I don’t know if it’s a trend I’ve just noticed over the past 20 years, or a fundamental part of human psychology I was oblivious to when young, but I am really disturbed by those who think everyone is secretly just like them, and anyone who fails to act identically is “broken” or “mentally ill” or only “pretending” to be different.
That's fair. Perhaps I should have chosen my words more carefully. What I was trying to say is that I've noticed that when dealing with very large and complex problems like privacy, climate change, terrorism, etc., people who claim, "I don't care about X, or I don't worry about Y anymore...", are often motivated first and foremost by fear. The problems get to feel so overwhelming that it becomes easier to either pretend the problem doesn't exist or convince yourself that you don't care.
To your broader point, you are correct. We do, and I'm guilty of it here, tend to use the specter of mental illness to silence or discredit people we disagree with.
I fight on many things, but a huge part of fighting effectively is choosing your battles: putting your effort where it is likely to have results.
Some things I've done that I think have a much better cost benefit trade off than fighting for increased privacy:
* Switching careers to work on pandemic mitigation: https://www.jefftk.com/p/leaving-google-joining-the-nucleic-...
* Donating half my income for the last 10 years: https://www.jefftk.com/donations
* Advocating for cheaper housing: https://www.jefftk.com/news/housing
Exactly. This is 100% cowardice. It's the mentally of a broken man who's too beaten to fight anymore. Very depressing.