Power Of Orwellian State Has Become Almost Irreversible (Part 5)

This Really Was Meant To Be Just A Warning

The insurmountable problem posed by the growing power of Orwellian States and the reason we should all be afraid is that once totalitarianism takes hold it is almost impossible to loosen its grip. Freedom and privacy are often its first victims which add to its resilience as it reaches deep down into the very heart of society and our culture. Not only have we stepped onto the slippery slope toward more government intrusion but many people seem to have flung themselves down this path trading their privacy for promises of a safer world as the government with the help of a complacent media spreads its message this is all "for the greater good." The blatant claims and subliminal messages they put forth have even spread into our schools and universities where government money and power influence the lessons we teach our youth.

Whether it is in your home or workplace private companies working with your government constantly comb through vast amounts of your social media and online shopping data. When we step outside our homes our movements and actions in the physical world are also swept into this dragnet. Currently, the government gathers an enormous collection of information through the video cameras placed on your street and all over your city. This means if you commit a crime, facial recognition algorithms may be able to match video footage of your face to your photo in a national ID database, if not today, soon, and this means it won’t be long before the police are able to show up at the door of anyone that does not march in step.

Cameras Are Rapidly Appearing Everywhere

For an idea at just how fast the noose is tightening around our necks just consider some of the actions we hear are currently or may soon be in the works. Quartz reported in November the DEA now operates a complex network of digital speed-display road signs that covertly scan license plates and the federal government wants to mount covert surveillance cameras inside traffic barrels that sit along America's highways. Chad Marlow, a senior advocacy and policy counsel for the ACLU, told Quartz that cameras in street lights have been proposed under a program called “smart” LED street light system. This would turn every streetlight into a surveillance device and according to emails uncovered by the Project for Government Oversight. When coupled with Amazon aggressive rollout of its  Rekognition facial-recognition software to law enforcement agencies it becomes clear the ability to monitor our every move is being greatly expanded.

How do you begin to fight or turn back a force that has even incorporated and leveraged the ever-present smartphone as an ultra-powerful surveillance device? By developing programs to organize phone data so that it provides real-time intelligence on every citizen, and using it to guide and influence our actions the power of the state has been deeply enhanced. Ironically, the poorest and most disfranchised Americans have lined up and enrolled in programs that allow themselves and their friends to be monitored by signing up for free "Obamaphones." Since social unrest often boils up from the bottom their reliance on these devices has become an Achilles heel to their ability to secretly plot a course of resistance.

Freedom Lost!

The coming together of these new technologies in the hands of the wrong person translates into the ability to immediately and totally destroy any individual. When this power is placed in the hands of an Orwellian State the implications for society are huge going forward. The control over the individual will become complete as we move towards being a cashless economy where we will be unable to buy food, may at any moment have our ability to message others cut, and will be forced to rely on autonomous vehicles to deliver us to our destinations. Such a lack of control over our lives constitutes their total control over us making us powerless pawns and slaves with little choice but to do their bidding or perish.

An example of how this is playing out can be seen in a USA Today article published recently entitled “Delta says USA’s ‘first biometric terminal’ is ready to go at the Atlanta airport” touting the event as wonderful news and a great step forward. Chad Newton, CEO of the Wayne County Airport Authority in charge of the Detroit airport, where another Biometric Terminal is being set up said;

“It is a great honor for Detroit Metropolitan Airport to become one of the nation’s first biometric terminals.  We look forward to partnering with Delta, CBP[,] and TSA to provide passengers with the option to utilize facial recognition throughout their entire travel process.”

We should ask what he means by “partnering?” Especially “partnering” with CBP (that’s Customs and Border Patrol) and TSA (that’s the Transportation Security Authority). How does one “partner” with them? The answer is that for fun and profit corporations happily accept their role in the construction of the cage and we the people enter it gladly and submissively to save a bit of time and because it is "for the greater good." It should be noted a wall at the border and tighter passport controls while keeping people out also keeps us in, this is also a form of control as our ability to travel is curtailed our desire to do so is also being diminished as we are told of the dangers lurking for those traveling abroad. Slowly but surely, what could be viewed as a forced isolation policy is slowly unfolding and those traveling is becoming limited to those with capital and wealth or having a government agenda.

It has become clear that in the wrong hands benevolent plans can easily be put to malevolent purposes. History shows that well-intentioned laws and programs can be perverted, corrupted or used to advance illegitimate purposes once profit and power are added to the equation. The war on terror, the war on drugs, the war on illegal immigration, asset forfeiture schemes, road safety schemes, school safety schemes, and eminent domain all rooted as legitimate responses to pressing concerns and have since become weapons of compliance and control in the police state’s hands. The recent wave of "red flag gun laws", which allow the police to remove guns from people suspected of being threats is another example of such a law and add to the government’s power to control the populace.

State Controlled Robots Could Do Mass Killings

With digital surveillance networks being implemented by governments throughout the world increases their ability to blackmail or fraudulently construct a solid case of wrongdoing against any individual. Fake photos, falsified records or simply hasten a fatal accident are all tools of totalitarian regimes. When we couple this with the growing ability of an Orwellian State to employ and utilize robots to carry out missions distasteful to humans the groundwork is laid for mass genocide. History reveals many incidents of genocide but the efficiency of automating such killings increases the likelihood of many more.

The chance of such carnage is greatly increased by our massive defense budget which diverts a huge amount of our nation's wealth to keep the patriotic war machines growing while propaganda keeps us on a continual war-footing, using threats created or imagined to accomplish this. Much of the damage being done is masked under the buzzword “bipartisan” which is used to conjure up the illusion that whatever agenda it’s being applied to must have some deep universal truth to it if it allows such wildly divergent ideologies to set aside their differences in order to advance it. In truth it usually means Democrat neocons and Republican neocons coming together in order to inflict new horrors upon us.

America’s two mainstream political parties agree furiously with one another on war, neoliberalism, Orwellian surveillance, and every other agenda which increases the power and profit of the plutocratic class which owns them both. While the plutocrat-owned mass media plays up the differences between Democrats and Republicans to hysterical proportions the sad reality is both have sold away our freedom for power and wealth. This translates into a situation where we, the common folk, find we are increasingly "guilty until proven innocent" as the government’s questionable acquisition and use of biometrics and DNA to identify individuals and data obtained through surveillance is manipulated to “solve” crimes.

This means that in a situation where government takes control over your life it is very important to have friends in very high places, however, in reality very few of us do. If you are fortunate to have such a friend, generally, you can only knock on their door so many times before they grow tired of you and usually, there are limits to just how much they can do to protect you. Again I ask, how do you begin to fight or turn back a force such as this? The trend is clear and the bottom-line is that in coming years we will most likely find the line between "bettering society" and "controlling society" will be drawn by them, not us.

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Footnote; This subject has grown so overpowering I found it a bit challenging to muddle through this series in an orderly and consistent way. I have struggled to contain this in a five-part series that slowly expanded from only three. The material I came upon would easily fill several books. Below are the links to the other four part of the series in the order they were published.
 https://Liberals And Conservatives Both Buy Into Orwellian Trend (Part-1).html
 https://"Surveillance Justified" Expands Grip Of Orwellian State (Part 2).html
 https://Propaganda Convinces Us It Is All For the Greater good (Part 3).html
 https://Orwellian Government Employing Robots Raises Concern (Part 4).html