Just come back from touring around a number of european countries and the absence of the surveillance cameras was very noticeable. Yet I did not feel threatened at any time even in public spaces with crowds gathering, nor did I feel my safety was compromised. Maybe surveillance cameras are just a reflection of a society that is insecure within itself and distrustful of its citizens. Without consultation or prior public consent, they are installed at the whim of authorities. Safe in their uncontested defence that the public welcomes all cameras as they protects them from acts of violence and no innocent has anything to fear!
That protection is of course an urban myth with very little substantive evidence to support it. The increasing numbers of installations are self-defeating. Every camera needs a person to sit and monitor it, for every 525599 (or 527039 in a leap year) minutes of a year. Just incase something is about to kick off. Other than that, your security is just a factor of luck. Is your particular monitor being watched at the moment you are under threat? Chance are so long against it you would stand more chance winning the european lottery! So cameras are next to useless protecting from an event but can have use after an event. As you lie unconscious on the floor, with luck, you might get spotted within half an hour if, of course a caring passing citizen does not respond first!
These cameras promote an entirely false sense of safety. They are of course of great interest to authorities wanting to control a submissive society. They gather vast volumes of data tracking each and everyone of us. With face recognition software they can, when they choose, track a person for their whole active day or life. All in the interest of our greater security of course. Such resources would only ever be employed against known national threats, like terrorists. It just does not add up. They do not know the terrorists in adavance, there are too many cameras for such a focussed need. No, they are used routinely to monitor you and I as we go about our every day lives. To make judgements about our actions and compile dossiers of citizens with behaviour patterns deemed suspicious. Nothing to fear as I live within the law. Yet your behaviour is being judged every day by you know not who. Software designed to pick up on nervous behaviour or by a low paid psychotic with a warped sense of normality. You have absolutely no idea nor any rights to know. Yet if by some mechanism you are placed in the suspect pile, your life can be change dramatically. To prove innocence is impossible. Once you are deemed a witch, or in this day and age, a terrorists, you are beyond help. Your cries of innocence merely confirm your guilt to those judging you.
No, let us get it straight, surveillance cameras are a weapon to be used by an authoritarian state against it citizens that are too submissive and indifferent to care.
Whilst I am at it of course the other aspect are speed cameras. Went through far too many road works when abroad and not a single one had an average speed camera let alone a fixed camera during the works. The organisation of the roadworks were far less controlled and organised than over here. If anything the risks were far higher there, but no cameras. Traffic density could be equal to or exceeding that here. I simply do not believe, and the evidence of my own eyes supports it, that we are not worst drivers. So why such a different reaction? Average speed cameras tightly controlling traffic speed through roadworks and even reducing the speed through the works arbitrarily down to 30 or even 20 mph, compared to, no cameras.
If the accidents rates were remarkably different between one country and another there would be an public outcry in the country at variance. No I suspect that accident and or driving death rates, one country to another, are more or less on par. Even in Germany where they still have unlimited speeds on parts of the autobahn I doubt whether there is a significant difference. So why does this country have such an obsession with speed cameras. It has to be distrust and control. Distrust by us the citizens of ourselves and the willingness of others to behave and an authority that leaps at that permissiveness, to exercise more control over its citizens that is never contested. All muddled and muddied up with good aspirational goals that allay social concerns, the need to save fuel in equal measures with doses of all speed kills. Twaddle but self-righteous twaddle so not easily dismissed.
At the heart of all this is a conundrum. The conundrum is that strong leaders are expected to be seen to act and be decisive and in times of threat, action is expected. In response to those expectations those in control publicly tinker. It matter not what they tinker at so long as it tickles the public's expectations of what is thought to be effective. In reality those tinkerings have very little actual impact on events other than massaging the public's concerns. There are no reliable studies to prove efficacy but they accumulate building up into a mythology of effective reactions to events. Just fantasy solutions for a submissive public that has given up on caring, thinking or protesting at self-evident bad decisions. It is up to you, have surveillance or speed cameras been proven to actually work? Get off your butt and do something.
Tuesday 30 August 2011
Monday 15 August 2011
Youth
No of course it is not because I having nothing to say, lots as always, it is just that I have not had the time! Lets get some strands together. No, our youth are not rioting, a riot has a purpose an intent and wish to get to some goal, pun intended. These youth are just rampaging. What we are witnessing is a new phenomena of our age, 'FlashMobbing' seems to be the parlance. Youth, with all their lack of doom, whipped up by the excitement of being part of something kicking off and with one2one messaging sucking them into the maelstrom.
So let us lay down the blame. Us. You and me are to blame. We have framed and allowed our society to drift down this path. We have watched indifferently as the political parties have corrupted our democratic processes, so we all end up dis-engaged. Look after number one and to hell with the rest of them is our culture. Even as we double talk about what a good idea the 'Big Society' is whilst inwardly shrugging that there is nothing you intend to do to make it work. That double speak, though silent is picked up by our youth and taken as gospel, not the mealy words of spoken agreement but the true unexpressed silent reaction of disdain and disinterest. They take that silence as the route map. So dont blame the youth for taking at face value the society you see, even if you double speak of another world you dont believe in.
Secondly we must blame the parents, for accepting too readily the easy option that single parents are an equal and okay alternative. For not insisting that the children forgo their own space and do join in and take part in family events from mealtimes to get togethers. For not requiring some account of their movements and friends. For allowing their children to develop in a culture where to want is to have without consequences and where authority can be safely ignored as it has no teeth. Where the sense of separateness of youth from the adult world they inhabit is endorsed and promulgated without challenge but actually cheered on as a sign of creative independence.
Thirdly we must blame ourselves for accepting as a norm the divisiveness of a rich get richer society. The quick abandonment of any social values in the hope that you too can get to inherit the riches not realising the chasm has grown enormously over the last decades. With us, the poor on one side gazing in wonderment at a life beyond grasp whilst the rich plunder the the poor, using their energies and desires to build the very barriers to keep the rich enclave for only the rich. All the while promoting the self-evident lie that all can partake of the riches is only you make sufficient effort. Little wonder if those without prospect of progress, yet daily buffeted with tangible emblems of rewards beyond their reach, despair or worse take what they cannot rightfully get. A divided nation is a grossly unfair nation. A divided nation ruled and controlled by the benefiters of that divide is obscene.
Nothing of course condones or mitigates in any way from actions against the very society you live within. Nothing justifies the trashing and looting our your neighbours just because, there is no excuse. We each have to be accountable for our own actions, within a raging mob or not. Accountable, well to our fellow citizens of course. So finally, much as we honest upright citizens are outraged by the sheer mindless stupidity and violence and want to exact retribution. Stop and pause. What we have are youth that are dis-engaged from their society. We urgently need to re-engage them, together with us along the way. So how is locking them up in prison going to help? Meting out stiff punishment leaves a glow of righteous indignation but these are youth who have never had it their way and expect to be pushed and bullied, if not plain ignored. What merit in taking away benefit when they are scudding along on the very bottom rungs already, kick them further down to do what? Again not a good way to go about getting engagement. Yes oh yes there has to be retribution. The consequence of their thoughtless and mindless act has to come well and truly home. How to do it in an upbeat progressive way that ends up with them tying back into our society is a huge challenge. Reward and punishment for failing to work at towards the reward has to be a way. That and working to repair the damage of their upbringing and building back self-respect and hope. Real gettable hope that can be actually grasped. Community work is an option, if they want to make amends but not if enforced against their will. Take away their right to messaging until their have earned its return seems fit for purpose. Take away their right to gather in groups of more than three again seems fit for purpose. Take away their right to walk free amongst us until they have accepted our rules of conduct. Intensive parenting classes and support for parents in standing up to their children again seems fit for purpose. Maybe, just maybe a boot camp experience for those wayward's that refuse to help themselves and are determined to turn their backs on the society that nutures them. But everything aimed at encouragement to join in with us and engage. Maybe we can then learn lessons from them!
So let us lay down the blame. Us. You and me are to blame. We have framed and allowed our society to drift down this path. We have watched indifferently as the political parties have corrupted our democratic processes, so we all end up dis-engaged. Look after number one and to hell with the rest of them is our culture. Even as we double talk about what a good idea the 'Big Society' is whilst inwardly shrugging that there is nothing you intend to do to make it work. That double speak, though silent is picked up by our youth and taken as gospel, not the mealy words of spoken agreement but the true unexpressed silent reaction of disdain and disinterest. They take that silence as the route map. So dont blame the youth for taking at face value the society you see, even if you double speak of another world you dont believe in.
Secondly we must blame the parents, for accepting too readily the easy option that single parents are an equal and okay alternative. For not insisting that the children forgo their own space and do join in and take part in family events from mealtimes to get togethers. For not requiring some account of their movements and friends. For allowing their children to develop in a culture where to want is to have without consequences and where authority can be safely ignored as it has no teeth. Where the sense of separateness of youth from the adult world they inhabit is endorsed and promulgated without challenge but actually cheered on as a sign of creative independence.
Thirdly we must blame ourselves for accepting as a norm the divisiveness of a rich get richer society. The quick abandonment of any social values in the hope that you too can get to inherit the riches not realising the chasm has grown enormously over the last decades. With us, the poor on one side gazing in wonderment at a life beyond grasp whilst the rich plunder the the poor, using their energies and desires to build the very barriers to keep the rich enclave for only the rich. All the while promoting the self-evident lie that all can partake of the riches is only you make sufficient effort. Little wonder if those without prospect of progress, yet daily buffeted with tangible emblems of rewards beyond their reach, despair or worse take what they cannot rightfully get. A divided nation is a grossly unfair nation. A divided nation ruled and controlled by the benefiters of that divide is obscene.
