Giving Away Our Privacy

I originally wrote this article on October 18, 2014.

Here are some lyrics to a catchy pop song:

‘ I’ve got bi-polar disorder
My sh*t’s not in order
I’m overweight
I’m always late
I’ve got too many things to say
I rock mom jeans, cat earrings
Extrapolate my feelings
My family is dysfunctional
But we have a good time killing each other

‘They tell us from the time we’re young
To hide the things that we don’t like about ourselves
Inside ourselves
I know I’m not the only one who spent so long attempting to be someone else
Well I’m over it
I don’t care if the world knows what my secrets are (secrets are)
I don’t care if the world knows what my secrets are (secrets are) So-o-o-o-o what
So what’
- Mary Lambert, Eric Rosse, Benny Cassette, MoZell

I agree with the assumed sentiments of the song:  I don’t have to be ashamed of who I am.  I don’t have to stuff my feelings down.

This is the stickler.  With any cultural message that comes at us, there is always some truth to it.  But we need to not stop there; we need to look even deeper.

The above song also says that the world, not exclusively loved ones, can know her secrets and that is acceptable to her.

Even that might seem like not-a-big deal.  After all, since the 9/11 tragedy, how many people have said, ‘I have nothing to hide,’ out of fear of being accused of being a terrorist?

‘I cherish my privacy, and woe betide anyone who tries to interfere with that.’
- Jeff Beck, Musician, songwriter, actor

Little by little, we’ve all gotten used to sharing a lot of information about ourselves because we ‘have nothing to hide’, because that’s just what people do now, because somewhere along the way (in school, in the media, in our corporate jobs, at medical facilities), we’ve grown accustomed to putting it all out there.

So we don’t even blink when we fill out cute little surveys about our feelings and beliefs, we keep our cell phones (volunteer tracking devices) turned on and with us all the time, we feel a bit snub with pride when we have professionals come into our homes to access our energy usage, we fill out ‘health’ questionnaires for mystery sources, we go to pro-community / environmental / ‘sustainability’ meetings assuming that the beliefs and ideas we share are actually welcomed and there are no other motives involved, celebrities convince us that being half-naked (or fully naked) and promiscuous is acceptable and normal, we are directed to reveal our beliefs at ‘politically-correctness’ seminars on our personal or work time, we let our kids be indoctrinated at school with who-knows-what by who-knows-whom, and we don’t even notice that every human detail is being tracked in databases to follow us the rest of our lives.

Of course, we plaster private photos all over instagram et al, Facebook, and cell phones. We email, text and post every detail of our and our families’ lives–even our exact locations.

Every electronic purchase is tracked, all to save a few bucks on their cash-reward spending program.  Using online banking is commonplace.  Google keeps track of every internet single search we do.

Hey, what the hell, let’s implant chips into our loved ones and ourselves.

Our friends and strangers bully us if we don’t sign up for any of the above.  We have nothing to hide, right?  Right, the majority of us don’t.

But we have a lot to protect and cherish:  Ourselves. Our loved ones.  We aren’t commodities.  We are precious.

‘Once you’ve lost your privacy, you realize you’ve lost an extremely valuable thing.’
- Billy Graham, Evangelist

The sticker, the truth in the first layer, about loss-of-privacy is ‘safety’ and convenience.   But what is lost is ourselves.  Let’s start thinking.  Let’s keep our eyes open and pay close attention.  The disclaimer is this:  Once we know, we can’t pretend we don’t anymore.

‘The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects [items of property], against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.’
- Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, part of the Bill of Rights

May we stop allowing ourselves to be boiled like frogs and start protecting our privacy, freedom, individuality, personal-responsibility, our loved ones and ourselves.  Let’s shift what’s going on in our society by respecting and loving ourselves.

Warmly,