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The UK surveillance state. Why?

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
By all means correct my misconception and explain the truly intended point.
What? You mean to say that you did not access those two links which explained so clearly how your quotation was a garbled goofy misquote which totally changed the meaning? And now you want me to write a lesson on the subject?

Actually, judging by your tone you do seem to be rather passionate about it. I find it strange, but if the British people don't feel violated by their state's intrusions then it's really no concern of mine.
State Intrusions? You think I live in a 'State'?
Look, what we want here is better safety and security whether it's in our kids playgrounds or our grannies going shopping, or our vehicle accident rates.

And the IT tecs are very young civilian people now, some who can hack into, say, vast banking networks and publish the names of rich tax dodgers hiding funds......... It's not the 'State' that's going to intrude into long hidden crimes........... it's clever civilian youth.

But generally, if somebody does a bad thing here, there is a beter chance that there will be an IT trail from the incident right back to their front door.

I wait with bated breath.
Don't do that! Just keep posting, and then it'll just be a matter of time before you show some support for a safety/security measure............ a 'State' control!
 

ADigitalArtist

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
There is one thing that we should thank religion for I suppose and that is if we did not have it the world would not be able support the populations. Religion is best form of indiscriminate culling known to man.
The biggest historical body count comes from atempting to suppress religion with extreme prejudice. By anti-religious regimes. So...no? No ideology has clean hands in representation, because none of them are monolithic, and trying to excise religion has only led to more bloodshed.
 

HonestJoe

Well-Known Member
It's not the government or surveillance agencies that are generating fear of Big Brother.
I agree, it’s the opponents of government (either it’s current politics or government in general) who do. My point is that they’re just as guilty as the people they’re attacking, telling us to fear the government because it’s trying to scare us.

What the government does condone are the scary rumors of immigrants, liberals, Muslims, transexuals, &c. undermining traditional American values.
Yours might be at the moment, ours generally isn’t.
 

Terrywoodenpic

Oldest Heretic
No problem in the Uk.
If someone jumps the traffic light they will be logged and caught.
Some town councils put security cameras in trouble spots the Government never does.
Cheltenham looks after our national on line security.
Criminals and terrorists get caught.

I would rather be watched than shot by armed police as in the USA.

In the real world I am never aware of surveillance at all, why should I be? Im most cases the footage is only examined if there has been a problem or ongoing situation.

In general I am very much in favour of it,
It is never used for impropper uses. So visiting adulterers are perfectly safe bringing thir girl friend over here.
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
The biggest historical body count comes from atempting to suppress religion with extreme prejudice. By anti-religious regimes. So...no? No ideology has clean hands in representation, because none of them are monolithic, and trying to excise religion has only led to more bloodshed.

A known 800 million + people have been killed in religious wars. That's wars where one side or both are fighting to impose their faith on others. So anti religious purges are peanuts in comparison.

But could you please identify some of these anti religious regimes, because as far as i understand it, there were other circumstances in addition to religion for stalin and mao's purges. I.e. nationalism, obedience to the regeme etc.
 

Stanyon

WWMRD?
a dog that was born and raised in a kennel can be quite content for it knows nothing else. Even if the electric fence is taken down it may still remain inside, the invisible wires still shocking it if it crosses over that seems a mental fascism taught and accepted.
 

Kangaroo Feathers

Yea, it is written in the Book of Cyril...
But isn’t all the talk about invasive government surveillance a political strategy of scaring people too? ;)
Depends how you feel about intrusive surveillance, doesn't it? There's no right answer to this stuff, it's all about striking a balance between security and liberty, and where the exact line is changes across time.
 

Rival

Si m'ait Dieus
Staff member
Premium Member
State Intrusions? You think I live in a 'State'?
A Nation State, yes. Any country with a functioning government and other such systems are all states. France is a state, Romania is a state. It culd be argued that places like Somalia are failed states.
 

Twilight Hue

Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Depends how you feel about intrusive surveillance, doesn't it? There's no right answer to this stuff, it's all about striking a balance between security and liberty, and where the exact line is changes across time.
The irony is if somebody was following you and watching you everywhere constantly and continually 24/7 you'd get peeved off after a while, yell at him or her to bugger off, and maybe even call the police.

