On the contrary, they do realize that loss of privacy makes life harder for "troublemakers", and they see that as a benefit. Don't make the mistake of assuming that everyone shares your moral code.

The best comeback I've heard to that sentiment is, "would you like a camera in your bathroom?". And then the other night I was talking to my aunt and she mentioned that she has an Alexa in the bathroom so she can listen to music and I realized it might not be as good a retort as I thought.

A better retort might be: "Do you want your health insurance premiums to be set based on which recipes you Google?" This one has the advantage of having a material impact and being almost-real[1].

[1] https://www.coverage.com/insurance/status-update-your-social...

I agree to an extent, but I think you're grossly oversimplifying the way that the average non-technical user views their privacy online. It's true that many people don't really care about advertisers tracking them, but they do care about other privacy-related aspects of their digital experience such as having their location tracked or the content of their communications monitored. As evidence of the latter, I present the enduring popularity of Signal and the fact that WhatsApp thought E2EE was an important enough feature to roll out across their entire user base.

The small minority of society that needs privacy (we should be honest and say that it includes some really nasty criminals as well as the good guys) really needs that kind of privacy, the kind that the average user is at least somewhat interested in. Ad-tracking isn't a huge concern to your average union organizer.