I rephrased my comment a bit, because &quot;privacy&quot; versus &quot;limiting government power&quot; is a false dichotomy. The former is one avenue of the latter. And by saying that limiting power is somewhat ineffectual, I&#x27;m referring to the shorter term when a government will attempt to take all the power they can in an emerging area (eg mass surveillance), and only later be slowly pushed back as society slowly learns why the specific concentration is a bad approach.<p>&gt; <i>We have a way to change it. It&#x27;s called &quot;democracy&quot;.</i><p>Except that &quot;democracy&quot; describes the situation I outlined where the majority tyrannizes the minority. You&#x27;re <i>really</i> saying that the way to change it is to simply <i>wait</i>, which is a complete disservice to anybody persecuted in the past, or anybody being persecuted today for things that are &quot;still&quot; unpopular.<p>If you believe progress is truly <i>inevitable</i>, why are you bothering to discuss this? IMHO, the way progress is <i>created</i> is through specific instances of people fighting for it. And a meta-issue like privacy is what enables those on the forefront to <i>be</i> the social change before it is accepted. You&#x27;d have no gay marriage if sodomy laws were enforced effectively.