It's so much — more than we can comprehend. I realized this during our class discussion about the USA PATRIOT act last week in class. I was pretty surprised and kind of frightened to discover that some people in class seemed to have no problem with the act whatsoever. Don't get me wrong, I understood their points, definitely, which were basically, "I don't have a problem with it because I'm not doing anything wrong and I have nothing to hide." I get that, and really I don't have anything to hide either, so I don't feel especially threatened.
But the point of all of this is, that's not the point. The real gist of this is that our first, fourth, fifth, sixth, eighth and fourteenth amendment rights are being threatened under the Patriot Act. And some people are totally okay with that, which blows my mind. Maybe it's because our generation wasn't the one who had to fight to gain these rights in the first place, an neither were our parents or even grandparents. Maybe it's because we are so far removed from it, and don't know what it's like to not possess these rights, that we take them for granted and assume they will always be there. Amendment rights, of course, are not tangible so maybe that's why it's hard to imagine missing them.
What scares me about the surveillance and lack of privacy included in the Patriot Act is the potential they hold for even more similar legislation. Under Obama's presidency, I don't really think that would happen, but if Bush were to be starting another term, I would definitely be worried. It's a slippery slope, though, no matter who sits in the Oval Office — how far will the government go in the name of security?
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
BNW & V
So about "BNW" and "V" — I found our class discussions last week and the week before, about the book and the movie, and especially about how the book relates to the movie and vice versa, especially interesting. I read BNW early in my senior year of high school for an english class, but I don't remember looking at it and discussing it in the ideological context that we did in this class and we didn't devote nearly as much discussion to it as we should have. And as far as "V" goes, I had heard it was a good movie but didn't really have any idea what it was about until we watched it a couple of weeks ago.
Anyway, I think we pretty much hit the nail on the head in class, in terms of which society is more secure and which is more free. As Natalie and Maggie and I mused before the large class discussion, the people in BNW are more secure and the people in V are more free, based on the latter group's ability to think for themselves and their memory and knowledge of what life was like not long ago, before the fascist ruling body took over. The basic difference is that the society in BNW was genetically controlled and kept in check biologically their whole lives. I would say they were brainwashed, but it was more than that. But in V, the people, even children, knew that most of the state's actions were complete bullshit (they even knew the media was lying to them, evidenced by the cries of "bullocks!" at the TV during the evening news) but they were powerless to do anything about it. That is, until V came along.
One of the most interesting comments in our class discussion (I can't remember who said this) was when someone brought up the fact that the character V would never exist in BNW, let alone be able to mobilize that society against its government, since no one is born or lives organically in BNW — they are created through genetic engineering and go through a series of treatment to guarantee their status in society, and above all, their satisfaction with it. V himself would never have been dissatisfied with his place in BNW, and neither would anyone else.
Anyway, I think we pretty much hit the nail on the head in class, in terms of which society is more secure and which is more free. As Natalie and Maggie and I mused before the large class discussion, the people in BNW are more secure and the people in V are more free, based on the latter group's ability to think for themselves and their memory and knowledge of what life was like not long ago, before the fascist ruling body took over. The basic difference is that the society in BNW was genetically controlled and kept in check biologically their whole lives. I would say they were brainwashed, but it was more than that. But in V, the people, even children, knew that most of the state's actions were complete bullshit (they even knew the media was lying to them, evidenced by the cries of "bullocks!" at the TV during the evening news) but they were powerless to do anything about it. That is, until V came along.
One of the most interesting comments in our class discussion (I can't remember who said this) was when someone brought up the fact that the character V would never exist in BNW, let alone be able to mobilize that society against its government, since no one is born or lives organically in BNW — they are created through genetic engineering and go through a series of treatment to guarantee their status in society, and above all, their satisfaction with it. V himself would never have been dissatisfied with his place in BNW, and neither would anyone else.
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