Your best friend does not care \ stacker news ~meta

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13.4k sats \ 38 comments \ @1c8c319862 26 Aug 2023 meta

Over the past couple of years, I have tried convincing my best friend (and others) to improve their data privacy. However, I have got this ugly feeling that my best friend does not care about their privacy and the dangers of surveillance capitalism. Instead, they are just following my advice to please me.

So far my best firend, started using a vpn on their devices and stopped providing addtional information when purcahsing stuff online. My best firend also uses simplex messenger (when chatting with me), and has bought some corn.

Now the twist, my friend uses fingerprint sensors on all devices since it is 'practical' and does not change system defaults to improve privacy, does not care to monitor if their vpn is actually running in the background, only has one personal e-mail address, probably uses the same login credentials and password for everything, loves consuming social media (does not post stuff publically), and sends a lot of selfies as direct message (not to me though lol).

Final thoughts, I feel like I am running in circles. As long as I still spend time with my best friend (and others), we are stuck in the same boat, since their data privacy practices indirectly influence me. What I am getting at is that I feel pretty hopless, and that I am getting to a point where I am seriously concidering to unfirend a lot of people. What to do if your best friend just does not care?

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389 sats \ 14 replies \ @bataroot 26 Aug 2023

I feel you 😔

It's really hard to accept that most of our family and friends are part of the masses, easily controlled and just trying to live a life free of conflicts.

It's also difficult to realize that they might be putting our life in danger one day, even worse becoming our enemies.

To quote Albert Jay Nock:

The official class and their intelligentsia will turn up their noses at you and the masses will not even listen. They will all keep on in their own ways until they carry everything down to destruction, and you will probably be lucky if you get out with your life.

https://mises.org/library/isaiahs-job

I have personally decided, for my own safety and wellbeing, to keep my interactions with them cordial but limited. It might seem heartless, but we need to fully focus on the remnants.

🤝

262 sats \ 5 replies \ @mallardshead 26 Aug 2023

Jesus some of you guys belong on a Broadway stage.

131 sats \ 1 reply \ @bataroot 26 Aug 2023

don't we all? :)

5 sats \ 0 replies \ @mallardshead 26 Aug 2023

I suppose you're right.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @1c8c319862 OP 26 Aug 2023

zapped

136 sats \ 0 replies \ @nemo 26 Aug 2023

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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @nemo 26 Aug 2023

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96 sats \ 5 replies \ @1c8c319862 OP 26 Aug 2023

That quote hits really hard. What really bothers me, is that deep down most people actually understand how important it is to choose if something should remain private or not. Since, most people freely choose to lock their doors and have curtains in their windows. However, if one talks to them about surveillance capitalism, they simply shake it off by saying "I have nothing to hide" or "they already know everything anyway".

I am really on the fence - but it is so hard to unfriend people, especially if they are relatives. How do you handle your relations with relatives?

121 sats \ 3 replies \ @bataroot 26 Aug 2023

It's sad, but I keep them superficial, weather-like conversations, even though even the weather is becoming a controversial subject now :(

Your post also reminded me of something I wrote a while ago, unfinished and never published...

In The Second Realm Book on Strategy, there is the concept of a First Realm (that I loosely interpret as "normie-land"). This realm full of NPCs (Non-Player Characters) is where most of us are officially identified by the State and have to maintain personal and/or work relationships.

The Second Realm is where we thrive; it should be composed of independent freedom cells where a Web of Trust can easily be enforced (under 150 people, see Dunbar's Number). Note that each of those cells could exist in a physical and/or digital form.

Our identity in the First Realm should be strongly separated from our profiles/pseudonyms in the Second Realm. We should control what each network knows about us and how much we are part of other networks.

Every relationship in the First Realm is considered weak and/or untrusted, while relationships in the Second Realm are strong and trusted, based on principles, meritocracy, recommendations, and consistency.

https://archive.org/details/second-realm-digital

5 sats \ 2 replies \ @nemo 26 Aug 2023

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21 sats \ 1 reply \ @bataroot 26 Aug 2023

Reading Havel is an inspiration for anyone who thinks you cannot thrive under tyrannical regimes.

