Interestingly, the original quote is "Those who would give up ESSENTIAL Liberty, to purchase a little TEMPORARY Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." which is quite different meaning. Otherwise you never have any safety, as safety is always at the expense of some freedom.
Arguably, this kind of work is the opposite - giving up non-essential freedom (in how you write code) for non-temporary (persistent) security.
The person you are replying to holds the perspective that keeping software insecure allows for a glorious overthrow of our digital overlords when appropriate. A bit like a digital 2nd amendment, really: the hackers will all band together and use their guns^H^H^H^H vulnerabilities to ensure freedom from tyranny. Is that position stupid? Well, they stop replying when you point out what those security holes are overwhelmingly used for. So you be the judge.
It's amazing to see how much the mass media along with Big Tech has brainwashed people with their alarmism. The dystopia is rapidly approaching where you cannot do anything without their explicit approval, and it will all be "for your security".
Some people are more prescient than most, but they've been canceled for telling others about it.
No, you just refuse to do anything about it, because you dream of that dystopian future so you can brush off your hacker skills and save humanity. Why don’t you actually try to fix the problem instead of mandating that loopholes exist for you (and basically nobody else) to use?
People have been trying for decades. I voted and hope 45/47 will give them something to be scared of. I fight Big Tech's authoritarianism every day. What did you do besides spreading more pro-corporate FUD and helping my enemy?
Why is it that the MSM gets all riled up about the people using encryption against the government, but when megacorps use encryption against the population, they're strangely silent? The only true freedom is insecurity. And we will fight against having that freedom taken away, no matter what.
I did watch what happened to Stallman. I don’t think the attack on his personal character was well substantiated but it’s pretty clear that he isn’t fit to lead a movement as important as the one fighting for software freedom. Not only is he seemingly incapable of understanding that his role is one of dealing with people, not code, but he has slowly fallen out of relevance regardless by fighting for freedoms which are largely not useful as more of the world comes online. Being able to recompile software or read its source code is little solace if you don’t actually know how to use that. Knowing free software is out there is not helpful if you’re required to use proprietary software for your job, to interact with your government, or just be part of modern society. The viewpoint of a guy who uses Trisquel but really relies on dozens of other people to actually function (seriously, look up what Stallman writes: he basically isolates himself from proprietary software by asking other people to do things for him and then sending the effects to him via some inconvenient mechanism that he feels happier consuming) is inappropriate for out of touch for someone who is seeking to fight for the rights of the average person.
As for who you voted for president: I guess you at least learned from last time to include it in your response. But I’m still not seeing any real action there? The new administration has said they’ll take on big tech but I don’t see software freedom driving any of their decisions. Most of them involve large companies having too much control over speech or raising the prices on services, but the solutions do not seem forthcoming. I’m actually concerned because this guy’s right hand man is the world’s richest man who built his fortune on proprietary platforms, and every other big tech CEO also seems to be running to support this guy because they think it will help them become even more entrenched. I can’t say what will happen in the next four years but looking at the previous tenure and spoken statements I see dismantling of anti-monopoly policies, regulation, and a general strengthening of corporate power. None of these seem conducive to an environment where free software can thrive.
As for myself most of my projects are some form of GPL. Many of them are focused on interoperability, specifically interoperability of proprietary platforms, so those who use them can become familiar with free software and have an easier time leaving them when they can. But the whole effort is a lot more holistic than focusing on one specific area of computer security, which I say even though that is my expertise and area of employment. Like it or not jailbreaks and exploits are neat but do not seem to be resilient drivers of software freedom.
It's a big bound check conspiracy, actually. Basically, Google will collaborate with US government to gather all the bounds, via Android. FBI will break into your house and look for all the `i < length`, and if they don't find them, they will terminate your `i++` on the spot. This is just the begining. Next time, they will go even for `int = 0`. You'll own nothing, just `for(;;)` and you'll be happy.
Arguably, this kind of work is the opposite - giving up non-essential freedom (in how you write code) for non-temporary (persistent) security.