Privacy

My friend made an interesting comment today. He claimed that those who insisted on having privacy have something to hide. If one were to accept his argument, one would be inclined to believe that the government and corporations' monitoring of the people are justified if they do not use the information in ways that are adverse to the peoples' interests. However, such information can be irritating, at best, for others to have. It can be downright harmful at worst. For example, people may receive unsolicited spam and "personalized" advertising. That would be rather unpleasant most of the time. However, something that is apparently trivial may come back to haunt someone if that piece of information were to come to light at a later date. That person may not feel that the information needs to be hidden, yet may come to regret releasing or allowing others to acquire it. Knowledge is a double edged sword, and privacy is often more desirable than not, even though many try to convince others otherwise.