I know that as leftists, participating in online communities requires a certain level of discretion. I’m admittedly not as privacy focused as I probably should be, but I would like to at least minimize the chances of being put on someone’s list. Do I need a VPN every time I open this site or do I just need to be careful of what I post?
Apart from if I would post some really messed up things, I don’t consider myself in any less danger here versus in real life, where I am a very active member of a communist party. Posting here is not going to do anything worse for my safety.
I am generally in this camp as well; my attitude in my online life pretty closely mirrors that in my real life. People who know me in person know I am an active communist, that even includes some of my bosses, nobody really cares.
I am not going to give out my specific address more than is available in my profile, but I just make it a point to not post anything online that I wouldn’t tell a stranger in person. If I post it online and somebody traces it back to me…I don’t particularly care. Doesn’t mean I want to start getting NAFO death threats, but they also have the attention span of a termite.
If there is something I really cared about keeping private, I just don’t mention it to anybody anywhere.