allows them to search personal data or perform geofencing. They are doing what we’ve criticized billionaire corporations for doing. The bigger issue here is that they are not a billionaire corporation. They are part of the government. The relation to privacy is very clear. Combine that with the fact that this is a non-partisan issue pre-Overton window shift and I see no reason to criticize Jonah’s message.

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31

Agreed. I think it’s helpful though that we be clear in saying “without making partisan statements” over “politicizing” as I hope you agree that privacy is politics. Politics meaning the analysis of power dynamics as opposed to espousing ones partisan views.

Both of these deaths were results of abuse of power of a nation state (politics). Of those abuses, privacy through the means of surveillance capitalism used to provide information to these ICE officers about these individuals and the advocacy they provided for their community.

We can speculate all day about why these deaths happened, but the facts we know are that ICE agents are using tools provided by corporations like Palantir to learn anything and everything about not only illegal immigrants or criminals, but every citizen. Further the tone of PG around the use of AI and other is constantly flagging how innacurate these tools can be and yet are being used to justify violent and growingly lethal action against citizens. Every state and judicial entity outside of the federal government says they are breaking the law.

These are facts, not partisan rhetoric. There are plenty of Republican officials calling out the administration to provide body cam footage of the killings and they are not handing them over.

I can understand not wanting to make this a partisan forum, but at what point are we even talking about privacy if not what happens after our privacy rights have been violated. You may not agree with the advocacy that these citizens were carrying out for their neighbors (citizen or immigrant), but as a fellow privacy advocate you should at baseline be upset with the violation of privacy applied by ICE with Palantir tools. Most importantly, we should consider how these breaches of our human right to privacy invade our rights to a fair trial.

I think it’s fair to say if privacy truly lived in a bubble and had nothing to do with politics. For example, why do we care so much about doxxing? It’s not that someone else simply knows your identity and address that scares us. If everyone in the world doesn’t care about my existence or stalking and murder wasn’t something humans practiced why would I care if you knew how to find me or connect my opinions to my address? We care because privacy enables us to live out other freedoms such as speech and health and safety and we fear how some individual may use that information to cause harm or violate those other freedoms.

Said simply, privacy is politics. It doesn’t have to be partisan, but often it makes sense to discuss the policies and actions taken by a particular administration to discuss the violation of privacy, and the downstream effects of those abuses to other human rights.

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32

100%

Thanks for providing your point of view! This is how any activism should be done. You comment on what you know and the facts of personally witnessing and being there or within said subject that you study.

Being there and experiencing it. Makes it a more personal, on the ground reporting and ensures that it is more accurate than say reading a post of someone who does not live within the issue or event that takes place. So, I love this approach keep up the great work!

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33

Can you provide links? Every ICE involved slaying so far has been self-defense.

That is how most jobs work. Every soldier and police officer is recruited ‘without training’ unless they previously served.

True, but ICE are only concerned with ILLEGAL immigrants.

They do deserve a fair trial. Surrendering to ICE is an option. Self deportation is an option. Assaulting ICE is not an option. FAFO.

Correct. ICE agents shouldn’t be attacked in the streets for acting within the law. The unjust violent protesters are in the wrong.

There is a fair and reasonable process. Their families can go with them. Anchor babies are a loophole which needs to be closed.

Illegal immigrants kill thousands more people than ICE in a given year.

34

I know what news channel you watch and where you get your news.

Also, can you too provide links and sources for your comments/views for what you believe is true?

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35

I don’t watch any particular ‘news channel.’ I was asking for links in case I’d missed a ‘protester’ being killed that wasn’t the woman who rammed an ICE agent with her car or the crazy man who attacked them multiple times then got himself shot. Don’t attack law enforcement. Sue them after the fact if you have a case.

36

Hi.

Canadian here. Let’s make the hypothesis that Ice goal is legitimate.

From my Canadian POV, it does not change the fact that ICE method have created a police state.

I am not aware of any other countries within the G20 were the gouvernement is so invasive of their own population.

Ethic of their method should be consider as important as their goal. It seem to me that some members want to minimize their wrong action because they agree with their goal.

By the same logic, to protect children from child molester, should we abandon all our privacy rights ?

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37

If there was proper border control they wouldn’t be able to use illegal immigration as justification for surveillance. Illegal immigrants SHOULDN’T BE THERE.

In my opinion ICE shouldn’t be hunting criminals in US cities either. I wish they weren’t! But it is necessary. ICE will be defunded and fade into obscurity once the problem is tackled. The US doesn’t need ICE to create a police state. They have police for that. And in relative terms it isn’t one. The US is still a relatively free country.

38

No. The greater evil would be to live in a police state. Totalitarianism isn’t the solution to child molestation. Effective policing and an ethical society are the only way to reduce, not eliminate, this scourge. Police in my country routinely overlooked grooming gangs. They didn’t need to infringe privacy. They knew all about it and did nothing. Banning encryption wouldn’t help because these offences take place in private, or in public, with the authorities blessing.

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39

Links to what? Someone saying it’s murder or the videos? The videos are not hard to find and I fear it might be against the rules of this site to link them directly due to showing people getting murdered, I recommend you search for them. If the former is what you’re looking for, I don’t know why you need a source to tell you what to think about a video you can watch with your own eyes.

Obviously the problem here is they are recruiting people without training and then not training them.

It is, and murdering someone for not surrendering is not an option. Not surrendering is not a death sentence.

Unless there is imminent threat of serious bodily harm or death, even this does not carry a death sentence.

Even if there was previously the threat, your right to defend yourself goes away once the threat ends. In one of the cases, the woman shot was fleeing the scene driving away from the ICE officer when he shot her. That is murder.

The loophole you’re referring to is clear and established constitutional law lmao

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40

Look it up yourself, I’m not going to spend a single minute of effort teaching something to such an uninformed person.

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41

She ‘fled’ INTO an armed federal agent. She was NOT fleeing for her life. She struck an armed agent with her car. This justified her shooting. He didn’t even draw a weapon until she made contact. He had been struck and dragged by a fleeing suspect before.

This was written before it was possible for an expectant mother to go into labour then cross the border on an airplane before delivering the baby. Yes, I know a mother in labour isn’t allowed to fly, but doing the maths it is possible to ‘go on holiday’ to give a baby US citizenship. The loophole needs to be closed.