SHEsaysWITHaSMILE.blogspot.com

Citizenfour. as seen by (me!) sandra, tvgp

i had, until last night, only seen the filmmaker interviewed by my charlie rose, and another fascinating, commercial free conversation it was..

i want to,   -that is, i will be watching this documentary more than once.  i have not read or studied the patriot act. i dodged much of the news/hype, etc. when the story hit big.. 

i just understood certain things.. some truths/some projections/some guesses/some assumptions/some intuitive leaps..

-that are basically obvious when you combine highly evolved technology with under evolved human beings..  and mix government, homeland security, common and uncommon citizens, foreigners, natives, natural and unnatural resources..  on and on.

of course it is complicated.  -of course our privacy is being invaded.  -this comes as very little surprise to (me!).   and here are some truths worth noting from my everyday citizen life in northern California, USA:

1. I arrived to the internet age and lack of privacy, with a chronic low level awareness everything i do can be, and might be, and probably is being tracked and traced and analyzed.    -what I don't know, is by who, when, where and to what ultimate aim.
potential aims seem to be:   -commercial; to manipulate me for financial gain.  -control/blackmail; to manipulate my behavior in the event i pose some threat to you being in control..   -to better understand/track human behavior in general..   im sure there are more but those are the biggies.  and snowdens position, as shared in citizenfour is correct..   when I rewatch, I will catch it verbatim, but to paraphrase for now:  we do not have a government and liberties/we have the controllers and the controlled.    -and, true also, -even under chronic scrutiny/surveillance, we are free-er than most other citizens in other parts of the world, but we are not genuinely free; and this does deeply effect intellectual liberties and deeply effects behavior...       and when time allows I will write more on the distinctions between when citizens are:

* knowledgeable/fully conscious 24/7 that there every move is under surveillance
* occasionally aware that maybe...
* under the false impression they have privacy here but maybe not over there..

-the most important thing to digest is this:  being under surveillance does alter behavior and    -here's a really wild scientific truth:  it changes behavior whether the human being is aware they are being watched or not..     and,  -it cannot be undone.   But i do not want to spin off there..  

I arrived to the internet/lack of privacy era with an entirely different attitude than the population at large.  -having been kidnapped and raped three different times, by three different predators, -all prior to the internet..      with a knowledge that I could have pretty easily been left for dead and no one would even know where I was, or how I ended up there..

I arrived to the age of perpetual surveillance with..   are you ready for this?!:

-gratitude.  

that's write.  gratitude.   -because in my PTSD days, in my mind/to myself, and sometimes out loud, I would frequently,

and not sarcastically, but quite genuinely, say.. "...if I end up dead on the side of a road somewhere, at least they will know where I was headed, when I left..  -and this will help them find me.."

for me..  a victim of multiple violent crimes..   I lived with the fear..  the fear worse than a brutal
attack itself.. 

-my fear, was the fear that no one could find me if I was kidnapped again.    -so, realistically speaking, I don't think I am anyone prominent enough in society worthy of close, detailed, scrutiny/surveillance..   but, I rather have enjoyed the thought, that..

if anything terrible happens again...   between my phone, my ATM card, my blog...    at least they will no where to start..   and this knowledge will help them find me.   I'm less worried about death, than I am being unfound dead.

anyway..  "Here I am!".   and, k...    " I'm over here now!".     and.. I actually use my phone, blog, and ATM card for all my purchases ON PURPOSE...

I am a three time victim of violent crime people..!  I want you to know where I am, and where I'm going..  because I feel much safer that way..

and same for my family members, my friends, my loved ones.

and it is very sad, but true..  I know I can't necessarily prevent another crime..   but I'm just grateful for the ability to provide lots and lots of clues about my last whereabouts...

"I'm at McDonalds now!"

***

now, this is also very true: I have rather severely restricted some of my own intellectual/emotional/spiritual pursuits exactly because I have this chronic awareness of surveillance..

That's a fact; a hard truth..    but in my heart and mind, based on my personal life experiences: I am making a trade off between unsatisfied curiosities vs.  -someone will find me if I disappear...

and I have voted, and continue to vote: yes..  Someone please find me..

***

this is also true for me:  I am wildly curious about human behavior; patterns; truths.    and I am aware people put up facades, create personas, are not always in positions to share truth for a variety of reasons...

I know, the only.  -only!- way to learn truths about human behavior is to secretly observe.   -we can never learn truths in lab rooms or clinical studies..     and so, while these agencies use surveillance to profit financially, to control behavior, etc.

I love to at least imagine, that there are people out there, -with the sole aim,  -of learning truths...

what are YOU really like behind closed doors?

***

new page: we do allow spying on people in the name of national security...

-as a child, i wished someone would spy on abusive adults/parents in the name of innocent childrens security..

let's consider Joyce Meyer's horrific childhood here for a moment:   -sexually abused by her father for how many years?  Raped over 200 times by her father...

does anyone have room in their heart, soul, mind..   -for security cameras in homes with the aim of capturing this crime and doing something about it?!

-stopping domestic and elderly abuse in its tracks...  

that's my fantasy:  not constant surveillance with the aim of commercial gain or behavioral control...

surveillance and spying with the aim of protecting innocent people and catching criminals.

-i cannot count the times I've wondered; pondered; dreamt:

what if google earth could have captured the lakeside rapist on camera...   and stopped him in his tracks..

how awesome would that be?!?

***

and I'll close here with this:   -how I can only laugh at the irony..  the irony of this huge concern addressed in citizenfour,  "they know everything about you"

and how my God given instinct is to blog up a storm, and share so much of my life..

How I so voluntarily help fill in any blanks that might exist between mere ATM records and cell phone calls..

"I'm at the movies now...   !".     " I'm at the library!".   "Here's where I work!"

***

and when people express their incomprehension at my willingness to share so much..

-because I make it so easy for people to find me..  and what if an evil person finds me..

my life experience proves that evil found me before the internet, before ATM cards, before cell phones and before social media even existed...

what im doing makes it so that good people can find (me!) too...

"I'm heading to the mall to Christmas shop!.... 

Thank you Jesus! Amen.."

posted by SHE @ 8:36 AM