I can speak as someone who holds public office.

In my work as an appointed member of government, all our meetings are held fully accessible to the public. We technically can have have conversations about what our votes will be, or what we think etc. outside of the meetings, however those conversations cannot let anyone whether us or any member of the public, know how the votes will go before the meeting happens, and that can include the minutes prior. If it happens it can range in anything from fines to jailtime, of course and garunteed to be blacklisted from just about any public work in the future given violation of our Oath of Office.

Thus, technically any conversations or messages between the board, our liason, etc. relating to the work we do can be subpoena’d or FIA’d, or just outright requested by members of the public given relevance, but generally anything we do as private citizens should remain private like for anyone else.

One of the reasons I won’t run for office is my comment history.

As much as I would like to say one shouldn’t say anything in private one wouldn’t say in public, i don’t think people have the maturity to handle it. The average person has at least one, if not several, irrational prejudices. I don’t think we can overcome that.

Group chats aren’t private. Individuals could possibly disclose what you tell them one-on-one. If in your life there’s something as damaging as what was said in those chats you’re talking about, keep it to yourself. Or better yet, get some new opinions.

Chats should receive the exact same considerations as conversations in person.

In my opinion, we as a species are not ready to live in public even as much as we are currently, with the level of privacy we still have. We are already so hateful and judgmental of the “other” and willing to use legal and social means to punish transgressions from the normal. Privacy is one of our only remaining antidotes to tolerate living against the grain of society.

Should your private messages and group chats be public information?

No.

Is it reasonable to hold individuals accountable for statements made that they thought were in private?

Yes.

You’re asking more than one question, really:

Should you have the expectation of privacy in “private” electronic communication?

–and–

Should “private” communications that become public be considered when vetting people for positions of influence?

Personally, I was raised with the understanding that you should never write anything down that you wouldn’t want read aloud in front of your grandma and the Supreme Court. The law (at least in the US) does delineate some type of communication that should have the expectation of legal privacy: with your priest, your therapist, your lawyer, and your spouse. A lesser expectation for when you’re in your own home, and none at all beyond that. Whether the law is right or wrong, it at least sets expectations. And those YRs were not protected. They perhaps have grounds to sue whoever leaked the group chat, but you can’t really cry foul at anyone else.

No?! What kind of question is that??

No, what the fuck?

just the ones of me f’ing your mom

First, there are still technical means and operational security techniques of having and safeguarding private chats, that means if you don’t utilize them and it leaks, it’s basically your fault for either not being informed enough or for being too careless.

Second, if you do criminal things in said private chats, and it leaks, then you should be held accountable for it. Especially if, as in this case, what you did went against the constitution, human rights or similar very basic laws that no one should break, ever. In these times, no one can predict if or when such online hostility turns into real-life hostile acts. The line that separates saying hostile stuff online and actually doing it IRL is sometimes very thin. With the extreme amounts of right-wing extremist propaganda on the web these days, I’d say this is a serious matter and there’s a high chance that some individuals will forget their moral compass and just go full Nazi after being exposed to too much of this stuff.

People should have privacy but people should also not act a way in private that would completely shame them. I mean yeah if you had a list of my porn viewing it would be pretty embarrasing but if everyones was out I bet mine would look tame or at least typical for a straight male. Outside of porn I can’t think of anything I have wrote that is indefensible but all the same a government like we currently have would target me as a lefty/commie/whateverotherbs stuff if they had access to it when I like apply to usajobs.gov thing. Im likely giving it away with my response to the constitution and presidential decree questions (are people aware of the bs questions on there now?)

Fuck no. Privacy should be a human right. This also would have massive opportunities for discrimination, blackmail, and just plain humiliation, making the cons a million times bigger than the pros.

It’s by definition not private if others can just look it up. I’d say no. Nobody deserves to be judged by their employer or others for EVERYTHING they do or say. Everybody has a bad day sometimes. Everyone gets really annoyed and says mean stuff.

Furthermore, privacy has profound mental health implications. People that cannot get privacy develop mental disorders like paranoia, anxiety, self-doubt, and all sorts of other problems.

On top of that, if they knew their messages could’ve been leaked… do you think they would’ve said it in the first place? They WOULD be thinking it, but you wouldn’t know.

Invading everyone’s privacy because you don’t want to have to exercise your brain is a terrible thing to ask. To those of us that do know how to observe and think, it’s pretty damn obvious when someone is a pile of crap like these people. Removing ALL privacy just so dummies can agree is… one of the worst possible reasons to remove privacy.