The Cowardly New World

China has embarked on an extraordinary program of continuous mass surveillance.

Yes, we are actually beginning to see the realization of George Orwell’s worst nightmare, not just in China, but everywhere.

Here it is.  No surprise, not anymore.  It is actually here.  It happened.  There is, probably, no going back, because, unfortunately, humans are really not very smart.  Would you rather have safety and security or privacy?   You can’t have both.  We believe them when they tell us that.  We invariably choose safety because when it comes right down to it we humans are very, very easily frightened.

Of course it’s a false choice.  We will not be safer if we give up our privacy and we will not not have privacy if we give up our safety.  The question is, how much do you want to give up?  And do you really, truly, seriously trust the government with the level of intrusive surveillance they are going to have?

China is moving faster than we are only because they have a dictatorial government that can do whatever it wants.  Ideologically, are they really all that different?  Their public reasons might sound different, but are they substantively different from “we must protect our citizens from terror” and “law-abiding citizens have nothing to fear”?

They even boast to their citizens that we can watch you all the time.  They scan faces in crowds at train stations and public squares looking for “criminals”, which often means people who dissent.

When we all read “1984” years ago most of us probably thought it would never happen here. Because we all read the book and we were all outraged and we all knew why it would be so bad.  Surely no democratic government would dare impose any practices that evoke visions of “Big Brother”.  But, especially since 9/11, they have gone right ahead and done it.  The U.S. government gave itself the right to examine all of your e-mails and all of your calling records essentially without warrant.  The Obama administration went right ahead and launched drone attacks on enemy targets without any real accountability.  And the hugely disappointing civil libertarian contingent in the U.S. has quietly rolled over in acquiescence.

So when western countries start following China’s lead and begin monitoring us in every public space with face recognition software to identify us and follow us and record our whereabouts at all times, I’m pretty sure the majority of brave, principled, patriotic citizens will cower in terror and comply fully with the new regime.  And we will have arrived at our nightmare.

[whohit]Cowardly New World[/whohit]