5 sats \ 0 replies \ @nemo 26 Aug 2023

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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @chaoticalHeavy 26 Aug 2023

I have tried getting high with them and bringing up topics they should be aware of. Sometimes they can sense that it's an important topic but they decide it's too far out of their comfort zone to invest in understanding.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @franzap 26 Aug 2023

While this could become true, it seems to me you are taking things too seriously. Relax and keep your friends close even if they still don't get it 🫂

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @carlosfandango 26 Aug 2023

This ^

104 sats \ 0 replies \ @WeAreAllSatoshi 26 Aug 2023

People have to have their own realization. What’s the saying? You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink? Something like that, idk

111 sats \ 0 replies \ @mallardshead 26 Aug 2023

I liked this because it's all of us with somebody we know. Your friend still won't care when he's using bitcoin but doesn't realize it, so long as how he's using it speaks the language of the masses (tap, swipe, click). A grand cultural awakening to privacy isn't coming on the grounds of liberty, not even with a black swan. We just had one of those with Covid. Several countries are near dystopias with their surveillance, yet their people continue on. If we took the technologies of today, and gave them to the governments and people of yesterday, things would be worse than they are today as a whole. The grand cultural awakening would simply be a system the sheep move to out of necessity, and utility; they couldn't care less what that system actually is. I happen to believe that system is coming for myriad reasons, and I'm happy to be part of its spearhead.

86 sats \ 3 replies \ @sudonaka 26 Aug 2023

https://sive.rs/anon

Live life like UTXOs- many different addresses, same hidden key.

13 sats \ 1 reply \ @1c8c319862 OP 26 Aug 2023

Unfortunately, the article only discusses how to handle your online-persona...

But, I second that - the utxo analogy is great, however, I do not know how to navigate and handle my real-life realtions with friends (or relatives). I doubt we can live like a utxo in-real life for two main reasons.

Since we cannot hide from privacy practices of our friends, likely their samrtphones are always close by and listening in. You might know what your best friend does on their smartphone, but at a family gathering, distant-relatives will publically share bloody everything: our activities, our food, and of course a selfie (this is the only photo we can perhaps opt-out of).
We cannot know or avoid that our distant-relatives follow a new trend. Like, sending in their dna-test. Perhaps they will do this without our consent or concider the consequences of their actions.

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @sudonaka 26 Aug 2023

Great food for thought.

I think it is possible to compartmentalize- your public persona should be convincing but they don't have to expose your nyms.

I just reread your original post and basically I would discourage un-friending anyone.

Split off a persona that continues to be their friend. Big brother can continue to track that nym and assume they have a correct file for you.

Have your true development continue separately and only share what is necessary. For example: Take a new phone number but keep your old number for the people who know you by the old number. If that friend never advances then your new nyms might have to leave them behind, but you can always "visit" them with your old persona.

This can get extreme and is probably not necessary for everyone and I recommend you fully consider the psychological implications.

3 sats \ 0 replies \ @bataroot 26 Aug 2023

I like this analogy :)

143 sats \ 1 reply \ @npub1freed0m 26 Aug 2023

This one hits home for many, if not all of us.

As we go down the privacy / sovereignty rabbit hole we feel compelled not only to "save" our loved ones, but to protect ourselves as well.

When we're dealing with family, close friends, or life partners - it's not so easy to just 'walk away'.

Sounds like you have done a lot already.. Just remember you can't force someone to care about their freedom. You can only protect your own.