It's ironic when government themselves who are essentially doing the same thing, are given a pass.

I have trouble figuring that out sometimes.
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
The United Kingdom is defined as a unitary sovereign state, so yes, you do.
Just where do you dig this junk up?
Exactly which idiot wrote that?

Just think about it..... what do you think that the Scots, the Welsh, the Irish, the English and the Cornish would say to that?
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
A Nation State, yes. Any country with a functioning government and other such systems are all states. France is a state, Romania is a state. It culd be argued that places like Somalia are failed states.

I forget where you live...?
Are you a Brit?

The reason I ask is that the above description just doesn't fit us here. The clue is in the word 'us'. That's a clue.

Oh, I'll be kind......... How many governments and separate law systems can a 'Nation State' have?

EDIT: I've just checked and you're English so you should know all this already! :D
Northern Ireland and Scotland have different law and/or legal systems to us in England, so you've just lost them from your definmition. And Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own governments. This means that there are at least 4 countries here for starters.
 
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oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
The irony is if somebody was following you and watching you everywhere constantly and continually 24/7 you'd get peeved off after a while, yell at him or her to bugger off, and maybe even call the police.

It's ironic when government themselves who are essentially doing the same thing, are given a pass.
Hello again..............
Let's try and identify which recording or observing action you might hate the most. OK? When we've isolated a typical example that you think is intrusive we can discuss just that one system? Be careful that the system doesn't exist in your own country.

Yiou might not like, say, vehicle insurance surveyance which is monitored in by many static detetors on busy highways, shopping complex vehicle parks etc?

Or you might not like the idea of Vehicle Dept ops who travel around our streets at night scanning EVERY vehicle and clamping those which have not payed road fund duty?

Maybe you don't like our IT word activation apps which auto-flag certain words used or spoken for further interest?

Is it the new laws about the monitoring of money movements?

Or is it the camera recording of pedestrian/vehicle trafic through most every busy street, filling station, shop etc?

Maybe it's some other recording/observing app you don't like?

Pick a system and we'll see what it is you're unhappy about. Obviously some Brits ARE unhappy and would side with you on this subject, I could give you an outline list if you like?

I have trouble figuring that out sometimes.
Well, that's what I'm trying to help you with.
 

Twilight Hue

Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Hello again..............
Let's try and identify which recording or observing action you might hate the most. OK? When we've isolated a typical example that you think is intrusive we can discuss just that one system? Be careful that the system doesn't exist in your own country.

Yiou might not like, say, vehicle insurance surveyance which is monitored in by many static detetors on busy highways, shopping complex vehicle parks etc?

Or you might not like the idea of Vehicle Dept ops who travel around our streets at night scanning EVERY vehicle and clamping those which have not payed road fund duty?

Maybe you don't like our IT word activation apps which auto-flag certain words used or spoken for further interest?

Is it the new laws about the monitoring of money movements?

Or is it the camera recording of pedestrian/vehicle trafic through most every busy street, filling station, shop etc?

Maybe it's some other recording/observing app you don't like?

Pick a system and we'll see what it is you're unhappy about. Obviously some Brits ARE unhappy and would side with you on this subject, I could give you an outline list if you like?


Well, that's what I'm trying to help you with.
I do appreciate the help you offered. For me it would be very difficult to live in such an environment even if it does provide a sense of safety or security. That aspect involving Safety and Security wouldn't really bother me.

What would bother me would be the fact that governments from time to time ultimately change over the course of time.

I suppose it boils down to a matter of whether you trust your government or not in a long-term sense. For now, I think free world countries like the US and the UK are relatively stable governments in terms of freedom of movement and commerce.

I don't know if this is accurate or not being it's a New York article, but this is what we're getting over here about British complacency in regards to mass surveillance and the confusions we have as Americans as to speculating and wondering why those in UK are so accepting in a collective sense.

Opinion | Why Surveillance Doesn’t Faze Britain
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
Depends how you feel about intrusive surveillance, doesn't it? There's no right answer to this stuff, it's all about striking a balance between security and liberty, and where the exact line is changes across time.

I used to design and build lightweight sea-going rowing boats. I often would row across the outer Thames Estuary and up the East Coast to an island where my father lived, and on two occasions, half a century ago, I rowed from Kent to Holland (Flushing in the Scheldt Estuary) on both occasions hitching a lift back to England (with my tiny craft!) on Brit Motor Yachts. And I didn't have a passport, I just had a driving licence with me, because Belgian and Dutch authorities never bothered with a bloke in a rowing dinghy, which they thought must be a local boat.

But by the time I could afford a nice comfy motor-yacht of my own things had changed. The Brit Coastguard radar systems could see a bloomin' seagull thirty miles out in the Estuary, and when I used to cruise far out into the Estuary and anchor in channels at low-tide, bird-watching, enjoying the solitude, the Coastguard systems would see a vessel leaving Brit waters, travelling out into the far estauary, stopping for several hours, and then returning.

Back then that was a signature for a smuggling vessel, and over a three year period I attracted one heap of attention on my boat because that's all I ever did with it, cruise around the swatchweays of the estuary.

Intrusion? One. Just one. One day a police officer with a dog rolled up at my moorings, asking about various other craft, and as we talked the dog was sniffing everything in sight. The joke was that it had no interest in my boat but went crazy about a neighbouring boat which eventually got busted for having weed on board ...........a caution was issued to that skipper.

Today I would not row out, motor out, into the estuary or beyond without reporting my journey, carrying a friggin' passport, the lot............ but new events and risks make modern surveillance out there a key protection for us all.
 

Father Heathen

Veteran Member
Just where do you dig this junk up?
Exactly which idiot wrote that?

The "idiots" who had compiled the dictionary, I suppose.

Just think about it..... what do you think that the Scots, the Welsh, the Irish, the English and the Cornish would say to that?

If they had any significant level of education, they would agree.

A Nation State, yes. Any country with a functioning government and other such systems are all states. France is a state, Romania is a state. It culd be argued that places like Somalia are failed states.

Thank you!
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
I do appreciate the help you offered. For me it would be very difficult to live in such an environment even if it does provide a sense of safety or security. That aspect involving Safety and Security wouldn't really bother me.

What would bother me would be the fact that governments from time to time ultimately change over the course of time.

I suppose it boils down to a matter of whether you trust your government or not in a long-term sense. For now, I think free world countries like the US and the UK are relatively stable governments in terms of freedom of movement and commerce.

I don't know if this is accurate or not being it's a New York article, but this is what we're getting over here about British complacency in regards to mass surveillance and the confusions we have as Americans as to speculating and wondering why those in UK are so accepting in a collective sense.

Opinion | Why Surveillance Doesn’t Faze Britain

OK........ in that article a journalist spun a story out of a meeting, and using journalistic licence built it up into something without really specifying anything.

Your country watches every IT transmission that you make whether in writing or speech. We probably got the technology from you. We're probably more open about it all?

Our security folks have foiled so many terrorist attacks now (two were tried in Court this week) that these successes hardly even make headlines now.

And child pornography is being stamped down upon through better surveillance of IT interest.

etc etc..

In fact I cannot think of a system which is malicious at this time. And if our government or permanent ministries (more nasty) might ever get caught doing bad things then we'll vote to change them.

But just now, the cheats, thieves, sex offenders, murderers, rapists, tax fraudsters, terrorists, driving offenders etc are finding it more difficult to hurt us.
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
The "idiots" who had compiled the dictionary, I suppose.
Well you shouldn't grasp at straws........... or idiots! :D

If they had any significant level of education, they would agree.
No they wouldn't........... any school kid could tell you that there are four different governments and three different law systems here.

Call us anything you like, other foreigners call us some dreadful things, but please don't call us a Nation-State.


Thank you!
That member hasn't had his morning tea yet.

And you must have woken up very early. Do you get grumpy in the mornings? :D
 

Kangaroo Feathers

Yea, it is written in the Book of Cyril...
The irony is if somebody was following you and watching you everywhere constantly and continually 24/7 you'd get peeved off after a while, yell at him or her to bugger off, and maybe even call the police.

It's ironic when government themselves who are essentially doing the same thing, are given a pass.

I have trouble figuring that out sometimes.
If the government were following me and watching me everywhere constantly and continually 24/7, I would complain bitterly, but that's not happening.
 
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