I disagree with this particular point. The US Postal Service has searched, read, and censored mail during wartime, and it's naive to assume that any provisioning of email service wouldn't have the ability embedded in it at behest of whatever legislation authorizes to the USPS to do so.
Also, given the current political climate, I would be very concerned that the Comstock Laws are coming back. Can you imagine your email provider blocking or maybe even criminally prosecuting people who send you information about contraception, safe sex, abortion, or legal sex work?
I'm not suggesting that anybody would be required to use their government provided email for everything. I am just suggesting that it should be available to every citizen as a right, since a reliable email address is so important to every day life now.
I wouldn't be sending anything through my government email that I would sent through the post mail. I would be cautious about sending anything through email, as it probably ends up in gmail unencrypted as it is, and is transmitted in the open through multiple relays.
But, we also know that Google, Yahoo, and other _do_ scan all your email. I'm not sure why you feel any safer with a huge corporation that has no oversight.
> I'm not sure why you feel any safer with a huge corporation that has no oversight.
A huge corporation with no oversight can, at worst, terminate my account unilaterally. Maybe they want to sue me, but that will go to a neutral arbiter (the courts).
A government run email platform can, at worst, arrest me or send a SWAT team to my house.
Also, given the current political climate, I would be very concerned that the Comstock Laws are coming back. Can you imagine your email provider blocking or maybe even criminally prosecuting people who send you information about contraception, safe sex, abortion, or legal sex work?