Sirotablog
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. David writes about political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties.
-
August 31, 2007 4:24 PM
Should Big Brother Be Watching Public Spaces?
Should there be surveillance cameras in public parks? Albuquerque, New Mexico is struggling with that question.
Here's an excerpt from the Albuquerque Tribune report:
"Cameras with the power to zoom in and identify what's in a pedestrian's hand will soon be aimed at the heart of Albuquerque's public space — Civic Plaza. Using $80,000 from the federal Homeland Security Department, the city is preparing to install a first round of cameras to monitor and record activity at the plaza and sidewalks around the City/County Building and police headquarters...'Cameras of that nature (at Civic Plaza) will necessarily have an oppressive effect on people's willingness to take part in gatherings that take opposition to the government policies,' Peter Simonson, executive director of ACLU New Mexico, said. 'The bottom line is that the evidence shows that we sacrifice a great deal of anonymity and, consequently, freedom in return for negligible improvements in public safety.'"
I can see both sides of this one. It is a public space, so it's hard to actually ban cameras for anyone - police or just regular citizens. Then again, Simonson is absolutely right - the cameras will likely have a chilling effect on political displays there.
I don't know the ins and outs of Civic Plaza in Albuquerque and whether its specific security needs even require these kinds of measures (which is obviously a huge X-factor in debating this specific story). But assuming for a moment that there really is a need to better secure the plaza, I think it's fair to say that generically, the better way to go in securing a place a city wants to secure is to have more police patrols rather than surveillance cams, both because patrols are a little less Big-Brother-Is-Watching-ish and police can actually do something if they are on or near the scene and something bad is going on. Then again, increased police patrols are probably more cost-intensive than camera surveillance, and again, we're talking about public space here - spaces that anyone is allowed to shoot with a camera.
So again, it's a tough issue. What do you think? Am I some sort of horrible authoritarian fascist for even considering the pro-surveillance side of this? Am I a head-in-the-sand moron, naively believing the threat of criminals and terrorists doesn't warrant such measures? Anyone who reads my writing knows that I generally tend to err on the protect-civil-liberties side of things. But as I said, I think this one is a close call. Your thoughts?
-
TAKE ACTION
-
About David Sirota
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. He is the New York Times bestselling author of Hostile Takeover. He lives in Denver, Colorado. His daily blog can be found at CREDO Action. He contributes regularly to the Denver Post's Web site, is a senior editor at In These Times magazine and is working on his second book. He has been profiled in Newsweek and the Rocky Mountain News and is widely known for his reporting on political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties. Sirota serves as co-chair of the Progressive States Network, a 501(c)3 organization that supports state legislators and that is a partner of CREDO.
You can subscribe to Sirota's e-mail newsletter by going to davidsirota.com and signing up in the lefthand corner. To find out more about Sirota, download his official biography or see his recent media appearances. You can e-mail him at sirota@credoaction.com.
The views expressed on this blog are his own, and do not necessarily represent the views of Working Assets (publisher of CREDO Action) or the institutions Sirota works for.
-
Recent Sirotablog entries
- Teaching McCain Econ 101
- Fox News at 5:15 EST
- Will the Elite Pay Their Fair Share?
- What's Right and Wrong With This Picture
- Bill Kristol Needs to Get Out More
- Six Words for Better Wages...And Why We Need to Promote Ideological Warriors
- What A Huge Scandal!
- Radio West
- Report: America's "Free" Trade Policies Harming Rural Latin America
- Free Speech TV
-
More David Sirota
-
This Modern World
-
July 29, 2008 -
July 23, 2008 -
July 15, 2008 -
July 8, 2008 -
July 1, 2008
-
-
Donations Recipients
-
RSS feeds
Discussion
It's one thing having a camera in a bank or a casino. They're dealing with large sums of money and have a history of robbery. That is also private property.
It's quite another thing to point cameras on a public town square. Unless there is a significant amount of crime in the area, the cameras and the people to man them are a waste of taxpayer money. And unless you cover that place like a casino or a bank, you're not likely to actually catch someone in the act. So, you're spending a lot of money on something that isn't likely to help anyone.
That's beside all the civil liberties issues, with which we've only scratched the surface. After installing cameras, they're going to want to hook it up to the same facial recognition software that casinos use. Or, they'll point the cameras at the streets, record the license plates that drive by, and load those into software.
This kind of paranoid nonsense tends to snowball. Next thing you know, we'll be the next England with cameras everywhere. Over there, they have cameras coupled with microphones which police use to talk to people. It is all quite scary and very 1984-ish.
So yes David, you are right to be alarmed.
Picture of Civic Plaza:
http://www.virtualalbuquerque.com/VirtualABQ/CivicPlaza/
David you are certainly right to be concerned. This country has become consumed with security over all else. As we've learned, often "security" is a clever term employed to cover up all sorts of governmental chicanery. We need to take back our privacy, not give up more. The idea that putting cameras in a public park in Albuquerque will make the nation or city safer is ludicrous on its face. We simply cannot let a group of radical terrorists subsume our Constitution. We are far better, and greater, than that!
Bottom line is: if an average citizen takes film/video of me in a public park, I can easily and legitimatly challenge its authenticity, the possible editing, the motives of the -grapher. If however it's a governmentally-approved film, the burden would be on me to prove ill motives on the part of the gov.
Wanna bet the local city council is getting major kickbacks from the camera snoopers?
The thing is cameras do nothing to improve security, it only shows that law enforcement is too damn lazy or inept to do its job. So what if a camera catches a thug mugging some working stiff. The camera can't do shit and unlike CSI fantasy shows pictures don't lead to arrests unless the person is wealthy and connected.
Fuck here in CA cops won't respond to 911 calls in some areas because the people are poor or too rural.
Worse in a state like NM where CCW laws make it easy for any law abiding citizen to carry. It reduces a camera's value to zilch. Fucking with people in a state with prevelent CCW is a not a good idea.
BTW if you want to fuck up those cameras get a 4-5 laser pointers, tape them together and aim them at the camera - it will fry the ultra-sensitive CCD array(just like the Chinese do to our spy satellites) thus turning them into high tech crap.
Yes David, be worried. Simonson summed it up.
Like, I am going to feel a whole lot safer knowing some security camera in the park that can "zero in" on my hand, say, if it is carrying a cannoli back from the bakery is going to save me from the bad guys.
Liken these impotent security cameras to those impotent TSA airport human screeners who handle our baggage and private parts through security lines. Same outcome: both violate our privacy and serve to create more suspicion and fear while being virtually incapable of actually protecting us in an immediate emergency.
Better to take that $80,000 and pay some Homeland Security guy with a black belt to patrol the park. That is the sane and humane choice, rather than for us to fall prey to the gazillion dollar technology and security industries that are dehumanizing our society.
The issue is one of public space. Albuquerque is violating the _public_ space by creating a _private_ function: viewing people via cameras as a spy technique. The only way to retain the space as truly public is to stream the information for free via the net. One could argue that computer terminals must be made available as well. Either way, the information gathered is from the public space, and since they are using public funds to do so, the information should be made available to the public.
If America wants to spy on itself, fine. The only way to make it just is to allow everyone to spy on everyone else.
You want to put a stop to security cameras?
Demand that they be put in every city council chamber in the country and in Congressional offices.
if its good enough for public spaces its good enough in the offices of our politicians.
It's only going to be a matter of time before Peak Oil makes it more difficult to get all those cameras going.
By the way, the industrial polluters won't be affected by the cameras AFAIK.
As the generation always bullying other generations, aging boomers will elevate security above privacy.
Still, reciprocity is an intriguing defense. All elected officials and public servants, as well as officers of public corporations, could be enjoined from ANY activity w/o thorough 24/7 and publicly retrievable surveillance.
Peak oil isn't going to stop the security cameras, they'll just put solar cells w/ battery backup on the cameras and keep snooping.
Security cameras don't belong in public areas invading our rights of privacy.
Security cameras do belong in city council, county commissioner, state legislature, meeting rooms in Washington DC and board rooms of publicly held corporations.
Elected officials are public servants and the public needs to know what its servants are doing.
Corporate officials need someone watching them so they don't cheat the stockholders or the public.
There is no "reasonable expectancy to privacy" in a public space or public transportation..
There is personal privacy but it such as on your person and a protection from unreasonable search IE the 4th Amendment..
And despite businesses using security cams, it doesn't deter criminals one bit.
All the cameras do is record people getting their asses mugged or beat half-way to death and the really gruesome stuff gets put on cable news.
More of a joke than a deterrent.
Join the Discussion