There is no "slippery slope" toward loss of liberties, only a long staircase where each step downward must first be tolerated by the American people and their leaders. -Alan Simpson
Last month, TechDEC — our Technology Decisions Exposition and Conference — was held in Tampa, Florida. Despite our fears of what the September 11 attacks would do to attendance, we went on with the show and were rewarded with a wonderfully successful event.
But then there's Tampa, a location we chose more than a year ago. I wish we never would have given it our business. Tampa epitomizes the worst of what government can do, especially in a time when our civil liberties are being threatened.
In a desperate and futile attempt to make its citizens somehow feel safer, the city has installed cameras on public streets, with software to match faces with a database of felons. An 85 percent match gets you a visit from a cop.
This is wrong. It is wrong on the face of it and it is wrong in the depths of it. The fact that the citizens of Tampa tolerate this Orwellian intrusion is disgusting. No citizen of any country-especially one founded on and presumably valuing freedom-should be scrutinized by its government simply for walking on the street. No one should face questioning or detainment simply for resembling a criminal.
Privacy is a right. Due process is a guarantee. These cameras violate both. They are the technological equivalent of being dragged to a police lineup when you have been accused of no crime and, indeed, when the police lack even probable cause to question you.
How short a step is it for these cameras to watch not for convicted felons, but for people wanted for questioning? And for what crime-jaywalking?
There is always the annoyingly vacuous argument that 'if you aren't doing anything wrong, you have nothing to hide.' But that presupposes a benevolent government. What if that changes? What if, say, reading certain books becomes a crime? Or following your religion? Or being a particular nationality? Or all of these?
We have today, for the most part, a benevolent government. But that can change. Don't forget: Hitler was elected.
There are many things government can do in the name of security: police on every corner, cameras in every bedroom. These could guarantee a crime-free society. But would you want to live in it? The people of Tampa seem to.
Let us choose to be free to walk our streets without being watched. Let us choose to assume the best of people, not the worst; let us assume that they are innocent, not guilty.
Children need to be monitored by their parents. The citizens of Tampa do not need to be watched by their government.
The price of freedom is the willingness to do sudden battle, anywhere, anytime, and with utter recklessness. -Robert Heinlein
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