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Mr. Hardråde!?Quote:
Originally Posted by Watchman
Question to our British patrons: Considering the amount of opposition British Orgahs display against this -continuous- increase of government policing power, how come they haven't stopped doing that yet? Is the general public supportive of these measures?
Love the poster by the way. ~;)
Harold landed in central/northern Britain AFAIK. Nah, my first name comes from the same root as William, or Guillaume as they render it in French. For some reason that seemed to amuse a fair few French teachers in the past.
The Daily Mail crowd loves authoritarianism, they can't get enough of it. Lefties realistically have nowhere else to go, so if Labour secures the centre-right, they can keep themselves in power.Quote:
Originally Posted by AntiochusIII
Maybe they are supportive. I suspect supporters of these measures, like me, can't be bothered to shout about them.Quote:
Originally Posted by AntiochusIII
I mean - what is the big deal about cameras? Now if it were mounted machine guns, I might object. But cameras? What's the fuss? I can only see good coming from them.
Ditto DNA databases, phone tapping, ID cards etc.
They should help catch criminals and are no bother at all to ordinary citizens.
Now - where is my Daily Mail? I want to do the Sudoku...
:coffeenews:
Reading that made me very scared, Econ...
I shouldn't have come here for bedtime stories.
The problem with Cameras is: One they take away a citizens right to privacy and all other realitve things, there may be things that are legal but you still don't want people to see and makes you look bad or there always is the chance for errors or what not with these things that can still let Criminals get away with there crimes. I guess my point is if there's a want there's away for Criminals to get around these things. Secondly what about scencerios were these cameras can be abused, I won't go into the Orwellian 1984 type situation (though somewhat vallid). But what if you get someone down the road that well use that to say pick up dirt on their oppenets? Help indenfy nigh sayers for "special treatment". Personly I think the negitives in this case far outway the postives.
So what do you expect the government to do? Ban people from installing cameras on their own property? Remember the majority of CCTV cameras are privately owned, and the government only has access to the data they collect if their owners volunteer it. Government installed cameras watch over public spaces, where there is no right to privacy anyway.Quote:
Originally Posted by Destroyer of Hope
Walking down a street or through a shopping mall is an exercise in privacy? These are public places - cameras or no, there are loads of people who may be watching you. If anyone really bothers (no offence, but 99% of what we do is of zero interest to any strangers with or without cameras).Quote:
Originally Posted by Destroyer of Hope
Like what? I'm genuinely puzzled what you will be doing on a street or a shopping mall that is so shameful you are concerned a security guard or someone might be watching.Quote:
.... there may be things that are legal but you still don't want people to see and makes you look bad ...
I think the chance of errors and injustices is far worse if it is just one person's word against another. There's a reason police cars (and polic interview rooms) nowadays have video recorders - it makes the court cases go so much easier. I did jury service a few years back and the case was benefit fraud. The defense collapsed as soon as the prosecution produced a video of the supposed invalid patrolling his workplace in a sprightly fashion.Quote:
...or there always is the chance for errors ...
But how likely is that, compared with the tens of thousands of car robberies, muggings, vandalism, thuggery and other street criminality we endure every day?Quote:
But what if you get someone down the road that well use that to say pick up dirt on their oppenets? Help indenfy nigh sayers for "special treatment". .
Clearly you are not alone. But I just find it mindblowing that you see the balance of probabilities that way. I'd rate it 1 negative to 100,000 positives. :shrug:Quote:
Personly I think the negitives in this case far outway the postives
Well, I live in a big city with a lot of gun crime (for the UK anyway). We have the odd camera around and I - and everyone else - never gives it another look. They are not scarey; I'm not scarey. The street crime is a little more scarey. Still too rare to lose sleep over. But some poor innocents get hit by it. And if the cameras contribute, even if only a very little, to convicting the low lifes who commit it, then yes, I'll be supportive of such measures.Quote:
Originally Posted by HoreTore
Ah, how the extraordinary becomes ordinary...
I think the main point here is that it should be possible enough to run the society without turning it into a panopticon, which is just plain inherently disturbing.
Doubly so if and when it is not only regarded as normal, but welcome.
