Total Surveillance: The Response to Snowden’s Leak Ignores the Reality of Political Repression [View all]

[Purveyor]

by KATE EPSTEIN
Although Edward Snowden’s recent revelations about the breadth and scope of the surveillance-industrial complex didn’t add many facts to the public record of the ongoing post-9/11 security state saga, it certainly brought the issue to the forefront, forcing everyone to confront the stark realities of disappearing privacy and diminishing liberties. Many who defend the government (and corporate) spying argue that the right to privacy and anonymous free speech must be balanced against safety and security.

Many of these defenders are comfortable with government surveillance as long as the government doesn’t abuse its ability to spy and collect citizens’ data. If it will help catch terrorists before they attack, the argument goes, then it’s worth it, even if the idea of total surveillance is kind of creepy and we all wish this wasn’t the trade off we have to make. I agree with this commenter, responding to David Simon’s June 7th blog post in which the former Baltimore Sun journalist and Wire creator defended the NSA near-total surveillance, primarily because, Simon claims, there has been no evidence that the government has abused its surveillance power:

I’m not sure that actually having lived in a totalitarian society, like I have in communist Bulgaria, is a prerequisite to grasping that total surveillance, or the fear of it, kills free expression, and at some point even thinking. Self-censorship becomes way of life. And the power of the secret police that hears and knows everything and can pressure anyone into submission is huge. The Stasi strongmen could have only dreamt of the richness of detail Google and Facebook are providing to the NSA. Not to mention the automated analytical tools that are already available it [sic] are currently being developed. The possibilities of power misuse are just too big to ignore.

True enough in theory, and even scarier when we consider the overwhelming evidence that at least one goal the corporate-state surveillance apparatus is fulfilling is the political repression of activists on both the left and the right who advocate fundamental, democratic change to a badly broken system.

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http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/06/28/total-surveillance/