Because I can't connect directly to news.ycombinator.com, my request is first proxied through verizon and comcast and others. Without HTTPS it is super easy for them (or lesser known snooper) to add malware or whatever they want to the messages. It's useful because of the data integrity verification, not the encryption.

Probably sarcasm but...why shut the door when you're in the bathroom?

I like this analogy. We all know what goes on inside a bathroom, it's not really a secret. But it is private. There is a difference between secrecy and privacy, and this analogy captures the difference well.

I think I first heard the analogy in Cory Doctorow's presentation The Coming Civil War over General-purpose Computing, which was ironically given at Google. I highly recommend people watch it.

Or "why lock your car doors when stealing and hotwiring is a crime"? Sure, people have convertibles and jeeps with no doors, but they also won't leave anything valuable out in the open.

Because I know broken middleboxes will meddle with the traffic unless it's encrypted and authenticated.

Because privacy is a basic human right and not a privilege

Comcast.

Sorry about the downvotes. Poe's law is a bitch.