Not to deflate everyone's false sense of pride and outrage but no one gives a damn about who you are calling and emailing. Please, don't flatter yourself. No one cares that you're talking with your sister in Michigan, no one cares that you just dialed your weed delivery service, no one cares that you just sexted your secretary. Get over yourself. If you really think the government gives an ass about who you're communicating with, maybe you shouldn't be ratting them out. As long as you're not disposing of your device after a quick talk with your former mentor in Yemen, feel free to Snapchat a picture of your privates to whomever you want. Because absolutely no one cares.
No, no I get it. It's a slippery slope. One day they're collecting billions of pieces of data trying to search out a pattern of sketchy emails or calls flagged in their records to prevent a terrorist attack on the nation, and the next day you're tied up on an X like Theon Greyjoy just for calling your buddy to find out the Mets score. (They lost) I know how this works. Give an inch, they've got you on speed dial. You have every right to be paranoid if you're not calling radicals on the daily -- they're probably busting in your door right now. You shouldn't have ordered from that Afghani restaurant on your Seamless app.
There's nothing worse than people putting on this false affront over privacy just to pretend like anyone is even remotely interested in their life. Trust me, no one wants to know anything more about you that they can't already find on the Internet. By stalking you for five minutes. And using the information you've already willingly put out there. If anyone cared to know more, then you'd have a reality show. But if you don't, guess what, you're boring and no one wants to know who you've been g-chatting with. So why don't you just put up an Instagram picture tagged to exactly where you are at this very minute so you can think everyone is jealous and everyone else can just hate you more. And maybe even find you on Foursquare.
As much as I understand the concern about government overreach, I equally detest the notion of citizen over-esteem. The belief that you're so important that anyone from the NSA to the NRA gives a damn about you is so arrogant. That's the danger of American exceptionalism; that we all believe it. If you're so worried about being spied upon, chances are you probably should be. Why are you feeling so guilty if no one can prove it? And if it's tyranny you're worried about, and who isn't these days, good luck stopping that with text messages and your personal collection of guns.
Also, not to be a spoiler, but didn't we all already know this? Isn't this something we've all already agreed upon like years ago? I thought it was a given that the government got to monitor the bulk of our phone and email records. How else would they notice the shady ones? I actually prefer them looking at all the information instead of picking and choosing. Otherwise, that would be called profiling. And who would support that in this country? If the government wasn't tracking all this information I'd be worried they weren't doing their job.
This whole NSA scandal has now grown so boring and egotistical. People barely care what you have to say when you're talking to them; they could definitely care even less when you're talking to someone else. If you so badly want to feel violated, sign up for Tindr. But don't try to act like the government gives two cents about you. Especially after the sequester. If we all have so little trust in the government we won't even allow it to do its best to protect us then maybe we should all move to Somalia. I hear they have far less surveillance there.
Listen, I'm not some national security hawk. Who believes our species is constantly endangered. I'm not a fear-mongering big government fanatic. I couldn't even name my Congressman. I'm not a technocratic idealist. Believing that privacy is a thing of the past. I'm just someone who recognizes that I'm far too unimportant for the NSA to care how many people I'm hitting up on Hotmail. And if I was that important, well guess what, I hope I'd be smart enough to figure out a more secure way to communicate my illegal doings. Until then please do me a favor and like me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter.