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UK Plans To Monitor 20,000 Families' Homes Via CCTV
metrix007 points out a story in the Sunday Express with more surveillance-camera madness from the UK, where the government now wants to place 20,000 CCTV cameras to monitor families ("the worst families in England") within their own homes, to make sure that "kids go to bed on time and eat healthy meals and the like. This is going too far, and hopefully will not pass. Where will it end?"
This is an actual, verbatim representation of Orwell's vision for the future (today's present). There isn't any needed for interpretation, it's literally 1984. Wow.
You just can't make hyperbole out of this shit anymore. Get the fuck out of England while there isn't a 30ft concrete wall preventing you from doing so. Either that or start killing your politicians.
For the love of jebus, ignore the Daily/Sunday Express just as much as the Daily/Sunday Mail. They are terrible, borderline-racist, reactionary publications with a fixation on Big Brother (Orwell, not the terribe reality show) and 'foreign types stealing our jobs'.
There's a site dedicated to the terrible nature of these publications, which is well worth a read, if only for a giggle.
Other news sources (Telegraph, Daily Mail) mention "24-hour supervision", but no CCTVs. Without the CCTVs, it's not really that different from homes for the elderly.
That they are even talking about this is nefarious indeed. What we the people should be doing is insisting on our legislators and lawmakers being CCTV'd 24/7 along with phones. (With exceptions for national security.)
Imagine how much corruption would be uncovered this way. If the representatives choose to conduct business elsewhere it can be assumed they are guilty of something or at least worthy of voting out.
Yes, that sounds much better.
No one is watching Big Brother in the UK anymore, so instead they're going to use the classic Soviet Russia twist:
(takes deep breath)
In UK, Big Brother watches you!
Plus, Davina McCall needs something to do besides those hair colour adverts.
Summation 2
May not have been written with that intent, but it's serving that purpose rather nicely so far!
There is no freedom if everything is criminal.
http://www.aaronrogier.net
First, they came for the paedophiles; and I didn't speak, for I was not a paedophile.
Then, they came for the hoodies; and I didn't speak, for I was not a hoodie.
Then, they came for the problem families; and I didn't speak, for I was not a problem family.
Then, they came for me. But I was in Canada by then (please?!)
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
In the UK, TV watches you!
If a family fails so much at parenting that they have to be supervised by the government to do their job, I really don't think that it would change anything. Sure, it might prevent the parents from beating the crap out of their children, but if they do that, taking away the children is a better idea anyways, or do you really expect them to turn into loving, good-citizen parents just because Big Brother is watching? I'm not as opposed to surveillance as most of the /. crowd, but this...they aren't just completely invading *private* homes, it's also completely stupid - that is, if it weren't just to increase government power. Yes, the UK is really becoming a Stalinist state, slow maybe, but they sure are. And like in every authoritarian state, they already disarmed their citizens. I'd get out of that country ASAP if I'd be living there.
A good education is a bit like a STD - it makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and gives you a desire to spread it.
Boy 1984 has in the news a lot recently. 15 years late?
El Gordo is off on his hols and the underlings feel they can let out silly proposals like this. Then the ministers get to keep their TV hours up by spending copious amounts of time saying that this is only a proposal knowing full well that it will never happen.
The 'Comics', newspaper like the Daily Wail and Express need to fill their copy and stories like this are exactly the sort of thing to fill the 'silly season'.
Besides if by some legal mangling, the cameras were ever to be installed, they would be:-
(within minutes)
1) Stolen and sold down the Pub for Drink,Fags or Drugs.
2) Vandalised
3) The house sublet to a nice family ensuring nothing for the monitors to see.
Anyway, NuLab will get a real tanking in the next election and the Tories will have all their attention on getting the country out of the financial sesspit that Gordon 'prudence' Broone has got us into since 1997.
Finally, as this is in a clear breach of the European Human Rights Directive I think many of the wailers here should get a life.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
If those youths are victimizing people they can certainly be prosecuted under existing laws. A new invasive monitoring program is not needed to deal with that. The thugs you describe will still exist after your government implements this program. What do you think they'll try next?
You need to have a line you aren't willing to cross, and you need to decide where that line is now. Seriously, sit down with a cup of coffee and some note paper and figure out what are the liberties you absolutely will not forfeit for any reason. Be at least mentally prepared to quit your job and move out of your home and country when those liberties are taken away.
No, they can't be prosecuted, because as you may or may not be aware, if you call the police, because someone has damaged you/your property/your familys property then it's like literally asking for your head to be kicked in. If they are being monitored then any victim won't need to call the police.
The best example from that site:
In other words, the same miserable selfish fuckers who created a massive and expanding underclass in this country ought to be able to go to a shopping centre without seeing the consequences of all those spending cuts they loudly demanded so they could upgrade their cars earlier or have a slightly longer holiday.
Begging is seen, to this government, as purely a nuisance to businesses and middle class shoppers. They don't see a beggar and think 'This person should not be so desperate' they look at a beggar and think 'This person is affecting the value of commercial and residential real estate in this area'
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Not compulsory? Please re-read your own sentence. Anybody who would willingly agree to this 'non-compulsory' treatment is somebody under serious compulsion. Like the fear of prosecution.
Well, if you don't want the fear of prosecution, then don't set fire to your neighbours' cars and don't encourage your children to do the same. This is not compulsory. It is something that you can choose as an alternative to having to face the real consequences of your actions. It seems compulsory only because it is a lighter option than the sanctions that are already in place for criminal behaviour.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Wrong on so many levels. Unless it's a troll in which case, hey you win. As has been pointed out elsewhere, most perceptions of WIlliam Wallace in popular culture are driven by that awful Mel Gibson film which could not have been more innacurate if it had a plasticene Grommit alongside Wallace. I can't speak for Quakers, but certainly a lot of settlers like the Puritans were intent on setting up their own theocracy in the new world as well as escaping persecution at home. Did Canada break free? I don't recall a Canadian War of Independence? No, it was done piecemeal and largely peacefully. I don't care if they have the Queen on their notes; at least no one pretends the British Crown is infallible like some of people in the US who believe the Founding Fathers were but a little lower than the angels. As to Civil War we've had ours thank you very much and it didn't solve much. Meanwhile the USA is full of far too many people who think that if you talk like Alan Rickman you must be the bad guy. Give me a break. We don't brainwash our kids every morning in school by making them worship a flag either. Polemic? Yes, of course. I've visited the USA many times and have found most people to be regular guys. I don't form my opinions of the USA based on the National Enquirer and one chap who emigrated to England from the States who I met in the pub. I suggest you take a broader look around. The UK is full of idiots of all political shades and colours just like any other nation. I don't want live in a country where you can't feel safe unless you have a gun. Fine. You do? Fine, your call. Just get a grip.
Remove the defacto right that everybody is supposed to have to children - a lot of the less intelligent people will never make good parents, and shouldn't be allowed.
So who gets to decide in a culture where your right to vote is among the most sacred? Oh, and this very discussion is about how bad it is when governments just decide things.
Not to mention how easy it is to take this idea futher, but I don't want to be Godwinned.
You're the type of person that makes it necessary for the rest of us to maintain the right to keep and bear arms.
Too many people on the planet as it is.
Show us you have the courage of your convictions, kill yourself. Oh, that's right, it's the others who are the too many, you'd be one of the chosen ones, correct?
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
"There will soon be laws stating that minors must wear clothes inside the house..."
Fixed that for ya!
Seriously, that could readily be the upshot of such surveillance -- new laws requiring modest dress inside the home, lest your children be exposed to adult bodies, or worse, adults get to see children's bodies. Because after all, only someone who loves CP could possibly object! It's for the children, didn't you know!
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Main Entry: pornography
Function: noun
Etymology: Greek pornographos, adjective, writing about prostitutes, from porn prostitute + graphein to write; akin to Greek pernanai to sell, poros journey -- more at fare, carve
Date: 1858
1 : the depiction of erotic behavior (as in pictures or writing) intended to cause sexual excitement
2 : material (as books or a photograph) that depicts erotic behavior and is intended to cause sexual excitement
3 : the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction
Nudity is not pornography and pornography does not require nudity.
There are currently no laws stating that minors must wear clothes inside the house, so tell them not to. Then, the government records CP and they all burn at the stake!! It's flawless!!
Wouldn't that be nice!
No, what would actually happen is, the government would argue that the parents knew there were cameras in the house, so that by allowing their children to be nude in the house, they were complicit in the production of CP. Oh, I almost forgot! The kids knew it too, so they were also CP producers. So, they can pretty much throw the lot of them in jail, which is what they wanted in the first place, what with those being "the worst families in England." The government gets off clean because they can just argue that the purpose of the cameras wasn't to make CP, but was to rehabilitate those families, and part of rehabilitation is hiding their filthy, nasty, disgusting, sinful bodies at all times. So it's a double-strike against the families, and the government are heroes!
The one I'm waiting for isn't government sponsored. It's the biggest troll the world has ever known: A worm set up with a payload of hardcore CP, that sends emails to the FBI (truthfully!) alerting them that the host computer contains CP. I'm actually surprised this hasn't already been done several times now, let alone ever! You know, if your motive is mischief rather than money, why ruin mere data when you could ruin whole lives?
3 : the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction
By this i suppose that technically a significant proportion of modern news is in fact pornography.
XML - A clever joke would be here if
...and pornography does not require nudity.
...but it helps :)
-- Sex is the antonym of pringles. Once you pop it's time to stop.