Fingerprinting and Other Privacy Issues ...
Engadget (of all places) ran a story about parents of kids in a school district threatening to sue over fingerprints taken without the parents consent.
This is one of those issues that I'm of two distinct minds about. I take my privacy very seriously, and the idea of people making any sort of profile of me without my consent really freaks me out. In this particular case, I think that fingerprinting these schoolchildren and not notifying the parents until after the printing had taken place is about as egregious a privacy violation as you could make.
At the same time, I'm fairly certain that we could prevent a lot of crimes from taking place if people knew that there was a fingerprint and/or DNA profile of them was available to law enforcement. There are certain classes of crimes that happen only because people assume they can get away with it, and I think knowing that you can and likely will be caught would act as a strong deterrent.
Then the more liberal part of me kicks in again and says that it's essentially treating everyone as criminals prior to any crime being committed.
Then again, to paraphrase "The Incredibles", if everyone is treated as a criminal, then no one is.
But that's a slippery slope down to a Big Brother scenario.
I'm having a hard time coming to grips with this one. Should all schools fingerprint our kids, and should there be any opt-out policies?
Tags:
DNA,
Fingerprinting,
Privacy
4 comments:
The problem with government breaches of privacy isn't just the principle of the matter--treating everyone like criminals as you put it. There are certain classes of government oppression that can only occur if the government intrudes into the privacy of its citizens in this way. Concern over the government invading privacy in this way is about heading off, as early as possible, potential abuse of power by government. By the way, this isn't a liberal/conservative issue, it's a libertarian/authoritarian issue. (See the Nolan chart.)
Are you telling me that I'm a Libertarian? Oh snap!
Seriously, though, this sort of thing is why I'm a Business major. That said, I've felt myself drifting further away from the right wing (I've always been a centrist, but more on the right than the left). Apparently, I'm starting to drive upwards on the personal freedom scale as well.
However, most of the political quizzes I've seen definitely "push" you towards their agenda, and many political issues can't be quite so easily quantified. For example, one quiz I took gave me the following ...
"You want government out of people's personal lives, but you appear to desire some continued government control over people's economic activities. There is no political party that represents your views."
It then told me that I was probably closest to the Green party, but that they're more socialistic than I am. I'm pretty well screwed come November. :)
Yes, the "world's smallest political quiz" which uses the nolan chart, is definitely a bit pushy. Honestly though, I think most average folk, when forced to really think about it, would be closer to libertarian than anything else.
Actually, I wouldn't mind a bit of careful government socialism in a climate where there is a lot of personal freedom. A sort of "libertarian democrat" if you will. I know one thing for sure, I can't abide the neo/christian conservatives that are currently screwing up the country. I used to vote for nothing but Republicans. A few weeks ago I cast my first non Republican votes ever.
I'm just tired of people screwing with my life. Look at the recent Internet gambling ban for example. Now party poker is going to shut out American customers. Sure I can probably get around it in various ways (other sites for example), but why should I have to?
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