Greetings Economists, On Sep 1, 2007, at 7:54 AM, Doug Henwood wrote:
So even if the observation is intermittent or imperfect, the fact of being potentially scrutinized has an effect.
Doyle; That part is probably the main operative social compact of surveillance technology. The horn starts blaring on the car when something touches it. And the awful noise keeps on happening. And everyone thinks car horn alarms are nuisance. you writes; As usual, I can't really follow your point entirely, but part of the point of a Panopticon is to convince the prisoner or worker that he or she may be under observation at any time - to put the cop in the head, as they say. Doyle; Which doesn't go very far as a concept. Christian churches do a lot of sermon/preaching blab blab blah blah to convince members of their personal Gods eye on their sinners head. And the Christian's have a well earned reputation for hypocrisy. Craig the rancher sneaks sex in bathrooms while preaching against gay marriage. Or capitalist black markets, drugs, rackets, and so on sell Las Vegas. They can't seem to control crime any better with surveillance technology constantly improving. After awhile at some point the claim that your employer wants to watch your every step must seem laughable to even the most guilt ridden office pencil stealer. So besides endlessly repeating a trope that has a very long history indeed there must be more to the concept of sitting on your ass looking at the prisoners masturbating away and writing in your guard notebook George wanks at 2pm every day on the dot, but Henry does it whenever he feels like. Better send someone to watch Henry every second. No they are so understaffed don't have time to do that. The tools of surveillance need interpretation by a human. You can't tell me bosses don't have ways to find out if people surf the net for decades. Policing all that dust ball chasing behavior requires a human. You can't make the computer 'think' like a human quite yet. The term panopticon is another bogus but high falutin sounding metaphysical term that amounts to nothing more than putting a cop on every street so people are afraid to do the 'wrong' thing. Whatever wrong is supposed to be? Sex, drugs, rock and roll? Well all that is big business, so the wrong must be somewhere else. As to understanding each other, I had this epiphany the other day, if you and I speak the same language we are united by that but not especially likely to agree. Understanding is a slippery and difficult thing to talk through. I don't think agreement is attainable in a world in which power tells me to work, and I have no say so. I can't say what I will do make that go away and if power shifts enough, together we'll find a way to mutually understand what to do because social power makes things clear enough. thanks, Doyle Saylor
