Devil's Advocate

What is the price you are ready to pay for your freedom? Your life?? Nah, the government is not interested. Your privacy? Looks like someone's interested over here!!! Our society is fast becoming a vigilante society. More so since we've had the 7/11s and the 26/11s of the world. The war against terror is on. Terror has permeated into our cities. Intelligence is of paramount concern today. Agencies worldwide are trying to gather greater power by all means possible. Even if it means at the cost of privacy- your, mine, ours alike. With each passing minute surveillance techniques are getting more and more sophisticated. Getting to know that spy satellites can read the time off someone's wrist watch is passe. Everyone knows about killer drones. The fact that a cellular phone is a homing device evokes no emotions. What's next?

Next is happening right now. Companies like Google are indexing the way you surf the net- an insight into your psyche. Couple it with information like your Social Security Number or a Unique ID(UID) and the terabytes of data from The Human Genome project and you have a system in place wherein your privacy goes for a toss.

But why am I creating such hoopla suddenly? The reason- The Enemy of the State. After the movie got over, one of my friend pointed out that if Social Security Number is a boon, it also is a pain in the ass. Why? Because all your social activities- right from your driving license to vehicle registration to bank account to cell phone to medical to what have you is connected to this one number. Result- a glaring vulnerability. It's akin to a double edged sword- the government can (mis)use it, so can the hackers. Watch the movie The Net to see how your identity can be stolen. Just at the click of a button.

So what shall we do? Security of a nation is necessary. So is your personal freedom and privacy. Certain rights cannot and should not be compromised to ensure freedom. What good is a freedom which keeps a tab on what is going on in your bedroom.

The gestapo is watching. There is no escape lest you, the common man is aware of your right. The Indian Establishment has already started the process. Unique ID Number is just one of the ways forward in a slew of many such steps.

I'm no gay or lesbian rights activist. I'm not interested in the sexual allegiances of people either. What happens in the bedroom, stays in the bedroom! But the erstwhile British Raj made it a point to wrap on the moral veil and tell the subjects how to behave in their bedrooms. Free India decided to ctrl+c and ctrl+v the draconian laws and hence Section 377 of the IPC was also carried forward as a raj hangover. We're in desperate need of customized laws that reflect the sensibilities of India and not that of some colonial ruler. The funniest part is that Britain has long done away with these inhuman and discriminatory laws.

The worst part of 377 is that it gives even the highly competent constables (due pun intended) of Indian Police to detain people of same sex on the charges of sodomy, even if they're holding hands in the public.

Being gay does not make anyone inhuman or straight people highly humane. On the contrary, people who consider themselves as straight are the one's discriminating, launching violent attacks against gay people.

And as I've already said, the government has no right to interfere into and encroach upon our privacy by peeking into our bedrooms. Sure, religious leaders and moral police will take their stand against this development calling it as unnatural and all but I hope that these developments are irreversible.

God made humans with free will everyone has the the right to exercise his own free will. Period.

Will the so called 'keepers of the society' please shut up???

Sample this- you are standing in a shop and your bike is parked a few feet away. A wannabe dude passes your bike, stops, rotates its rear view mirror as if he's the next Bruce Lee, adjusts his mop like hair, admires his Tom Cruise look and walks away happily. The person who's unhappy is you when you return to your bike only to find that someone has fondled with it.

Now cut to this scene- you come back to your bike only to find someone sitting on its seat and all this while he has played with its instrumentation, its gears and what not as if he's the rightful owner. You frown, glare scornfully, utter a few bad words (you know what words I'm talking about!!!) and helplessly drive away.

All of us who own two wheelers have been privy to such situations all too frequently. Sometimes we're on the receiving end too (because we shamelessly emulate each other).

What does this tell? Following are my inferences (you may choose to disagree if you belong to the aggravating camp)-

• People here have no civic sense.
• We don't know how to respect someone's private property.
• We just love to abuse someone else's property (maybe this is how we vent out our frustration).
• Our teachers and parents have failed to sensitize us (oh I just love this blame game).
• We've taken this Sanakrit mantra of Vasudhev Kutumbkam so very seriously and customized it in such a manner that we consider everything we lay our hands to be our property!!!

Please guys, give me a break!!! Respect someone's privacy. Or at-least try to.....

Stumbled upon this piece of news a couple of days back (catch the full article @ http://www.hindu.com/mag/2009/06/07/stories/2009060750090300.htm) and was instantly alarmed, not because its titled in the name of national security, but because of the sheer importance this article holds. Because its about your privacy, my privacy. Because I've been watching too many films like Enemy of the state and their like. Because a senior babu can be privy to your emails, can block your URL, can round up your ISP to cough up your surfing data (yes, they'll know if you visited all those x-rated websites). So much so for the anonymity you longed for. All this in the name of national security.

Yes, whatever you read in the above paragraph is totally correct. An innocuous sounding The Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 seeks to give teeth to existing laws on information technology and cyberspace. And it was hastily passed in the wake of the 26/11 Mumbai attacks. You and I were happily sleeping, our supposed vigilante(?) media, which creates a hue and cry when the Indian team gets out of the T-20 World Cup was sleeping. Everyone, was SLEEPING.

Privacy? What's that? More importantly who cares about privacy? True, national security is important. But providing your babus with absolute powers is quixotic. And all this while the laws remains open to interpretation by these people. And talking about ambiguity (intentional?), sample this- unavoidable circumstances are not defined, remote areas are not defined.

As the case already is with us people, we are not sensitive towards the privacy of other people, we are not aware of our privacy rights and all this clearly reflects in the draft. Looks like we are interested more in taking cue from China when it comes to freedom of expression on the net. We all bear testimony to the fact as to how (in)justice was served in The Pirate Bay case.

The net was the last bastion which offered some sort of anonymity and freedom but by the looks of it, those days are soon going to be over. Big Brother is watching. The gestapo is watching. All this while we are sleeping. Comfortably Dumb??? Yes!!!