Surveillance society

[jbeegoode]

"I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical," Thomas Jefferson

Dissolving the Feds? I need my retirement and Medicare. The rich would steal it, claiming that that that would make me stronger and give me more dignity.
Jbee

[BlueTrain]

I would disagree with Jefferson over a few things and he was never in a fight. It's probably a good thing he wasn't around when the Constitution was being written.

Double-check your bug out bag and have your revolting revolution. It's the stuff of murder, pain, death and terror. Hope you make it through to the other side to the green fields beyond. The so-called primitive peoples of the world don't do stuff like that. Be careful what you wish for.

On the other hand, I have long admired Thoreau and most of what he wrote. It was so well-written, it sounds like it was written yesterday. Poe, who has the lead in movies based on his stories, is comparatively difficult to read. Even more so is Shakespeare, who probably has even more movies based on his plays. But one day I realized that I had lived almost 30 years longer than Thoreau did and so I don't think as much of him as I used to. That may not be a good reason to discount Thoreau, though. I've never published the first book. One of my wife's cousins has published three or four, a good supply of which is in the bedroom at his home. Thoreau said the same thing about his books, too.

[jbeegoode]

Oh dear...You'll need to check out a couple of history books, and also check on the definitions of. "rebellion" and "revolution."

He stayed out of fights and roamed heavily armed as he traveled, smart guy. He was integral to setting up checks and balances to make government work, change and not get stagnate as is the tendency. He is integral to the Bill of rights. He always was concerned about the ignorant passions of masses and the Rights of the minority. He knew French Revolution, brutality and all of that nasty stuff, the before, the during and after. I've read a ton of Jefferson, including nearly all of his personal stuff.

This is about surveillance state issues.
Jbee

[BlueTrain]

I know he supposedly went armed. I've seen his little pocket pistol. He may have been worried about a slave rebellion. He owned a few. As for rebellion and revolution, you can't define it out of being bloody affairs. Jefferson was overseas when the constitution was written. Madison, although a friend of TJ, disagreed with him on his idea of frequent bloodletting. If you're in favor of a revolution, now would be as good a time as any. Of all the things I'm worried about state surveillance is not one of them. I know they probably did a pretty good background check on me before I went to the CIA headquarters a few years ago for a ceremony.

Among the founding fathers, we admire Washington and Mason. My wife is related to both of them and is a direct descendent of Mason (which means she's related to Paris Hilton). I'm not descended from anybody. Anybody worth mentioning, that is, although one relative supposedly started the gun fight at the Carroll County (Virginia) Courthouse several decades ago. But my father never mentioned it.

[Peter S]

I recently read a book about the history of English rebels. The author handily defined the difference between revolution and rebellion - a revolution succeeds, a rebellion doesn’t.

[jbeegoode]

You say that he was out of town, like he had no influence in the drafting of the Constitution, nor Bill of Rights. That's absurd. Like I said before, go read some history. Franklin was abroad, too. You are ignoring the history. Jefferson was your benefactor, Constitutional architect and founding father.

This racist bias that has been put out since his Black lover became news is quite thickly dope. It is high and mighty garbage, judging people outside of the context of their time and place. People, founding fathers, carried lots of weapons to protect themselves on the road, particularly when they became outlaws and traitors to the King. The slave rebellion crack is a rude low cut, playing racism on one of THE most important influences upon your freedoms. It was Jefferson that allows you to make such a slimy mean spirited cut to his character. That doesn't mean that such behavior is okay, or below the dignity of this forum.

What difference does it make where your wife's bloodline came from? My ancestry has two revolutionary officers personally commissioned by George Washington, based on their proven service getting his butt back from the French and Indian Wars. They were rewarded with a farm after the revolution, which was lost, because their Quaker background compelled them to free their slaves, which was very unpopular in those days in Virginia. You have no place to judge Thomas Jefferson in his personal context, or how he handled his love affair, particularly to make rude race cuts.

I've had a family member participate in every major war since, until wars were fought for just oil. Other than the Native American branch, my family began coming here in 1645 from Edinburgh, all arriving for religious freedoms. Can you tell me what that has to do with anything surveillance state oriented, or is it just rambling on? Just get a grip on it...please.
Jbee

[jbeegoode]

 Revolution Definition:
: a sudden, radical, or complete change
b : a fundamental change in political organization especially : the overthrow or renunciation of one government or ruler and the substitution of another by the governed
c : activity or movement designed to effect fundamental changes in the socioeconomic situation
d : a fundamental change in the way of thinking about or visualizing something : a change of paradigm the Copernican revolution
e : a changeover in use or preference especially in technology the computer revolution the foreign car revolution

This ain't 1969 and there ain't no John Lennon in 1789.
Jbee

[John P]

There was no John Lennon in 1789, and there's no John Lennon now. That's because a certain document from that earlier date said that ordinary citizens need to have weapons available.

You say you want a revolution--well, you know. Who are the people with minds that hate?

[BlueTrain]

If you want absurdity, just imagine a bunch of slave owners getting together to talk about freedom. Clearly the American Revolution was not about freedom; it was about independence. I am surprised that I am so frequently asked if I have a website. I do not, because I value my privacy, aside from the simple fact that I have no idea what I would post on a personal website. I don't have a cellphone, don't wear a watch and I have no website. I am about as free range as possible, at least for someone who is married and owns a home. Being married may cancel everything mentioned so far.

If Jefferson wanted frequent revolution, he should be happy with the perpetual wars we've been engaged in for the last thirty years if he were alive today.

[jbeegoode]

Jefferson would have equated the wars of the last thirty years with many of the wars of his era, give or take a 100 years, or more. Governments controlled by elitist oligarchies called royalty, fought for profit, politics and ego with no regard for freedom, or the welfare of the people. In other words, Just another poor boy off to fight a rich man's war: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjT6B6IFUU8

The revolution was not just about independence. It was a coalition and diverse situation. Thanks to Jefferson in particular and some other learned men with foresight, a constitution was set with a Bill of Rights, that had everything to do with freedom. There were many conflicting influences and practical social matters making it difficult to hold things together, in the context of those times. When people look back at history, they tend to project their values, and current truths, to pass judgement onto people who were doing their best with what they lived in.

Slavery was acceptable, inferiority was a wide spread belief, women were not free, many people believed that kings were an act of God, and Lord knows the plethora of silly religions. You set your slaves free and the entire region, (the one that Bluetrain lives in today) turns against and crushes your farm's viability. That's only one example. It took one hundred years and a civil war to just begin change and begin justice. I think that it takes a lot of gall and ignorance to sit and judge the men who framed the Constitution. Especially to attempt to diminish them. Some were as you say, but certainly Jefferson and Franklin do not fit your simplistic stereotypes, nor deserve the underlying angry racist resentments that the small men of today wish to bundle them up in.
Jbee

 

[BlueTrain]

That certainly describes our recent wars and foreign adventures. My son did his part, though.

Regarding your third paragraph, I am not diminishing the founding fathers, but I feel no obligation to agree with everything they did or said. Obviously neither did other people or else there would be no amendments after the Bill of Rights. We always have the freedom to disagree, whether or not we can do anything about it. They were necessarily men of their times and did what they did with certain relatively recent historical events in mind, including the religious wars of the previous century. So you are correct in that we see that past in the context of our own values and experiences as well as failing to appreciate the context in which the revolution was fought and the constitution was written. I am certainly not diminishing or belittling anything about them, otherwise we wouldn't be so proud of my wife's ancestry. As I mentioned already, I have no such ancestors myself. But far from being disrespectful, these and others you're probably never heard of are practically worshiped at our house. I call it ancestor worship but I'm not the first to say that.

One of the faults commonly made when considering historical events is to compress time. In this case, we forget that the U.S. operated for years before constitutional convention, under the Articles of Confederation. So even they changed their mind about how we should be doing things. It goes without say that not everyone then agreed with what they did. They had varying attitudes about slavery but they all grew up with it and they would have gotten nowhere if they'd tried to do anything about it. As it happened, I think, slavery became even more important economically later. Some attitudes about slavery linger. Didn't mean to step on anyone's toes.

I guess I have gall to spare. And that trail camera is still there but I go a different way now. And to think I actually went to a lot of work to clear out a little space in the woods, in one of the few level spots around, where I could just set and drink coffee. That's what really bothered me. I'll have to go to plan B now. Or rather location B. Or maybe another place, since I think location B might be visible to the camera (another spot I had cleared off in the woods with a tree just right for leaning against).  If you're ever out this way again...

[jbeegoode]

Oh that camera would be so much toast!

We went out into the borderlands yesterday. Nobody but us nudes in the war zone. There is a wall out in the distance, but still it is teaming with surveillance for miles inward. Border patrol trucks and binoculars, cell towers with dishes and military style pill boxes. These are not commercial, probably hookups to hundreds of surveillance cameras. We got out and took some pics, got back in and it just felt creepy. We're in the middle of nowhere and it felt creepy. You just don't know what is out there. No sheriffs, just these hundreds of white trucks with green bars. We go to the tourist lookout and there's a truck and a guy watching from the vantage point. I've got nothing to hide, but I certainly have something to protect. I shouldn't be feeling watched. 1984.

When Nixon put up road blocks in 1970, he was stuck down by Constitutional law. Now we have road blocks, surveillance, and a military all along the border for miles. Increments. It is creeping north. Then there are the overly powerful private entities in the game. The incursion doesn't end, unless a line is drawn. That works both ways from without and within, foreign and domestic.

The above sounds political, but then why do people who wouldn't mind being seen by others freely nude feel creeped-out, if there isn't something more to it? Is there a moral issue? Is there more to Big Brother than control for political ends? Why is privacy an issue?
Jbee

[BlueTrain]

There may be more than one thing involved. Chief among them is probably the fact that the area you're visiting is near the border. It's clearly a sensitive issue these days, as you well know, probably more than it's ever been. And I think the reason is because a certain president as managed to make it a national issue by making people afraid. Much conservative thought is fear-based. But you probably know that. And you also probably know that many people who call themselves conservative aren't conservative at all but instead, are radical or reactionary.

The family used to own a cottage on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. My wife and I, when we were younger, used to sometimes go to the less visited parts of the National Seashore so we could be nude on the beach. But in recent years signs have appeared that specifically prohibited nudity on the beach. I have no idea what caused those signs to be put there but I could make so guesses. Most likely, some highly vocal (loud voices are the ones that are heard) and local individual decided they didn't want naked people on 'their' beach and did something about it. Of course, on the other hand, there are always those who push the envelope, sometimes unwisely, but who knows.

Ironically, I think there might be more legal nude beaches in the U.S. than ever and more public nude 'happenings,' to use an old word. The naked bike rides, body painting festivals, things like that. They don't happen in a lot of places but just the same, some attitudes are changing. But in the meantime, the extreme right is worried about illegal immigrants. Why let in legal immigrants, then? Who knows what we're supposed to be afraid of tomorrow?

[jbeegoode]

"Signs, signs, everywhere there's signs"

Down at Verde Hotsprings a couple of weeks ago, I saw a steel sign erected that said "Nudity Prohibited." In between in thick black letters was painted, "NOT." The place has been nude friendly and impossible to enforce for the five decades that I have been showing up. Look outs were placed in earlier days to keep the campgrounds free. There is similar reaction Redington Pass with some signage.

People resist injustice and the oppression of a few. I'd make those signs go away over and over again, if they meant that there would be no fair warning about local authority's attitudes and free beaches. Civil disobedience is an old tradition. It stopped prohibition.
Jbee