Column by Paul Hein.
Exclusive to STR
The conversation around the lunch table got around, not surprisingly, to the NSA and its surveillance activities. Nobody liked it. It was Virgil who said what many were probably thinking: “I don’t like it either, but if you’re doing nothing wrong, what’s so bad about it?” There were nods of assent, and a few murmured “It’s for national security, after all.”
“Do you need to go to the men’s room?” I asked Virgil. He looked surprised.
“No, why do you ask?”
“I’ve got my camera with me; I thought I’d go with you and get some pictures.” Virg looked at me as if I were crazy.
“You mean to tell me that you’d be taking pictures of me in the john?” he asked.
“Sure, why not. You’re not going to be doing anything wrong in there, are you?”
“Of course not, but there’s such a thing as privacy, you know; and your photographic ambitions would trash my right to it.”
“Hold it! I’m confused. You just claimed a right to privacy, but said a minute ago that no one should object to being observed if they were doing nothing wrong. How can you have it both ways?”
“Easy. Some things are private, and what happens in a bathroom is surely very much so. Security is well and good, but there have to be limits, after all.”
“Well, if that’s true, then the bathroom would be the perfect place for villains to meet and plot their terrorist activities. What better place for cameras?”
“I think you’re being ridiculous, but if national security can be enhanced by cameras in the bathroom, then I can’t object to having them there. Does that make you happy?”
“Not especially, because you are agreeing to waive your rights—in this case a right to privacy--for what you call ‘national security.’” That’s a euphemism, Virg. Your security isn’t enhanced by government spying, nor is mine. With distrust and even fear of government on the rise, the rulers are taking steps to protect their own behinds, but calling it 'national security' sounds a lot better than 'covering our butts'!”
“Well, call it what you want, but I still say that if I’m not doing anything wrong, I can’t complain about the surveillance, even though I don’t like it.”
“But that’s precisely why you SHOULD complain about it! You don’t like it!”
“Wake up, buddy. There are lots of things we do that we don’t like, because it’s the law.”
“OK, but this law you subject yourself to, but don’t like, is simply what some strangers DO like. It’s not engraved in stone by the finger of God, after all.”
“So now you’re a scoff-law?”
“No, just a realist. Look up any definition of 'law'. You’ll find it is just an expression of what the law-givers--strangers in City Hall, or the state capital, or Washington, want. What you are saying is that the wants and desires of these strangers, concerning your own life, carry more weight than your own wants and desires regarding your own life, and, moreover, you approve of that situation.”
“We all just can’t go around doing whatever we please, can we?” He intended it, I think, to be a rhetorical question.
“Why can’t we?” I said. “To paraphrase you, ‘if you’re not doing anything wrong, why can’t you do what you want?’ In any event, why would you assume that strangers are better equipped to direct your life than you are? Have these rulers of ours demonstrated a superior moral character, or intelligence?”
He laughed. “Well, hardly.”
“So there you have it,” I said. “We’re conditioned to think that we must put aside what we would like--namely our privacy, in this matter--for what the strangers that rule us would like. We gasp at the very thought of doing what we want to do, but accept without blinking that we must do what they want us to do. Think about it, Virg. How does that make us different from slaves?” There were several moments of silence.
We ordered dessert.
