Planting Cut Flowers

To plan for the future without having a sense of history is like trying to plant cut flowers.
— David McCullough

I’ve been thinking about cryptography in P2P systems. Projects like TOR and Freenet focus on using cryptography to protect anonymity.

The grounding principles is that this allows the dissemination of information while protecting the publisher’s identity. Using these systems, people can coordinate their activities in opposition to oppressive organizations, be they corporate, religious or governmental.

History suggests that the surest anathema to tyranny isn’t a well organized opposition, but instead public martyrs. Opposition creates sides, people pick a side and stop really thinking about the issue. Martyrs, however, shake things up. They make people look at their choices in a new light and reconsider them.

How many people do you think saw people putting out cigarettes on the arms and backs of black people during the sit-ins of the 60′s and thought, “That’s my side? This is what I stand for?”

Nonviolence is its most effective as a tool for political change when it is public enough that it has the opportunity to change minds.

I certainly respect the work of those who seek to protect anonymity. I think there’s a space to be filled though for technological solutions that allow very public verifiable discourse. After all, privacy is simply the ability to deceive effectively.