Would you be okay with these minor changes to U.S. laws regarding liberty and privacy if it gave you more....?

Question

Security.

Would you be willing to give up just a bit of your privacy, civil liberties, and freedoms if it would ensure a great amount of safety and security in return?

We're not talking about a huges loss of freedom or privacy. Just little things here and there.

What do you think? Would you go for it?

Answer 1

NO

Answer 2

This is the problem, we start sacrificing what we consider to be little minor freedoms. The government tells us that it's only minor, and if you aren't doing anything wrong then you have nothing to fear. Trust us we will protect you from the bad guys. Then it starts to escalate, we then sacrifice more and more freedoms until eventually we have none left. The government then takes control of every aspect of our lives. We allow the government to now listen into our phone calls without a warrant, confiscate our belongings, come into our houses without a warrant, arrest and detain people without probable cause. The government then starts to label anyone it pleases as terrorists, and then we allow them to torture them, hold them without the benefit of a trial, without the benefit of council, or even seeing the charges against them. They rot in a cell day after day. The government then can do this to anyone of us. We then live in that fear. In that fear do we really have security? No, we don't. All one needs to do is to look at history. Did Nazi Germany or Stalin's Soviet Union have security? I ask this because in the end this is what these people did, traded liberty for security. You see, Hitler knew what government officials have known throughout history, that during a time of national emergencies people are scared and thus much more willing to surrender their liberties in return for "security." They traded what they considered to be minor freedoms for security, and they received neither. So, no I will not sacrifice minor securities for any kind of security hope or promise. Because when you get right down to it, there are no minor liberties without out one we lose all. And in the immortal words of Patrick Henery, “I know not what coarse you others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

Answer 3

I think, no I hope the main thing most Americans want is to leave the country in at least as good a shape as we got it. Its not the near term effects of the erosion of civil liberties that should alarm people. It what happens 50, 100 500 years from now when we have given our children and grand children's liberties away ans shackled them to a government they can neither get rid of or live with.

Answer 4

We already do that. Every time we take an airline flight we voluntarily give up some priviledges in exchange for security.

The answer to your question is it would depend on what the level of threat is and how emminent it is. If we were in a situation where by physical danger to ourselves and our families was emminent then yes most of us would take a bit of loss of freedom over a permanent loss of life.

As for me and my family we are opposed to giving up and more freedoms and privacies. We prefer to take care of our own problems and do so quite well. We all have concealed permits and are well trained in defended ourselves. I have an alarm system a couple of well trained dogs. Bad guys leave us alone.

Answer 5

Of course not. Laws that supposedly bring security, such as gun control, only take away liberty and security. We've had school shootings because of gun control on school grounds (preventing anybody from defending themself).

We don't need any of that. Government action always leads to the opposite result of what it is supposed to do, so why would we want to pass a law to "strengthen" security when it is only going to make us less safe. We especially don't need to destroy our national defense sending the National Guard and Border Patrol to foreign countries to become sitting ducks for Al-Qaida to kill.

I don't want any snake oil. If we want to be secure, we must become a free society. 9/11 happened because of an idiotic gun control policy that prevented plane pilots from defending themselves. If pilots were allowed to have guns, the Al-Qaida suicide pilots would not have tried to hijack an airplane to crash into the Twin Towers. Criminals are concerned about self-preservation and will never attack an armed target. They fear a civilian with a gun more than the police.

Answer 6

Our Founding Fathers sacrificed security for Freedom. Now, we are expected to sacrifice our Freedoms for the illusion of security.
No.

Answer 7

We do & always have. Liberties are not & have not ever been absolute. My right not to be blown up by a terrorist trumps your right to talk to your friends in Iran without have the goverment listening.

Answer 8

These "minor" changes aren't about security, they are about making it tougher on the terrorists. I don't feel like I am giving up one shred of freedom, but then I have nothing to hide.

Answer 9

be more specific. I work, so I give up a lot more than just a bit of my privacy every day.

Answer 10

yes i would. the problem IS: what defines "just a bit"?

that is where we cannot agree as a whole.

Also, who monitors those who are taking this "little bit"?

Again, I think as a whole we tend to not trust those in power to do so, especially since we are so divided among partisan lines.

Answer 11

The government is welcome to listen to my petty little problems anytime.

As things stand, there may come a time when we are forced to either allow them to or, surrender our country to terrorism. What choice would you have me make? Does it make sense to protect one right so vehemently that we end up losing the country, our lifestyles and standards of living?