Breaking Free From Big Brother

WE LIVE IN A SURVEILLANCE STATE where our every communication, choice, interest, purchase and movement is logged by intelligence organisations and corporations. So much information is being collected on each of us that, in conjunction with modern computer processing, an accurate extrapolation of even our thinking, psychology and most probable future choices and actions can now be made, potentially allowing individuals to be detained before they break laws. It would seem that Orwell's "thought crime" has become a reality.

When those in authority think nothing of abusing their power and acting in authoritarian and Orwellian ways (and let’s face it, even Western “democratic” governments abuse power big time, as the people are starting to realise), then it can become dangerous in a surveillance state to go against the official economic and political narrative. In other words, surveillance facilitates the erosion of democracy by allowing those in authority to more effectively censor and silence those who question and oppose them.

This intimidation by Big Brother to keep us in line is facilitated by our natural psychological tendency not to stand out from the crowd. This may seem to contradict the pervading fixation on fame and individuality, but these are just alternative expressions of conformity, this time to the ideals of society rather than to society itself. This desire to be "different" is soon dropped when admiration is replaced by social rejection.

The fact is that very few of us are comfortable stepping out on a limb because inbuilt fear of social rejection is so strong… so deeply ingrained in our psychology. This is why the oxygen of true individuality is actually privacy. True individuality is like a seed that needs to be planted, out of sight, in the dark loam of privacy in order for it to germinate and sprout. Without darkness, the seed has no future. And it is the same in human society. Without privacy we remain as sterile seeds that are easy for governments and corporations to use for their own ends.

This is why individuality and expression are rare in surveillance states… why the people of those countries are so uniformly bland. Their individuality has never had a chance to develop. (Please note that having an interesting Facebook page is not necessarily evidence of individuality.)

For it is when we feel hidden from the judgemental eye of society, when we feel free from rejection by others, that we feel safe enough to express and develop our individuality. But by eroding privacy, psychological conformity is enforced in all but the hardiest (and craziest) of individuals. (True outsiders may also fear social rejection, but they will not allow that to stop them being from being true to themselves and expressing their inner rhythms rather than those imposed from without by society. These individuals are the scourge of surveillance states.)

So in a world in which we feel so closely monitored and scrutinised, more of us fall into line, afraid to stand out from the crowd. We are intimidated, from within and without into acting politically and socially correct, losing much of our authenticity, spontaneity and compassion in the process. (Losing compassion in this way is evidenced by the human and animal cruelty so evident in surveillance states.)

In this oppressive glare of mass surveillance, we are more likely to try to toe the official government line as "good citizens" because not only do we know we are being watched and judged, but there can be real ramifications to falling short of expectation as the legal system starts to group outsiders with terrorists. (It is not only terrorism laws that are being used to stifle non-conformity, but also offence laws — there is always someone who is going to be deeply offended by our individuality!)

Of course mass surveillance is only intimidating if you know about it. This is why those agencies that are spying on us are very likely, at the highest levels, to have sanctioned the whistle-blowing that uncovered their nefarious activities. They know that the real power of mass surveillance in keeping people in line is through intimidation, and that there is no intimidation when absolute secrecy is maintained. Edward Snowden, for instance, was undoubtedly a brave hero, but he was probably a pawn in a larger game of social control. (It is a dangerous game for those in authority to play as, although the awareness of mass-surveillance deepens control, it also exposes surveillance to democratic rejection. However, the powers-to-be probably believe that democracy has eroded to a point where the intelligence services can just do what they want whilst the people are too busy watching talent shows to object to the infringement on their basic freedoms.)

The ignorant repeatedly parrot the phrase — "nothing to hide, nothing to fear" — without any understanding of human psychology or how corrupt and abusive ALL governments are, even those that masquerade as global guardians of freedom, liberty and democracy… in fact, especially those! If we have nothing to hide, it does NOT follow that we therefore have nothing to fear. The fact is that we should ALWAYS be wary of both erosions in privacy (which as we have seen naturally lead to more conformity) and the inevitable corruption of power. Public surveillance is undoubtedly a massive power-grab, and so there is no doubt that it is leading to a huge hike in government and corporate corruption. This corruption can only be counterbalanced by transparency, but transparency is usually rejected on "security" grounds, and those whistleblowing organisations and individuals that enforce transparency are labelled "terrorists".

We have witnessed this corruption again and again in our politicians and corporate leaders and systems, and yet, most of us still hold the naive view that this corruption is not endemic or that it does not really matter or affect us. We desperately cling to the friendly, avuncular face of Big Brother because we are too afraid to acknowledge the reality of Orwell's dystopia. "I have nothing to hide," we console ourselves. "Let Big Brother watch me as much as he likes… I will be happily getting on with my life, staying on the right side of the law." And this is the big lie: that the good citizen has nothing to fear. For the very definition of what it is to be a "good citizen" is constantly shifting towards passive acceptance of totalitarian government.

This endemic corruption, that is constantly redefining the definition of the "good citizen" for its own purposes, does everything it can to erode the democratic system, removing the checks and balances that block its ambitions. One of the primary ways it does this is by allowing those with large amounts of money (large corporations and billionaires) to undemocratically influence the legislative system with full-time lobbyists and bribes. The result is a society that steadily and legally creeps towards totalitarianism, whilst its naive citizens are distracted by the vacuous mainstream media owned by the very same people who most profit from us being distracted.

The unfortunate fact is that a society set up as a free democracy is not the ideal environment in which the military-industrial complex can really flourish, because things like human rights, workers' rights, consumer rights, freedom of speech, healthcare etc., throw too many spanners in the works. The needs of ordinary people get in the way of rabid profiteering and corporate/elite agendas. Ideally, the elite would prefer (and are rapidly developing) a society of robots who clinically execute their designated roles, rather than messy human beings for whom work is merely one part of their living agenda, and not usually the leading one.

In this scenario, ordinary people become the enemy, not necessarily by their specific actions, but through their democratic power, human needs and agendas, and of course through their sheer numbers. This is why governments and corporations watch the people so closely (and let them know they are being monitored): ordinary people like you and me represent a serious threat to their plans. So surveillance is their method of intimidating people into being compliant citizens, and identifying key individuals and organisations in society that most threaten their agendas. And they will certainly neutralise usurpers' efforts in various legal and illegal ways — even lethally if necessary.

So surveillance is primarily to do with the security of the elite that parasite off society, using the cover of counter-terrorism to wage a totalitarian agenda on the general public. These elite are the ones behind the current global banking system, and they decide how humanity moves forward by how they assign wealth (much of which is syphoned off through taxation and corporate profits). Their goal is not a peaceful world — for peace is not profitable — but a highly regulated world where democracy is a distant memory and the people virtual slaves to a system that uses them for its own ends.

In this world, freedom has become the freedom of which channel on TV to watch, who or what to be offended by, or which puppet to vote for — in other words — we are increasingly allowed only meaningless choices. We have no say, for example, in the distribution of wealth, in accountability of our governments and NGOs, and in accountability of corporations, the military and universities, and the choice and use of the technologies that they produce. We also have no choice in the ethics of our collective treatment of animals, in how much data the government and corporations should be allowed to collect on the general public, and in what the data will be used for. These are just a few of the choices that the public in the freest democratic societies around the world do not actually have because the good citizen universally cannot be trusted to act outside their own interests and in favour of the agendas of the elite, despite the heavy propaganda campaigns waged by the mass media.

So, as much as possible, important decisions are made for us because these issues are considered far too central to the interests of the elite for them to risk allowing ordinary people, like you and I, to have our opinion on these topics actually matter. And in democracies, where society is ostensibly meant to go in the direction that the people decide it should go, this necessitates secrecy and manipulation. And when that secrecy is publicly highlighted, it is justified under the banner of "national security", "corporate secrecy", "privacy laws" and "legal non-disclosure", although increasingly no excuses are given at all and requests for justification and freedom-of-information applications are met with a wall of silence. It unfortunately seems we are getting conditioned to living with increasingly unaccountable government, and our politicians feel little compunction to justify undemocratic behaviour because they are not held to account by mass protest.

Every now and then the people are thrown a real democracy bone, but only when the results of any vote are considered to be already in the bag. It is a dangerous ploy by those who control society to maintain the illusion of democracy, all the while doing everything they can, including orchestrating mass-media support, in order to get the result that they want. This is unfortunately how the game of modern democracy is played.

For example, the only reason the British people were given a vote on membership to the EU was because the government at the time believed that a “remain” vote would be a foreseen conclusion — that the people would easily succumb to the scare tactics of the mass-media, which painted every dire picture it could of what would happen to a nation that broke away from the EU. But the vote tipped unexpectedly towards Brexit, and a national choice was made that will have massive ramifications. This is real democracy in action, and it was undoubtedly a serious mistake by the establishment as the voting did not go according to plan. As a result, there has been a lot of attempted backpedalling as the establishment and those loyal to its agendas have tried to derail Brexit through legal challenges.

