I know this seems like a very strange question to be asking at this point in society but I’m going to explain my reasoning for doing so. In English on Monday, we read an extract from 1984 by George Orwell, for those of you that have read it in its entirety you will understand why I am asking this question, for those of you that haven’t the basic idea behind the book is the author George Orwell writing about what he thinks society would be like in 1984. Obviously we are way past 1984 now but the way Orwell describes the society he imagined was cameras everywhere watching everything you do, the government telling you what to think and what you can and cannot do amongst other things.
I know that our government don’t tell us what to think and things like that but the way Orwell was describing the cameras was basically his description of CCTV! Everywhere you go there are cameras watching you, the only privacy you have is in your own home! one of the teaching assistants and I started to discuss this very idea! we were saying that the 1984 that George Orwell pictured in the book WAS nowadays! At first I didn’t really see where she was coming from and was saying that cameras were a good thing because it was what was keeping us safe and she said that yes that is what the cameras are for but sometimes they are not used like that and what they were sometimes used for was for general snooping around to try and catch someone doing something they shouldn’t.
As I walked home from school, I slowly started to agree with what she was saying and the fact that the generation I am in has grown up with CCTV and her generation hasn’t made a lot more sense as to why she would think like she does about this particular subject. Don’t get me wrong, I know for a fact that if we didn’t have CCTV many criminals would get away with the crimes that they commit and the police wouldn’t be able to come and save a victim of a mugging or worse but do we really need as many cameras as we have? it’s getting to the point where there are cameras in the toilets! granted, they can’t see in the cubicles but for the boys toilets which have a urinal outside the cubicles, it does feel a bit weird taking a leak whilst you know someone, somewhere is watching you do it! even in schools there are cameras watching your every move! it wouldn’t surprise me if Michael Gove decides to put cameras in classrooms soon! can you imagine how awkward that would be? someone watching you do your assessment!
I don’t think that the government have any respect for public privacy anymore! to be honest, they have gone security mad ever since 9/11 in America and 7/7 in London, I know that people think that if there was more security back then that both attacks wouldn’t have happened but if you look at 9/11 in a different way, then you would see that all of the terrorist that took part in that tragic event managed to get past security AND CCTV! so basically neither of the things that have been increased over the years actually managed to help in the first place!
I honestly think that we need our privacy back! I’m not saying that the government should get rid of security altogether, I’m just saying they need to lay off of it a bit! we are all living in paranoia of the next attack which probably won’t even happen now that Osama Bin Laden is dead! Come on people wake up and realise that we are all safe without the amount of CCTV cameras around that we have!
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