Nothing of course condones or mitigates in any way from actions against the very society you live within. Nothing justifies the trashing and looting our your neighbours just because, there is no excuse. We each have to be accountable for our own actions, within a raging mob or not. Accountable, well to our fellow citizens of course. So finally, much as we honest upright citizens are outraged by the sheer mindless stupidity and violence and want to exact retribution. Stop and pause. What we have are youth that are dis-engaged from their society. We urgently need to re-engage them, together with us along the way. So how is locking them up in prison going to help? Meting out stiff punishment leaves a glow of righteous indignation but these are youth who have never had it their way and expect to be pushed and bullied, if not plain ignored. What merit in taking away benefit when they are scudding along on the very bottom rungs already, kick them further down to do what? Again not a good way to go about getting engagement. Yes oh yes there has to be retribution. The consequence of their thoughtless and mindless act has to come well and truly home. How to do it in an upbeat progressive way that ends up with them tying back into our society is a huge challenge. Reward and punishment for failing to work at towards the reward has to be a way. That and working to repair the damage of their upbringing and building back self-respect and hope. Real gettable hope that can be actually grasped. Community work is an option, if they want to make amends but not if enforced against their will. Take away their right to messaging until their have earned its return seems fit for purpose. Take away their right to gather in groups of more than three again seems fit for purpose. Take away their right to walk free amongst us until they have accepted our rules of conduct. Intensive parenting classes and support for parents in standing up to their children again seems fit for purpose. Maybe, just maybe a boot camp experience for those wayward's that refuse to help themselves and are determined to turn their backs on the society that nutures them. But everything aimed at encouragement to join in with us and engage. Maybe we can then learn lessons from them!
Monday 1 August 2011
Weekly Sanity Check
Just as I despair of the all the attention seeking, the shallow me only selfishness and the endless mindless prattle that fill every day along comes Alison Graham's weekly column in the Radio Times. A breath of sanity. A welcome no nonsense, face life as it is and get on with it attitude. She, like we all, has her lapses when she get overcome with girlyness. Fair do's and she does forewarn with an unmissable klaxon before she gives into her temptation. Her doing girly is of course gritty, blunt and scalpel sharp to the point. Gets over it and gets back to her plain, but so nicely couched self. So often she mirrors, or rather she hones in with clarity on thoughts that were rambling around in me. Or perhaps more honestly, she plucks out of all the chatter a key essence of social conduct that I wish I had had the sense to see, before her enlightenment. And consistent, week after week. No overblown ego, no inflated sense of importance, just another generous insightful observation sparked off by some TV media event.
Her day job, the one that pays the bread, those previews of all the up-n-coming schedule programmes she is paid to write are equally pithy and to the point. A degree of dissemblance is entirely forgiveable. She is employed after all to promote programmes appearing in the schedules and though she seems to have a range of freedom, it is clear she cannot just say, it is all rubbish this week but has to find something. Over time it has become very clear those days when she is of a mind it is all unworthy rubbish, then picks out some long standing formulaic series or some oft repeated golden classic to make her choice for the day. Her linguistic somersaults and verbal gymnastics become words of wonder, as she trips lightly through many varied degrees of faint praise to satisfy the only upbeat requirements of her paymasters. Not that that stops her, occasionally firing both barrels from the hip, finding up-beat words to scathingly expose the nature of rubbish that she has been paid to praise.
Her day job, the one that pays the bread, those previews of all the up-n-coming schedule programmes she is paid to write are equally pithy and to the point. A degree of dissemblance is entirely forgiveable. She is employed after all to promote programmes appearing in the schedules and though she seems to have a range of freedom, it is clear she cannot just say, it is all rubbish this week but has to find something. Over time it has become very clear those days when she is of a mind it is all unworthy rubbish, then picks out some long standing formulaic series or some oft repeated golden classic to make her choice for the day. Her linguistic somersaults and verbal gymnastics become words of wonder, as she trips lightly through many varied degrees of faint praise to satisfy the only upbeat requirements of her paymasters. Not that that stops her, occasionally firing both barrels from the hip, finding up-beat words to scathingly expose the nature of rubbish that she has been paid to praise.
A very loud thank you, Alison Graham. Each week you restore my faith as I brace myself for another week's bombardment of trivia. Thank you pay-masters, for carrying on having the courage to give her her head.
Oh yes as a ps, whatever she says is liberally drizzled with high octane irony, delicious!
Oh yes as a ps, whatever she says is liberally drizzled with high octane irony, delicious!
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