site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   2935 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 19, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Is there anything I as an individual can do to push back against Flock cameras or broader mass surveillance in the US?

Reading 1984 as a sixth grader I was horrified by Big Brother and the authoritarianism illustrated in the book and always felt that if those things came to life it would be right and imperative to fight against them, and every year I’ve seen more and more authoritarian overreach that disturbs me.

I do not vote as I believe it’s a massive waste of time at best. I am not fond of solutions such as “call your congressperson” or “show up to your local council and demand change” because these are similarly time wasting activities in my opinion.

I am frustrated by the acceptance of the public for these technologies with terrible implications for the present and the future. I don’t want to break the law in order to fight them and don’t want to become more of a target, which seems inevitable if you want to speak against it publicly. I feel very disappointed in people around me and the modern west when I realize the state of mass surveillance today.

always felt that if those things came to life it would be right and imperative to fight against them

Now you're realizing there will be no fight. Good and kind citizens would just vote everything in, to protect the children, preserve the peace and fight the terrorists. And people who warn about the dangers are just insane fearmongering extremists. Who you're going to fight - a concerned father that thinks his teenage daughter spends too much time on tiktok? How are you going to fight him? And when he votes in the regime that can disconnect you from the internet if they don't like what you say, how your fight is going to look then? Are you going to murder all those kindly cat ladies from Kids Guardianship Bureau that would disconnect your account for exposing children to dangerous ideas? Reading 1984 as an adult is much more scarier, when you understand how this actually works...

You should vote.

The cost is not actually that high: a few hours a year, right?

The benefit is, of course, abysmal. It gets better for local elections. I suspect you could push it further by spending more time and effort signaling your single-issue status. But on its own your vote is near worthless.

More importantly, it is a good categorical imperative. You should vote because people similar to you should vote.

I mean, you should vote. But if you want something higher impact, volunteer with local campaigns that oppose flock cameras. Many local elections are nonpartisan and people are simply lost as to who to vote for; a door knock or a phone call can replace the all important (R) or (D).

More importantly, if the politicians are aware of your campaign and it size and influence they'll be more likely to sway on that issue. Even if you don't swing the election, the threat that you could maybe nudge the polls a bit will make both candidates more likely to want to curry favor with you on your issue.

Is there anything I as an individual can do to push back against Flock cameras or broader mass surveillance in the US?

The most effective thing you could do is advocate for massive increases in human policing. A cop on every corner, with DA's willing to charge all plausible cases, and judges willing to seriously hold people accountable, even juveniles and minorities. Reopen the asylums and confine the mentally ill who serially refuse to take their meds.

Flock cameras are tolerated or even desired almost entirely due to the (often accurate) perception that too much crime goes unpunished. Once we're all living in a low-crime high-trust society again, people will be much less willing to trade their public anonymity for security.

That's by design. High-trust society does not need overlords. Low-trust society does, because it's the only hope peaceful people have against random violence and petty warlords. It all works towards the same goal.

If you're not already aware, Deflock is pushing back against this issue specifically. There are also local groups in various areas, maybe there's one near you or you could start one yourself?

Flock is pretty expensive for cities and seems to have trouble clearly showing an impact on violent crime reduction. It is often hard to beat the financial argument, with equity/privacy being a great excuse. Without ceding the privacy grounds, I would suggest critiques based primarily on efficacy/cost.

That argument only works until it doesn't though. An efficient surveillance state is worse than an expensive one, and I'm wary that any argument fronting cost will merely incentivize companies to figure out how to do it cheaper. Then, even if you haven't technically ceded the privacy argument, the balance of interests on the thing you were primarily talking about has now flipped and it looks like you've lost the argument. Never lead with the point that's standing on a shaky foundation that might collapse out from under you at any moment. Even if it's not technically load-bearing, it will be publicly seen as such.

Is there anything I as an individual can do to push back against Flock cameras or broader mass surveillance in the US?

As individual, fully legally (we are all law abiding citizens here)?

The effective altruist way: if you have high paying job, grind extra hard and donate the money to some trustworthy and effective organization fighting for privacy rights (no idea if there are any).

