Privacy Wars
February 18, 2009 at 12:10 pm (Rants, Things Worth Discussing, Uncategorized) (call, cell phone, change, civil, crime, facebook, future, government, internet, laws, listening, monitoring, Policy, privacy, record, right, rights, rules, tapping, technology, teens, text)
So, in light of this whole Facebook ordeal (Facebook website changing its policy and user agreement to say they pretty much own anything you put on their site) I have been thinking about privacy rights and our rights as Americans. Being an American means you lend the government the right to control various aspects of your life under the belief that this government is of the people, by the people and for the people. Therefore, we oughtn’t have reason to believe that the government, which technically is ourselves, has anything but our best interest at heart. Sadly, this does not seem to be the case.
My attention has also been drawn to news reports of police charging teenagers (as in, high school age kids) with child pornography and solicitation of a minor and a myriad of other serious crimes and even felonies for sending nude photos of themselves to other teens. Now, I have no problem with them being charged with something more like a misdemeanor count or something, but felony charges? Really??? One of the articles mentioned that these charges would go on their “Confidential Permanent Record”. That’s what really hit me. Why the &(#$ do we, as Americans have “Confidential Permanent Records”? Who said THEY could keep tabs on US?
Now I can understand, somewhat, the need to catalog someones criminal past up to a certain extent. But notice I use the word “criminal”. Misdemeanor misconduct like sending a nude shot of yourself to someone else (solicited or otherwise) should not constitute being marked so that you can’t get certain jobs, you have to announce to the world you are a sex offender when you change residences, etc. etc. It’s an outrage and it is a clear violation of our rights as Americans. This is almost as insulting as the NSA wire-tapping that took place following 9-11. Unfortunately, no one is standing up to this the way some of the telecom giants stood up to the feds.
To borrow some words from an excellent article I read on The Guardian’s website, “In their book Born Digital, John Palfrey and Urs Gasser review the characteristics of “digital natives,” those who were born (after 1980) into the digital age – those who have never known life without the internet. These kids have “digital dossiers,” which begin with their first ultrasound and continuing throughout their life. By the time they reach adulthood these children will have rich digital files, ripe for privacy violations and information mining. The authors liken aspects of the dossier to a tattoo, something personally identifiable and often regrettable, perhaps a racy photo a teen posts on MySpace. Palfrey and Gasser ask, will “digital natives” worry about privacy as we know it? Or do they have a completely different view of what privacy is, shaped by the societal changes wrought by the digital age?”. The whole article can be read here : http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/feb/17/privacy-children-internet-digital. I think that’s a very good point and something a bit eerie to consider. It is never a good thing to have so much personal information be so very public. What will the future be like when you can simply google someone’s name and get all their information, life history even baby pictures? The idea of poor choice pictures posted on the internet being available to anyone and everyone is a frightening thought. Especially here in the US where a picture on a web-based community website can prevent you from getting a job or even get you fired as has been the case in several instances in which the pictures ranged from sexy (albeit clothed) pictures of a school teacher to (yet another teacher) brandishing a fire arm. What is really harmful is that no one seems to be concerned about the context in which the photos are taken and I don’t expect there will be any change in that in the future. I think all in all, it’s just safer to try and be as opaque and as invisible as possible when it comes to the internet.
It’s Been A While…
February 12, 2009 at 1:32 pm (Rants, Things Worth Discussing, Uncategorized) (bailout, bias, bubble, CEO, collapse, communisim, conservative, discussion, downturn, economic, economy, government, liberal, media, mortgages, news, Obama, political, politics, president, recession, responsibility, socialism)
Okay, time for a brief update before I break into another rant. I am all moved in to my new place and I like it for the most part. There are things about it that annoy me (like the apparently INSANE guy living upstairs who opens and closes his sliding glass door 24/7 over and over and over again!) but for the most part it feels like home. Sort of. I’m working on the finishing touches- wall coverings, plants, etc.
I am also getting some schoolwork done these days. One class is more or less a dissertation course and the other is a class solely on Chaucer which makes me want to eat paint and dive in front of moving vehicles.