It was amusing that Prime Minister David Cameron blamed "populism" for the shocking result over which he resigned, implying a lack of intelligence in the common people! Democracy after all is populism! This is the contempt with which most democratic governments now hold ordinary voters and taxpayers.

The same, of course, applies to the recent US Presidential Election, where Clinton who was backed by the establishment and the bulk of the mass-media, lost to a wave of populist voters looking for change, voters which she labelled as the “basket of deplorables”, “irredeemable” and “not American”. Whether Trump actually delivers that change or will be allowed to deliver change is quite another matter. Policy promises that get politicians elected are often discarded once they achieve their objective because, in reality, the balance of power is not in the political process but rather in held by those who head the banking, corporate, military and intelligence institutions. So although the people might elect who they think is an outsider, someone strong enough and independent enough to resist the momentum of globalism dragging us towards totalitarianism, in reality that person and their party at best have their hands tied, and at worst are political puppets consciously acting out the democratic sham.

The fact is that the elite abhor the democratic process because it can upset their globalist agendas. Globalism may destroy cultures, but it makes a much better business model as corporations get access to cheap labour and larger consumer bases. When your focus is big money, things like nationalism, culture and community go out of the window because they only put breaks on globalism. It is a fact that a fragmented society of cheap labour is the military-industrial complex’s wet dream. It represents the wholesale subjugation of the human race to the agenda of the ruling elite.

But nationalism nowadays is a dirty word associated with far right Neo-Nazi politics, so that any hint of protecting the nation and its values (including, I might add, freedom and tolerance) is dismissed. This is just political correctness handed down by those who profit from the destruction of nationalism — the elite — whose long-term plan is a one-world government ruling a people too fragmented, traumatised and disorganised to oppose the globalist agendas.

This is not to say, of course, that nationalism does not have a dark side: dangerous Neo-Nazi political organisations do exist! It is just that ordinary “healthy” nationalism, the kind that stands in the way of toxic globalism, is now being increasingly categorised as “extreme” by those brainwashed by the modern educational system and mass-media. It is a taxonomic convenience that facilitates the easy evisceration of values that, until relatively recently, were considered healthy and important for a civilised society. [I would like to say at this point that I personally have never liked nationalism of any kind, but I am aware that it offers perhaps the only real brake on globalism.]

So woe betide if you love your country, your community and/or your culture: you will be grouped together with all right-wing neo-nazis, and you will be vilified as part of the problem rather than part of the solution. You are from “the basket of deplorables” and if shame does not silence you then social justice warriors will certainly try more direct means. This is the insanity of this modern world where those who stand up for freedom and tolerance in society are now the ones pushing for ideological slavery.

And central to this globalist agenda, which involves the erosion of accountability and the obscuration of the political process, is extensive public surveillance. It provides the perfect means to both intimidate society into obedience and identify the disobedient before they can do too much damage to the agenda. This provides an environment in which society will inevitably continue its slide into totalitarianism.

Many now realise that this monitoring and control of the general public extends orders of magnitude further as governments use covert geoengineering, nanotech, chemical and EM frequency programs to directly control environments and minds directly. It sounds like a science fiction dystopia, but those who are willing to look at the evidence will see that there is unfortunately compelling indeed. An unprecedented centralisation of power and control is taking place like nothing so far in history as we know it.

If we believe that we live in a material universe, blindly following the laws of physics, then we most likely need to concede defeat. From that perspective, although we do represent a threat by our sheer numbers, the elite's control over our minds, indirectly through the mass media, social networks and entertainment, and directly through nervous system altering technologies, means that we will never have even the imagination to oppose the tyrannies of government. You just have to witness the raucous glee with which the majority vote for even the most corrupt and psychopathic politicians to see that reason and empathy are overshadowed by other influences. We are democracies in name only because we seem to repeatedly make choices that are not actually in our interest.

For readers more conventionally minded, it is better to stop here. For I am going to be introducing perspectives that go beyond the conventional mindset. If you do stop here because of a materialist outlook, then your best hope is to support any means by which abuses of power can be brought to the public attention. Organisations like Wikileaks and Anonymous, and whistleblowers like Edward Snowden and Bill Binney, are absolutely essential for this process, and it is vital that they are supported. They really are the last bastions of democracy. From this perspective, pushing for transparency is our only hope to bring about accountability. Forget government lies that these organisations are endangering nations: what is at stake is our very freedom and democracy. Follow the government line and vilify these organisations, and you are hastening the arrival of totalitarianism, period.