The less effective but more altruist way: drop your job and other obligations and become full time agitator for the cause. In modern world, it means shitpost on the internets (so far, AI will soon replace these jobs).

donate the money to some trustworthy and effective organization fighting for privacy rights

Ah, this is a good idea, I don't know why I didn't think of that myself. I'd love to know if anyone here who knows of any good places to donate for this sort of thing. The other night I did a little research on the topic and the ACLU had a long screed against Flock cameras but I know the right generally dislikes this organization. I'd be happier donating to a neutral or bipartisan org instead if anyone can recommend one.

The Institute for Justice filed a federal lawsuit that I believe is currently on appeal, and likely has more in the pipeline. They're basically a libertarian ACLU focusing on property rights and economic freedom. They probably also have a way to donate directly to their Fourth Amendment/surveillance work if you want to laser-focus your contribution, but I think they're pretty unobjectionable from a conservative perspective in general. They mostly go after governments for making it hard to start small businesses.

You can shift public opinion to get other people to vote/go to council meetings/become elected officials by using techniques from public relations/propaganda. That is how Edward Bernays shifted the public perception around smoking to increase the amount of people that smoked.

Locally, I noticed that people seem to be able to stir up the issue on social media to get enough people to show-up to the council meetings to get the Flock contract not-renewed, but it kind of seems like a shell game where the government will quietly shift to a similar provider when the public pressure cools back down again when people inevitably switch their attention/efforts to other things.

Flock's strategy specifically revolves around grooming political candidates and running through executive branch work, so there's not a ton you can do on that side short of making their candidate contributions more visible and highlighting some of the company's sketchier spends. Rossman's been doing that a bit, albeit to mixed result, but that's a lot better than most. And destroying the physical cameras is less than useless; in some cases Flock ends up paid twice, but regardless they've got to have a replacement budget, just because building deployed cameras to be resilient is a loser's game.

The more... esoteric versions require looking at past successes, and with the caveat that I'm operating solely from public discussion:

Baltimore has a massive distributed camera and recording system, first in its class, combined with a massive shotspotter deployment, and... it's completely useless, and that's a policy decision. Video isn't stored for long to start with, the camera selection went heavy on PTZs and then set them up in an intentionally unfocused (literally and figuratively) sense, the privacy and compliance training means no one who's actually trying to solve serious crimes can get into the system, a few dozen other problems. Downside: it's only a past-facing decision: making it into the privacy nightmare opponents paint it as is a sub-million USD and sub-year project. But you can't undelete data (in this case). But you're stuck with Baltimore mayors to do it.

Carpenter and progeny, and courts willing to draw it to its most maximal ends. It's an ad-hoc general free-floating right to privacy, it's only really useful for the guilty, even its successful cases have a 'first hit's free' problem, and it's not exactly principled, but it covers any privacy question you want so long as it's nontrivial, and it has some bipartisan support.

And destroying the physical cameras is less than useless; in some cases Flock ends up paid twice

Sure, but on the limit some level of destruction will work. Will your city council replace the cameras 4 times each? 10? At some point it will be untenable. Flock is happy to replace the cameras and bill the city according to the "Camera Protection Plan". The city has some limit on what they will spend.

I saw this while renting a car in Greece. There are speed cameras everywhere, like literally every couple of miles on some stretches, but apparently repeated mass sabotage of the cameras eventually made the program too expensive to operate, so only a handful of thr boxes around the country ever actually have cameras in them at any one time, and they have to be moved frequently to stay ahead of the good samaritans. You're generally safe to ignore all the "cameras" you see, because 99% of them are just empty boxes.

Though this might say more about Greek state capacity and Mediterranean laxity than anything else.

At the limit where the city will go bankrupt from it sure, but below that level you're unlikely to convince the city not to put cameras to protect from crime by going on a property crime spree. Your actions will likely justify putting more cameras to try and catch you vandalizing the cameras.

Not bankrupt but merely feeling the fiscal burden of replacing cameras. And yes, they'd try to crack down on camera breaking.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats