In 1949 when George Orwell published his dystopian novel, 1984, it took on such a life of its own that a new word entered the lexicon: Orwellian. I recall when the actual year rolled around, little of the disasters the book had predicted had come to pass or, if they had, they had escaped public notice.
Now, in 2013, we find that there is more truth than fiction to some of Orwell’s notions. It is highly likely the problems have been around for some time and only now are we becoming fully aware of the intrusiveness of the government into our daily lives. It’s more than a little ironic that the disclosures about government scrutiny came from Gregory Katz’s article on June 7 in the Manchester Guardian, given that Orwell was an Englishman, although born in India.
Katz reported the vast intrusions of American security surveillance under the aegis of the National Security Administration, headed by James Clapper. That Verizon subscribers had their telephone activity monitored was shocking enough, but it soon became apparent the problem was much broader than that, reaching the arcane world of internet servers, private email, and who knows how far beyond.
Mr. Clapper testified before Congress in March about these issues. It is unclear whether he was just having a conversation with the intelligence committee or if he was under oath. If the latter, then he clearly should be prosecuted for perjury. He answered the direct question about whether or not the government was collecting data on private telephone activity or any other similar information; he simply replied, after a nanosecond pause, “No.” Re-questioned, he gave the same negative. Congress did not seem disturbed by that answer, although they were familiar with the provisions of the Patriot Act that may have given the government legal authority to carry out such programs.
We all recall the warrantless wire taps that President Bush carried out in the immediate post 9/11 period. Perhaps the current breaches of privacy are, in the eyes of our officials, simply an extension of that policy. President Obama has been quick to say that no eavesdropping has occurred. Who among us is comforted by that reassurance? A few key strokes on an NSA computer bank could certainly make that a non-reality.
That terrorist attacks have been, we are told, prevented by the surveillance is comforting and it does add credence to another of the President’s statements: If we are going to have increased security, then we must give up some privacy. That brings up the 1984 question: When does privacy become, in the words of Orwell, “thoughtcrime” defined as thinking bad things about the government, now seeming more like Big Brother than we would have thought possible.
“Doublethink,” another concept from the novel, is holding that two contradictory views are equally correct and can be justified by “newspeak,” an abridgment of language which leads to censorship and ultimately thought control. We don’t have the stretch the imagination too far to see that deployed.
Obviously there is much murkiness in these areas but it does bring to mind a comment my 7th grade teacher made. Said she, never put anything in writing that you don’t want to face in court. How Miss Goggin was prescient enough to say that, I cannot say, but had she known of YouTube, Facebook, email, Skype and the unknowing surveillance under which we find ourselves, I am sure her view of government would be quite different from the halcyon days of the Truman administration.
No, we are not at 1984, but a lot closer to Big Brother than most of us, conservative or liberal, democrat or republican want to be. Sadly, I don’t think we have much control over those who make the decisions that govern our individual freedoms.
Hayden Hollingsworth
