"State actor defeatist"-style arguments against taking any technical precautions often conflate two things that the government does: 1. Large scale mostly passive dragnet surveillance, 2. Individually targeted surveillance.

Reasonable people can admit that they can't do much about case 2, while still believing that applying countermeasures against 1 can be effective. Also note there is more than one government in the world that may intend to exploit your lack of privacy...

Just because you're given up on privacy and sovereignty doesn't mean you should go around infecting others with the same contagion.