'S a principle thing. Nevermind now I don't particularly have anything to hide, I still don't like being watched.
Equating being watched by cameras with being watched by security guards is a fallacy.
Security guards and other humans cannot record with perfect memory every detail of a scene for eternity. When you live your whole life on camera, then any moment of it can be called up for review years later. And what if certain actions or opinions become 'frowned upon' by the government in the future?
CR
I can't think of any sepfic activities, i'm just against the idea of my day to day actions going into some Government Archive. CR makes a very good point in his last post.Quote:
Like what? I'm genuinely puzzled what you will be doing on a street or a shopping mall that is so shameful you are concerned a security guard or someone might be watching.
Call me paroniod, but cameras already set a framework for a corrupt government to use. Would you trust it in the hands of Bush, your worst enemy? Or even worse Hitler or Stalin. Although the chances are unlikely there always the chance that someone can cross the Rubicon and find an aid to keep power in the cameras or use it to get to power.
Are you serious? :inquisitive:Quote:
Originally Posted by econ21
You must be one of the 'if you have nothing to hide, then why are you concerned ?' brigade. The left seems to think that 1984 was a manifesto.
The stalinists and "new labour" guys maybe, but we other lefties are way to paranoid to support such things.Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneApache
Well, they have cameras in the subway stations here so I won't pick my nose there or make it more comfortable for little husi in my trousers or something like that. :beam: ~;)
So yeah, little husi is really concerned about thi but he's happy that there aren't cameras everywhere. For some reason I always felt like they had cameras in the dressing room of the gym, though there aren't any. :shrug:
I had a patient in the other day. He was suffering from severe depression.
Basically his household had been plagued by some young teens. Smashing windows, threatening his kids, slashing tires. Police did nothing more than "make a note of it".
Things escalated until his son got into a fight with their leader. By this point it had been going on for about 18 months.
In the fight the antagonist was punched and broke his jaw. So he's suing for GBH. The father of the accused was understandably upset by this. He was then assaulted by the police and arrested for breaking the peace.
So now his son is bieng done for GBH, the rest of the gang are putting out death threats to his children (they turned up once with knives and bats) and the police are still doing nothing useful.
If they could get DNA from the scene, or catch them on CCTV I'd be pleased. If I get caught minding my own business I can live with that.
~:smoking:
I've said it before and I'll say it again, you don't just beat an intruder these days, you kill him and feed him to animals. Some people never get it. :no:
Of course I am serious. The libertarian American fantasy about fighting their evil big government means zilch to me. Ditto 1984 scenarios. I have no fear of the British government turning on me and if they did, whether there is a CCTV camera in my shopping centre would have zero bearing on it.Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneApache
Again - what actions? In future years, the government is going to criminalise me picking my nose or what? It's all so hypothetical and nebulous as to be bizarre. What "opinions" is a CCTV camera in a shopping mall going to catch? If I go on a political demonstration, the police will probably video me already. The CCTVs don't make much difference. If they help pin down some crimes like the London tube bombings or deterr muggers from riding the subway, great.Quote:
Originally Posted by Crazed Rabbit
It should be possible, but we (or I) live in a society where around 16% of young men are the victims of crime each year. Doing something to reduce that is far more important to me than avoiding a panopticon, which frankly does not bother me at all. I would rather like it if there was blanket satellite/CCTV coverage and a complete DNA database on all citizens. Why the heck should some rapist or thug escape justice because of nebulous fears of a DNA database or of CCTV cameras in a tube station?Quote:
Originally Posted by Watchman
The issue reminds me of the debates about seat belts or smoking in years gone by. You are trading off real lives ruined with trivial "freedoms". And the debate will probably similarly shift against the paranoid libertarians as the technology improves.
A 15 year old got shot by another child on a bike recently. There are CCTV pictures, but you'd be hard pressed to match it to a person.
From that I feel that CCTV needs upgrading - with higher resolution cameras possibly black and white to maximise detail. Some decent optics would be good too.
Better murderers go free than the innocent get taped, yeah? :wall:
~:smoking:
They should make a TV show of the best scenes as well.
"The best of CCTV
See people falling, running against lanterns or get robbed as well as other hilarious material from all those idiots roaming our streets.
Tune in next Monday at eight pm on xxx."
:2thumbsup:
rory, you're just having a knee-jerk reaction. Think about it a little bit: how would have CCTV cameras helped in this case ?Quote:
Originally Posted by rory_20_uk
What would they give you ? Proof that the teens were at the site ? The police already has proof they were on the site: the guy's testimony, his family's testimony, and, what's more, it's obvious they were at the site since the guy broke the punk's jaw! He couldn't have broken his jaw unless the punks were there!
Another aspect: did the term "hoodie" exist in the common vocabulary in the UK 10, 15 years ago ? It became mainstream, and used as it is today, since the proliferation of CCTV cameras. You are aware, I hope, that most of these yobs are also called hoodie for a good reason, yes ? Because most of them wear friggin' hoods - and why do you think they do that ?
So, let's say for the sake of the argument that there were indeed cameras at the scene. And all the teens were wearing hoods. So your "proof" would be that a bunch of faceless people were at the scene. Wow, that's clearly gonna help the police ! :dizzy2:
Furthermore, rory, come on. You're a very intelligent person, and you also keep up with the news. You're aware of the systemic problems the police is facing in the UK - and has been facing, for the last several years.
Even here, in the backroom, we discussed several times how the police catch criminals and set them free, or they get mild sentences with suspension, because the jails are full, because their hands are tied by stupid laws, by red tape, and so on.
Recognize this for what it is: a systemic problem with the law, and the law enforcement. For various reasons (which can, and should be fixed), the police cannot, and are not willing to, go about this the sensible way.
Putting _more_ cameras in place won't change a damn thing with these problems. You're treating the symptom, not the disease.
Besides, I believe that both you and econ21 have decided for some reason to turn a blind eye to the article posted in this thread, which makes it pretty clear that the huge amount of cameras you have right now is not helping reducing crime !
How can you believe that putting in place even more cameras is gonna make a difference ?!
econ21: who are you and what have you done with econ21?
Look, there are several aspects of the problem.
First, as I pointed out in my previous post (my reply to rory), putting cameras will NOT solve most of these problems.
Also, please read the article that shows that there has been NO reduction in crime since the placing of these cameras.
Secondly, Rabbit has made a very valid point. You're asking the wrong question. You should not ask "Why not put the cameras in place ?". The question is why should the gov't be allowed to place them in the first place ?! The question you're asking is equivalent to "Well, I'm not really using this right I have, so I'm ok with giving it up, and it's ok for the gov't to take it away from me.". But no, it's not okay.
Also, as Rabbit has pointed out, there's a HUGE and fundamental difference between some guy seeing you on the street and forgetting your face in the next second, and your presence being tagged and logged for the entire duration you're outside of your house, and the records stored and available indefinitely. I hope the difference is clear.
As for how that system can be abused, oh, where do I even begin.
Are you aware that the illegal tapping of phone conversations in the US have been used to listen to senators that are opposed to the party in power ? And that's only the cases that have surfaced to light, but if they've done that, there's no reason to believe they haven't done that in other cases, which we simply haven't found out about yet.
And don't even try to tell me that that's in the US: gov'ts are the same everywhere, because they're all about the same thing: power and control.
Furthermore, since you seem to be an adept of the "think of the children" party, let's elaborate on that aspect. A lot of child abuse, varying from sexual molestation to physical violent abuse, takes place indoors. Since clearly you're willing to place cameras everywhere to prevent these from happening, then I'm sure you'll be glad to allow the gov't to install them in your own house. And everybody else's house, naturally. I mean, we don't want any children to be harmed, do we ?
And if these cameras prevent even one kid from being harmed, then our society only has to gain, right ?
So we'll place these cameras in your bathroom, and in your bedroom. I'm sure you and your wife won't have a problem with that. After all, think of the children. They deserve everything we can do to protect them.
And it's not about picking your nose and being caught on camera.
Basically you're saying "I don't see how this will bother me, so it's okay".
You want me to give you scenarios where this can be abused in ways that WILL bother you? Ok.
Scenario 1.
It's summer, nice weather, warm outside (ok, I know, this is the UK; well, relatively speaking then). Your wife/daughter is walking on the street wearing some relatively transparent/revealing clothes.
The guy operating/watching the CCTV's is bored as hell, and why not focus the cameras on this hottie, and follow her around for a couple of blocks ? He can also switch from camera to camera whenever she goes out of the range of one given camera. And maybe he can zoom in as much as possible, you know, to see some more "detail".
If a guy on the street did that, people/cops/you would react to that, and those guys can be dumped, one of several ways. But with the ubiquitousness of cameras, ont only can she not get rid of the electronic stalker, she won't even know.
But I'm sure you're perfectly comfortable with some prick zooming in on the girly bits of your wife/daughter, and maybe spanking the monkey a little bit while he's at it. It really is a boring job, staring at those screens all day long, believe me.
Scenario 2.
Say your son/daughter has an important football game/theater play/whatever important event, and you know your boss won't let you take the day off so you can join them.
So you lie and call in sick, but your boss is a paranoid bastard and he gets access to the CCTV system and manages to find recordings of you walking happily outside somewhere on the street. So you lied to him, and you're getting the boot.
And before you say that this is a stretch, and the boss would never get access to that in the first place, please consider a few things:
a) There are 652 (yes, six hundred and fifty two) institutions who will have access to the phone tapping info (see one of my articles in the first post). This number will not go down, it will only increase.
b) In the beginning I agree that the system may not support such complex operations as searching through the records for a given face and doing pattern-matching. But soon it will, now that there's an increased interest in these technologies.
Scenario 3.
Burglars. Right now, if you wanna rob somebody, but don't want to get into more trouble (such as an encounter with the house owner), they need to watch that house. So, for every house that they might be interested in, you need one burglar to watch it. But with a nice CCTV system, one guy can watch a whole bunch of houses, and knows _exactly_ when you leave and when you come back. Not to mention that they can follow you around for a few days and figure out what your daily pattern is - and, again, they can do this for a bunch of houses in parallel.
And the difference from the same burglar watching you from across the street to get the same information is that you might actually see him, if the same guy sits in a car parked outside your house for 2 weeks in a row... but with the beautiful support of advanced technology, you won't know a thing.
And since I can foresee a question along the lines of "How would the burglar have access to the CCTV system ?" Oh, please. Please, what beautiful society is that where there are no corrupt cops and/or security guards ? Forget about the fact that they could hack into the CCTV system, let's just assume we have a dumb, non-techie burglar, who can just bribe the CCTV operator to let him spend some time there studying his prospective victims. But this could never possibly happen, because corrupt people don't exist, and CCTV operators who have a crappy, mind-numbing job, that pays peanuts, would never succumb to a few easy bucks.
If you don't see any problem with your entire life outdoors being practically recorded and stored indefinitely for random bastards to have a look at it, then I think there are more serious issues here.
As for DNA databases, oh boy, it's orders of magnitude worse.
How about your health insurance company tripling your payments because they detected some genetic predisposition to some particular disease ? Or perhaps you not being able to get a job with health benefits, because your prospective employer can also find out about that predisposition ? Or perhaps they can ask you for your ID when you go to the liquor store, and they run it through their database and see that you have alcohol problems/some genetic disorder that makes it risky for you to buy alcohol. Well, then, perhaps they can refuse to sell it to you, or charge you a premium, since you're a greater risk.
Or what about errors ? You do know that there can be identical DNA codes, right ? So they do indeed find "your" DNA at the scene, but unfortunately for you, it's not yours. However, this is "indisputable" proof, so you get sentenced. Right now the odds of finding two identical DNAs are low, because they only have relatively few records. If everybody is catalogued then of course this can, and will, happen.
Or perhaps your son/daughter won't be able to obtain a certain job, because their employer doesn't like their genetic code, and they only want to hire "perfect" people, or people that are above some threshold as far as genetic variations in the DNA code go.
Do you still believe these are all hypothetical and will never happen, and even if they do, it doesn't bother you and it's all good 'cause it's for the kids ?
And believe me, I can come up with a lot more scenarios, but if nothing that I've said has had any impact, I doubt that anything I can come up with will.
Sure, no body is saying cameras will right society. All I am saying is that they will have some small benefit for essentially zero cost. On the article, we are probably talking marginal changes and starting to hit diminishing returns. I suspect some cameras deter crime - especially on buses and the underground. But the main effect should be in solving crime - getting the evidence to convict.Quote:
Originally Posted by Blodrast
Indeed - why should the government be allowed to put up zebra crossings and traffic lights, create a police force that could - shock horror - arrest me, check on my income and employment etc etc. Sticking a CCTV camera in a public place is a trivial exercise in state power. Big deal.Quote:
Secondly, Rabbit has made a very valid point. You're asking the wrong question. You should not ask "Why not put the cameras in place ?". The question is why should the gov't be allowed to place them in the first place ?!
Not really. It doesn't bother me. But I thought most camera tapes are wiped after a few weeks due to space issues. Maybe the technology has got better and they are kept for a longer duration. Which is a good thing. I don't believe in a statute of a limitations.Quote:
Also, as Rabbit has pointed out, there's a HUGE and fundamental difference between some guy seeing you on the street and forgetting your face in the next second, and your presence being tagged and logged for the entire duration you're outside of your house, and the records stored and available indefinitely. I hope the difference is clear.
Yes indeed, as a US Senator who regularly uses sign language in front of a CCTV camera outside my chip shop, I am very concerned of this potential abuse.Quote:
Are you aware that the illegal tapping of phone conversations in the US have been used to listen to senators that are opposed to the party in power ?
I think we are talking about CCTVs in public places. Hospitals do sometimes plant cameras in cases where parents are suspected of abuse. Some of the results are horrifying. But for the sake of argument, no, I would not object at all if the police did that in someone's home, provided they had good grounds for suspicion.Quote:
Furthermore, since you seem to be an adept of the "think of the children" party, let's elaborate on that aspect. A lot of child abuse, varying from sexual molestation to physical violent abuse, takes place indoors. Since clearly you're willing to place cameras everywhere to prevent these from happening, then I'm sure you'll be glad to allow the gov't to install them in your own house. And everybody else's house, naturally. I mean, we don't want any children to be harmed, do we ?
Oh give me a break, you don't need a CCTV camera to oggle a woman, just a pair of eyes. Doesn't bother me in the slightest.Quote:
Scenario 1. ... some prick zooming in on the girly bits of your wife/daughter, ...
Sounds hugely implausible, but again no big deal - you cheat, you risk getting caught.Quote:
Scenario 2.Say your son/daughter has an important football game/theater play/whatever important event, and you know your boss won't let you take the day off so you can join them.
Of course, there is a risk of corruption. You could use that argument against having any police or security at all (who guards the guardians?). Better to have us all on our lonesome hiding behind the curtains (or is it in our bunkers?) with our shotguns ready to blast each other's heads off as the paranoid libertarians fantasise about. But really, if a burglar wants to case a joint, there are easier ways of doing it than infiltrating a CCTV network.Quote:
Scenario 3. Burglars.
And how many such cases of burglars using CCTV have there been? Compare that with how many cases have used CCTV evidence to get a conviction. I'm guessing we are talking 1: 1 million.
Let's not go there, there's no way we will agree.Quote:
As for DNA databases, ...
I am sorry for being so argumentative, but the scenarios have absolutely zero impact. I really don't see what the fuss is about. :shrug:Quote:
...if nothing that I've said has had any impact, I doubt that anything I can come up with will.
Well, I could continue to refute some of your points, but, as I said before, I don't think that's gonna take us anywhere. I continue to strongly disagree with your views (and not just on a matter of principle, I _do_ have arguments to support my claims), but I don't see any benefit for anybody to turn this thread into an exchange of arguments between the two of us.
The most unfortunate thing is that it wouldn't bother me in the least if _you_ lived in such a society, as long as I could _not_ live in it. But unfortunately, when the cameras are in place, they won't magically not record me, as well as you. So I'll have to bear the effects even though I was against the whole thing.
nm
edit: this is why you should limit your drunken posts to the drunkards thread, kids.