I wrote a blog article in November 2008. This argued that New Labour are introducing too many laws to increases state control and erode personal freedom and listed a few such as identity cards and mass interception of Emails.
The argument in favour of these laws is usually “If you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear” but the people who use this argument are Talking Bollocks! The British establishment has a long history of abusing laws and another example of this was reported in The Independent today. It seems that police are using laws designed to prevent terrorism to harass photographers.
This seems a little hypocritical since, these days, the police seem to be pretty avid photographers themselves! I myself have witnessed them obtrusively abusing their policy on filming demonstrations to film a discussion between a bunch of pro Israeli oldies and a bunch of pro Palestinian hippies.
hypocrites?
Photography
We are an absurd race
Tags: photograph, Snoopers Paradise, society, strange race, think for ourselves
Why do this?
We humans are a strange race. We like to belong. We like to feel we have a purpose. It seems that we will do anything rather than think for ourselves.
While browsing around for Christmas presents in Snoopers Paradise this afternoon I cam across this photograph. If the photo had showed the Queen of England inspecting a regiment of thousands of men perhaps I would not have noticed it. I think it caught my eye for it’s absurdity.
Suppose that this handful of individuals were the only people in the world. Would any of them behave in such an absurd fashion? How would they decide which of them were to line up and which to inspect? I guess it is society that has laid down the rules for these people and I guess it is society that lays down the rules for all of us.