Comment by atoav

> It's more of an appeal to emotion than a rational reason.

But that is precisely the rational reason. In a free society you want people to act freely. To be able to act freely it helps tremendously to not be under constant surveillance by authorities, powerful actors and/or personal and political enemies. If one happens to have the same cultural background or political ideas as all those on the other side and one is generally a careless nature it helps in not feeling threatened by that surveillance.

The new thing digital surveillance brought is the ability to automate and for search things that happened once. Where in communist Germany the state had to have a giant apparatus that would break into your flat and install microphones, have people constantly following you around and listening in on every word you said. The impact this has on a free exchange of ideas is quite obvious, isn't it? These things have become far less resource intensive in the age of the web.

And if you now say: "Yeah but they were communists" — that is the point. If you are hoping those in power will be respectful because your values (currently) align with theirs; or because your information is (currently) more useful to them when not disclosed to your enemies — then this is a very optimistic view of the world. But things can change, and not all have that sense of optimism.

Not having to think about whether somebody will knock your door with state police in a decade because of something you wrote online is the reason why privacy exist. Not having to censor yourself because you are afraid those fringe lunatics on the opposite political side will destroy your life is the reason why privacy exists. Not having to censor yourself because your violent husband reads everything you wrote is the reason why privacy exists.

So maybe you can read this as: Power that sees what you do can (and does) change how you act, even if they don't come after you. Not having them see you is a good way of not having to change.