Philosophy
The following Public Service Announcement comes from the LAPD's citizen surveillance program and promotes the idea that, as responsible and caring citizens, we should report any suspicion of possible terrorist-related activities to the authorities. Even when we are not sure about the veracity of our own suspicions, the recommendation is that we "let the officers decide."
On the surface, the message seems innocent and based on a sense of communal love, but, actually, it carries with it the seeds of divisiveness. If you don't have to worry about whether your tips can be substantiated, you don't have to care, and this opens up the floodgates to the kind of racial profiling and communal spying that can only make people trust each other less and less, and spy on one another more and more. It's the gift that keeps on giving. Instead of iWatch, maybe it should be called iSpy or iParanoid or iDouchebag...
Tired of that weird foreign neighbor you can't quite figure out? Why not report him as a potential terrorist threat? Let the police decide... as they violate his civil rights. Hey, why not send a message to that new young minority couple across the street: that they are not welcome in the neighborhood? You don't have to worry about the consequences because, after all, you can hide behind the pretense of patriotism...
Of course, if anyone thinks you're a jackass, iWatch will allow them to send some Vick Mackey to kick down your door and make you his bitch, all in the name of safety and neighborly love :)
And did they really say "think about that"??? The irony, it hurts!
And unless there really is that much terrorist activity going on, the fact that iWatch was responsible for the submission of 1,500 tips in just a few months should make obvious the need for an upgraded program: iThink...
NPR has a story on iWatch.
.
- What Is A Terrorist?
I've always hated the cliche, "It's just a matter of semantics." We say that, of course, when we mean that a discussion is trivial worrying about defnitions instead of content, but semantics, the study of meaning, is quite difficult and important....
- Can You Deny Gratitude? What Does A Book Dedication Mean?
A friend has written a book and wanted to dedicate it to a well-known figure who had inspired his work. He sent a note and the figure's people responded that while this well-known appreciates the sentiment, the book was NOT to be dedicated to him....
- Promises And Care
Promises are like contracts. If you promise something to someone, they have the power to dissolve the promise, morally freeing you from the promised responsibility, if they choose. If you promise to wash someone's car and then they decide they don't...
- We Watchn' You
"How America Became a Surveillance State" by Alexandra Silver March 18th, 2010 Time It reads like a spy novel, but in The Watchers: The Rise of America's Surveillance State, author Shane Harris lays out the U.S. government's real-life efforts...
- Not Science's Fault
See what technology have wrought...the means to spy and manage individuals. It's things like this that revive the specter of George Orwell's 1984 and Winston's adventures in Oceania. "Big Brother" there was an iconic figure and here an extension...
Philosophy
iWatch... Because It's Simpler Than iThink
The following Public Service Announcement comes from the LAPD's citizen surveillance program and promotes the idea that, as responsible and caring citizens, we should report any suspicion of possible terrorist-related activities to the authorities. Even when we are not sure about the veracity of our own suspicions, the recommendation is that we "let the officers decide."On the surface, the message seems innocent and based on a sense of communal love, but, actually, it carries with it the seeds of divisiveness. If you don't have to worry about whether your tips can be substantiated, you don't have to care, and this opens up the floodgates to the kind of racial profiling and communal spying that can only make people trust each other less and less, and spy on one another more and more. It's the gift that keeps on giving. Instead of iWatch, maybe it should be called iSpy or iParanoid or iDouchebag...
Tired of that weird foreign neighbor you can't quite figure out? Why not report him as a potential terrorist threat? Let the police decide... as they violate his civil rights. Hey, why not send a message to that new young minority couple across the street: that they are not welcome in the neighborhood? You don't have to worry about the consequences because, after all, you can hide behind the pretense of patriotism...
Of course, if anyone thinks you're a jackass, iWatch will allow them to send some Vick Mackey to kick down your door and make you his bitch, all in the name of safety and neighborly love :)
And did they really say "think about that"??? The irony, it hurts!
And unless there really is that much terrorist activity going on, the fact that iWatch was responsible for the submission of 1,500 tips in just a few months should make obvious the need for an upgraded program: iThink...
NPR has a story on iWatch.
.
- What Is A Terrorist?
I've always hated the cliche, "It's just a matter of semantics." We say that, of course, when we mean that a discussion is trivial worrying about defnitions instead of content, but semantics, the study of meaning, is quite difficult and important....
- Can You Deny Gratitude? What Does A Book Dedication Mean?
A friend has written a book and wanted to dedicate it to a well-known figure who had inspired his work. He sent a note and the figure's people responded that while this well-known appreciates the sentiment, the book was NOT to be dedicated to him....
- Promises And Care
Promises are like contracts. If you promise something to someone, they have the power to dissolve the promise, morally freeing you from the promised responsibility, if they choose. If you promise to wash someone's car and then they decide they don't...
- We Watchn' You
"How America Became a Surveillance State" by Alexandra Silver March 18th, 2010 Time It reads like a spy novel, but in The Watchers: The Rise of America's Surveillance State, author Shane Harris lays out the U.S. government's real-life efforts...
- Not Science's Fault
See what technology have wrought...the means to spy and manage individuals. It's things like this that revive the specter of George Orwell's 1984 and Winston's adventures in Oceania. "Big Brother" there was an iconic figure and here an extension...