Big Brother’s Balls

UK Children’s Secretary Ed Balls advanced the nation’s plunge into overt fascism last month when he set out his plans to install CCTV surveillance cameras in the homes of 20,000 “problem” families. The victims will be monitored 24 hours a day to make sure children are attending school, go to bed on time and eat government approved meals.

You couldn’t make this up, unless you were a sick authoritarian Nazi hell bent on imposing the nanny state (what big eyes she has, what big teeth she has) on a population straining under the intolerable load of every last politically “correct” insanity you could have nightmares about. Luckily Ed Balls fits the bill perfectly.

In the true spirit of Orwell’s legacy, Balls refers to his jackbooted voyeurism as, “pretty tough and non-negotiable support for families.” Compulsory charity, you might say. Not quite charity though because the bill, some £400million, will be squeezed from the taxpayer as always.

Don’t get me wrong, a “lot of citizens” are going to think this is money well spent and the loss of the final barrier to government invasion of our privacy, our own front doors, will be of small concern in return for a promise of yet more security. They will probably be the same people who think it’s a good thing that our police have taken to randomly murdering civilians on the streets or on tube trains and punching women in the face when they utter a naughty word (nanny won’t stand for it).

Anything to get “that lot” from down the road under control. Let the government sort it all out, just as it sorted out the destruction of our societies in a Thatcherite bonfire from which emerged the new, isolated and malleable consumer citizen. A being detached from every social structure that had acted as both safety net and a restraint against our baser instincts. Screw society, what kind of flat screen TV did that ever buy for us?

As the history that our dumbed down education system no longer teaches used to tell us, give government an inch and there goes the mile. If anyone is still in doubt the anti-terrorism laws allegedly designed to protect us have now been turned against us they really ought to get out more. Maybe to see if they can catch a wheelie bin council spy using those very laws to encroach on private property with the intent of filing a report if you haven’t sorted your rubbish to their exacting standards. Anti-recycling terrorists must be stopped at all costs, I’m sure.

So go ahead and let them install their cameras and have a little patience, it could be a while before you get yours. These schemes take time to mature. First you have to create a problem and done properly that can take years. Our society wasn’t destroyed in a day, after all. Then you need to milk that problem so the correct levels of fear and insecurity are generated amongst the masses. The pot is boiling quite nicely now and it is only at this stage we can move on to draconian and thoroughly anti-democratic and anti-libertarian policies that would never be entertained if our society was not reeling from the ingested poison of relentless state intervention.

It’s only those “problem” families that are being picked out for dehumanisation right now. Serves them well and it could never happen to us, we are assured. Because we’re determined to be good citizens and we’ll obey each and every one of the thousands of new laws and regulations introduced by Blair and his cronies since 1997. An endless stream of bureaucratic restrictions crushing our daily lives. Bring it on! But do it slowly, step by step, too much at once and we might just complain – politely, of course.

Should we condone the behaviour of those elements within what’s left of our society who refuse to bear the responsibilities that we are prepared to bear ourselves? No, not if they want to live with us. But should we strip away their dignity and reduce them to the status of zoo animals and in the process leave ourselves exposed to a demonstrably invasive state? I don’t know, what do you think? No really, I’m not joking – what do you think?

Because if we leave the business of thought to “our” government for one moment longer then don’t be surprised when the installation team arrives at your house in response to your unacceptable Internet browsing habits or your overheard words of contempt for the banksters that robbed you blind or your “third strike and out” late arrival at school or that unauthorised sandwich filling in Jenny’s packed lunch.

Hysterical over-reaction? We’ll see, but we’ll have to watch carefully and we’ll have to watch patiently, because these things take a while. Step by step by step by goose step.

I wonder if Balls would have had a big enough pair to prance around in this manner some twenty years ago? Lord only knows what sort of trousers our leaders will be wearing two decades from now. Voluminous at the top and tapered down the legs, fitted neatly into shining, calf length boots with a nice leather jacket and smart peaked cap to complete the arrangement. And we’ll all be famous because we’ll all be on reality TV, morning, noon and night.

The future is not written, unless we allow it.

Tagged as: anti-terrorism, big brother, cctv, orwell, privacy