Some things you could do:

Use pihole on your home network to prevent their wifi connections to unsafe websites (like facebook)
Purchase a Pixel, install Graphene, and gift it to your friend or loved one
Focus and be encouraging about all the good things they are doing / have done (buying corn, using simplex, having a vpn)
Invite your friend / loved one to your local bitcoin group where they can be influenced by other individuals with the sovereign mindset

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @1c8c319862 OP 26 Aug 2023

True that, you do not want to force your beliefs on anyone. Yet, I feel like some peoples' carelessness about their freedom is indirectly harming mine, at least there might be long-term implications of their actions (e.g. super trendy dna-testing)

Thanks for the tips, I have pihole running already :)

43 sats \ 1 reply \ @JesseJames 26 Aug 2023

All You can do is to have honest conversation and emphasize your point. What they do in their lives is theirs and theirs alone. You might have an opinion and if the friend is willing to listen then fine. But do not let this ruin your friendship, let them be. Explain your point and then shut-up about it. They know where you stand. If they need more help, they know where to find ya. I think that sometimes we try too hard. Your heart is in a good place just be a friend not a pusher, I think it will serve you better. If you are concern about your own live, you have not a lot of choices but limit your exposure. Sad but true.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @1c8c319862 OP 26 Aug 2023

True that, you do not want to force your beliefs on anyone.

I have been way pushier in the past, now I am in a state of hoplessness... much sad... but perhaps they might come around one day, idk

2 sats \ 0 replies \ @iguano 26 Aug 2023

Exactly , do the thing for you , if friends need help they will ask.

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @netstatic 26 Aug 2023

I think there are both reasonable and unreasonable expectations for people to care about privacy. Asking that your friend has a different email for everything is unreasonable. Asking that he uses a VPN all the time is also unreasonable.

For every ask, focus on explaining the risks and make good reason-based arguments as to how these risks might be realized. A risk for you may not be seen as a risk for him and your perceived probability of risks happening may not be the same as his.

Encourage individual thought. If his privacy tradeoffs are different than yours in ways that affect your privacy than make an ultimatum for the means in which you communicate and/or reference each other (either privacy-focused or not-at-all).

1 sat \ 0 replies \ @sahil 26 Aug 2023

I feel you:

Privacy? I still remember my IRL friends saying to use things like FB, snap, Insta, Twitter etc! Tried educating them but failed at it :( Like about data brokers, using custom ROM, about giving permissions etc. But now some are realizing about it now!

#224912

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @TheBTCManual 27 Aug 2023

I have friends and family who don't see the issue with these tools and don't see the value in bitcoin either, even though I care I can't make them see the value in it, I can't change those who don't want to learn or change, let them be, if they do come around feel free to be supportive and provide insights you've learned over the years

You have to let people make their own mistakes, just like you did

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @l0k18 27 Aug 2023

Nature abhors a vacuum. Unfriend and other possibilities, better quality people, will come along. I think you should seriously consider that this person is riding you in some way, if they aren't really listening to you.

As for VPNs, I don't seriously believe any single point hop is securing you against very much. Maybe you can change your watcher from NSA to FSB at best. Tor is a joke, it has not improved in any meaningful way since 2007, just a bunch of mandatory protocol changes because they keep putting insecure garbage in the protocol.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @south_korea_ln 27 Aug 2023

Wow, sacrificing a friendship because they don't think exactly like you... What cult again did we sign up for?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @south_korea_ln 27 Aug 2023

But seriously, seems like you got some good friends there, if they are willing to do privacy stuff for you to please you even if they don't believe in it. That's what friends do, compromise. Think twice before unfriending such good friends.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @2bithits 26 Aug 2023

Yes, people often choose convenience over hard learning. Privacy is a big rabbit hole in itself.

Id say just start with 1 thing, & just keep mentioning it. Get him to enable the kill switch on his VPN. Then move onto another etc

In the end its up to him, there's only so much you can do.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @scottathan 26 Aug 2023

I don't know much, but I know that you ought not to part with them merely because they don't understand

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @nicosey 26 Aug 2023

Some people in the matrix...

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @locomancell 26 Aug 2023

you want your friend to go private so it doesn't affect your privacy, if not then unfriend... I think you need more p2p pleb friends

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @persimmons 26 Aug 2023

Honestly I sound like your friend but with no one in my life advocating for digital privacy. What dystopian future do you see happening for iPhone Face ID users like me?

23 sats \ 0 replies \ @nemo 26 Aug 2023

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