I've heard bad faith 'if it's legal, it's fine' quite a few too many times to see it as anything except either intellectual laziness or simple bad faith. This is a rhetoric that always seems to pop up whenever anybody advocates for the ethical practice.

I also think it's a pointless exercise to understand the legality of it. Unless you're an actual civil rights attorney, a legislator, or some kind of judge, you, me, and everyone else here has effectively zero power over how the law is interpreted. We can debate all we want but it's a dance in the ivory tower, removed from realworld consequence.

The only real way to push against these forces is to join up with a community organization local to you, volunteer groups that often struggle with basic tech setup and resource tracking. Folks from HN could be a huge boon to the movement if they simply had the initiative to get involved.