"I'd like to thank..."
Now in a day in age where we have hospitals closing, people being refused treatment, people selling their houses for care and sitting in their houses without the heating on during the winter because they cannot afford it and many other things we spend money on What? Well, watching those very same people being refused treatment, selling their homes for care and shivering from the winter cold because they cannot afford heating.
They don’t know, for instance, that a record is kept of every internet site they visit. They don’t realise that when identity cards come in, there will be a record of their movements and every time they have engaged with any public service.”
Reported in The Times today (29th October)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2426874,00.html
Now, I do see both sides of the argument here. One side being the very bland and simple "if you have nothing to fear then you need not fear"...Which I suppose is true on basic terms without ethical consideration. I mean, it's true if you have nothing to hide then they cannot find it. If you don't go on child porn websites or terrorist websites then you wont be convicted of going on them. So the overwhelming majority need not fear anything right? Just don't do the crime, simple...
“It’s not just unwarranted intrusions into privacy, it’s also the dangers of inaccurate information, of mistakes being made, of information being held for too long,” Thomas said. He cited an example of a schoolgirl whose playground banter resulted in her father being refused work because he had been classed as a suspected paedophile. “The little girl was overheard saying, ‘My dad bonked me last night’. A dinner lady heard this and reported it to the school authorities,” Thomas said. Social services discovered that the girl was referring to her father tapping her playfully on the head with an inflatable hammer. The file was closed, but five years later the father discovered he was still a suspected sex offender.
Reported by The Times (29th October)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2426874,00.html
Ok, so maybe we do have something to fear because with this watching, recording and interefence comes inaccruate data which really can harm our way of life. But still, there is that glaring factor that if we are not monitored then neither are those who actually are commiting crimes which means that by objecting to this we may well be preventing a paedophile getting caught...So I really do see the logical side but I do have hesitations on it and even more so, I have this undescrible gut feeling which makes me just dislike the idea of being watched, tracked, photographed and monitored despite how much good it can do.
It's a toughie, I suppose this is an independent decision where the person must use their own ethics to decide whether they agree with it or not. Personally, given the option to vote for or against it right now I would vote against it as a breach of civil liberty and right to privacy. I would accept a watered down version of this but I believe that as it stands, this is just too much and no doubt costs an arm and a leg which could be better diverted to more needy causes, like keeping the population alive for starters.
"It is dangerous to be right when your Government are wrong." - Voltaire
That is the kind of country we are creating I fear, a country where the state takes an authoritarian role, watching us and telling us what we can and can't do even in our homes.