The weather here is unseasonably warm- mid70s- and we are expecting snow next week. This is why I hate this state so much. My sinuses have been on a roller-coaster ride from hell.
Ok, now that that’s out of the way…
I was on facebook today (I hate social networking sites, but its not a bad way to keep touch with people) and I saw some posts from a friend of my cousin who is a raging republican. His posts addressed (essentially) Media Bias and Government Spending Bills to recover the economic fallout which he tied to a comparison between the current US situation and the Japanese economic failure in the 90s. I already rebutted his statements, but it got me thinking and this blog is where I do most of my thinking in writing… so here we go:
First off, media bias. I hate to break it to everyone out there, but if what you are reading has any advertisements in it, then it is biased. That is just how it works folks. That’s why when you cite sources of research in school most of your sources are academic journals, professional journals or the like. They are reputable sources because they are not influenced by the threat of some other company that is paying the bills pulling out their dollars because they didn’t agree with something that showed up in print. You can’t get any real opinions or any news that might be controversial from regular newspapers because most of them don’t want to print something that might cause a sponsor to pull out.
Speaking of sponsors, it s a good idea to know the chain of command in the corporate world as it relates to your news outlets. NBC is owned by General Electric. General Electric is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of nuclear power components. It then begins to make a lot of sense as to why you never see anything on the news that shows nuclear power as anything other than a “clean, renewable, green energy source”. When it comes to things like this, only the government gets to override the companies. That’s why when you hear the word nuclear on TV and it isn’t followed by a promotion as an alternative power source, it is followed by the word “bomb” or “missile”. The government still loves to play that nuclear apocalypse fear card when things get rough. Fear is the second greatest tool of control.
If you are concerned about liberal or conservative bias in your news, you should probably go stand in front of a bus as you have been effectively brain-washed and have no real opinions. If you think the republicans and democrats are separate parties, you are wrong. They are so much alike it is absurd. And where do they differ? On issues that the government has no place in being involved with such as marriage and abortion. They can oversee it as much as they want, but they have no right to tell you yes you can or no, you can’t. The only other notable difference is that the dems are honest about who they are and the republicans are not. Regan, HW and GW Bush ran as “fiscal conservatives” and then ran up insane deficits. Clinton had a surplus, but I see Obama running a deficit. The way I see it, these guys are the same party and just differ on tiny, relatively inconsequential points.
Now… the economy. Let it collapse. If you think the free market will fix it, then let the free market fix it and screw the bailouts. The way I see it, modern banking is effectively the same deal as the system of secret treaties between european nations that led to the first world war (not the cause, but the cause of its escalation). Only this time, instead of war, we are all getting drawn into poverty. As popular as the saying is, no one seems to ever learn from history.
Now, if you are one who thinks it is the government’s job to save these failing banks and whatnot, then congratulations- you are either a communist or a socialist (the same difference as republicans and democrats). I could jump off here and start a whole other rant, but I will refrain for now. The point I want to make to this group of people is, why SHOULD the government bail out these people? Because if they don’t there’s gonna be, what? CONSEQUENCES??? You’re damn right there will be, and there better be. I maintain that the proper way to have handled this is to make the companies and ONLY the companies pay for this. Those boardmembers and CEOs should have had to claim personal bankruptcy as well as commercial and the proceeds from the liquidation of their personal assets should go to pay unemployment to all the workers who lost their jobs as a result of the higher-ups’ irresponsibility. The company’s assets should have been liquidated and any loans they owned under X (say, $150,000?) amount should have been absolved. All others should have been sold to other companies still in business. The loans that were made on those crooked adjustable rate mortgages should be refinanced as fixed rate mortgages. Other than a couple weeks of unemployment, the government wouldn’t have paid a dime. Now, since a lot of local governments and other state and national owned operations got caught up in the mess, those loans should be bought out by the government and absorbed into the national debt since they are, after all, government owned. We were paying the bill for them anyway, might as well continue to do so. These would be refinanced as well.
I think that is all for now. My brain hurts.
