The Patriot Act vs. the Freedom Act
On October 26th, 2001, President George W. Bush signed the USA PATRIOT Act into law as a direct response to the events of September 11th that same year. USA PATRIOT Act is a backronym (meaning that the name came before the words that the letters stand for) that stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. The PATRIOT Act allowed for "enhanced surveillance techniques" and increased domestic security measures. In 2013, Edward Snowden revealed the extent of the NSA's collection of phone records; he fled the country immediately thereafter. In the wake of Snowden's revelations, the USA Freedom Act (a backronym for Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-collection, and Online Monitoring) was passed by the U.S. Congress. For differences between the two acts, watch this video at ABC News.
What Would the Philosophers Say?
Hobbes probably wouldn't have many objections to either the Patriot Act or the Freedom Act. Aside from the fact that there could be a question as to whether or not eavesdropping would violate Hobbes belief that a man has the right not to confess, he thinks that a person's liberties are limited to whatever the commonwealth says they are. Rousseau could argue that surveillance benefited the common interest of its citizens. Locke would have more objections to many of the security measures taken by both acts; for example, wiretapping could be seen as a violation of private property. I would also be interested to know what each of these long-dead men would think of the names of these acts--the Patriot Act and the Freedom Act. Both "patriot" and "freedom" are loaded words and have the potential to generate strong feelings. No doubt this is the reason that the words were chosen first and then backronym-ed into long, convoluted names that necessitated the use of the rather colloquial "eavesdropping" over the more technical "wiretapping" or the general "surveillance." The Patriot Act was signed into law in the wake of 9/11, at a time when Americans felt passionately about protecting their country and when nationalism was rampant. Over a decade later, those feelings cooled to a lukewarm pride that primarily emerges on the Fourth of July or at sporting events. Once Snowden revealed the depth and breadth of the NSA's surveillance, many Americans were outraged. (Admittedly, some people did think that Snowden was a traitor whose head needed to be put on a pike, but that is neither here nor there.) When the Patriot Act was revised and made into a new act, it was given a name to invoke that most American of values--freedom! Does this mean that patriotism and freedom are incompatible? One classic American patriot would disagree with this--Patrick Henry, of "Give me liberty, or give me death!" fame.
It is a really good point to versus Patriot and Freedom! It reminds me of a drama series named " person of interest", in which a man builds a machine that spies by being able to access every camera in the every corner of the world to prevent terrorist, literally omnipotent. It is built to serve government's demand. It did prevent a lot of terrorist in the early episode, however, in recent episode he develops his own intelligence.It begins to manipulate a small town to be all rooted a sim, in the name of absolute security of territories. That is where thing goes divergent. This is just a extreme example from drama. But I really think it shows something important. It is significant to trigger the awareness of personal privacy and "absolute security".
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ReplyDeletePersonally, I think it is the Americans’ interests for the US government to overwatch their activities. Though the secret policy violates people’s privacy, the government does it for safety purpose, which is always the priority for government, and it does not hurt anyone’s any interest except the terrorists.
ReplyDeleteIt is the countries that get spied on would be the outrage ones, because NSA’s monitoring goes against their interests. They are treated with respect when they are on the table but not under the it. This really annoys the US’ allies such as the European countries since they have to find out if it is worthy to stop the US’ monitoring on them and how.
I believe there are many benefits to be had for a state that employs a "noble lie" within their system, which is to say that the authorities (government or other organizations) implement a lie or otherwise fabrication of truth between the citizens and organizations higher up. This usually leads to an increase in "assurances" while, in most cases, hardly decreasing the amount of freedom perceived by the citizens. In this way, I would side more with the overall security of a state over the perceived freedom of its citizens, though not to a particularly radical extent far past what Snowden disclosed to the public.
ReplyDeleteI personally am fine with more "assurances" even if it comes with a perception of loss of freedom. However, I can definitely see the other side of the matter. In particular, I do think that government surveillance and monitoring can be something of a slippery slope. When is it too much? Can the people who have the power to make that decision be trusted to make that decision?
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