I think the issue is an issue of education.

When I see the 'green' colour followed by the word 'secure' when visiting a website using chrome, I know that this does not mean immediately that I have to trust the site. I presume the vast majority of hacker news readers will know better too. But what about the normal, average users?

I think we should just be more proactive in telling people what an SSL certificate actually is, and what https guarantees. Otherwise, we are not really having a discussion.