... government ministers should themselves be under twenty-four hour video surveillance. The tapes should be broadcast daily so that we, their constituents and paymasters, can see and hear what they are up to.
I think a movement should be immediately started to promote this. Plenty of people currently in government would quit their jobs, of course. Good riddance. The proposal solves the problem of who will watch the guardians - we all will. I would also include top media figures and bloviating academics.
Oh, dear! Bloviating academics will be under surveillance? Should I be concerned? Should I warn my colleagues? Is my career in jeopardy? Perhaps I should simply quit before the stuff hits the fan (or the video hits the net). Please, big brother, say it ain't so!
ReplyDeleteYou're I mean.funningme, R.T. You know who
ReplyDeleteWhat are you saying, Jabberwocky? Huh?
ReplyDeleteOdd, my comment got off. I meant to say: You know the people I mean.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of the idea I float every April: That members of Congress and their top several rungs of advisers and aides should be required by law to complete their tax forms in a proctored setting without benefit of electronic tools or outside professional help...
ReplyDeleteThere was a book called The Transparent Society, by David Brin, a few years ago, which posited exactly that and even beyond (anyone in a public space on camera all the time.) Among other things, the author figured people would soon get bored with watching people go about ordinary, daily activities.
ReplyDeletewikipedia reports:
...Somewhat more nuanced than simply being "against privacy," Brin spends an entire chapter exploring how important some degree of privacy is for most human beings, allowing them moments of intimacy, to exchange confidences, and to prepare - in some security - for the competitive world. Nevertheless, he suggests that we currently have more privacy than our ancestors, in part, because "the last two hundred years have opened information flows, rather than shutting them down. Citizens are more able to catch violators of their rights - and hold them accountable - than commonfolk were in the old villages, that were dominated by local gentry, gossips and bullies."
This might seem counter-intuitive at first. But he uses the song "Harper Valley PTA" as a metaphor for how people can protect their eccentricities, and even some privacy, by assertively "looking back." Brin also points to restaurants, in which social disapproval keeps people from staring and eavesdropping, even though they can. With enforcement possible because everybody can see.
From this perspective, a coming era of "most of the people, knowing most of what's going on, most of the time," would only be an extension of what already gave us the Enlightenment, freedom and privacy. By comparison, he asks what the alternative would be: "To pass privacy laws that will be enforced by elites, and trust them to refrain from looking at us?"
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