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Published: August 4, 2007

Visitor Comments: 15

(15) Tiferet, August 22, 2007 7:52 AM

There's no place like home.

It's time to pack up and come home.

(14) David, August 12, 2007 11:53 PM

Homeland Security to Covertly Scan Behavior

It is not just security cameras we will be contending with- a new kind of social control will be here soon. Is this really the type of society in which you want to live?

"Scientists and engineers have been asked to devise ways of analyzing people's behavior and physiology from afar, in the hope they may reveal clues about their mental state and even their future intentions, reports the London Guardian.

A program named Project Hostile Intent (PHI) is aiming by 2010 to develop technology that can scan the bodily functions of citizens without them knowing and uncover any possible hostile intent or deception.

The technology will be covertly placed in public and will operate just like CCTV, with DHS officials able to remotely access it and apply its use to anyone in the area.

The Guardian reports that the DHS has revealed to New Scientist that technology to be used for PHI includes lasers, cameras, eye trackers, microphones and heart rate and breathing sensors. The DHS has also stated that it wishes to develop a lie detector-type test that can be used remotely which is described as an advantage because it would not interfere with the flow of a crowd and it could be used without the target's knowledge.

The report also states that the Project represents an enhancement of technology already in use to scan faces in crowds.

It is not beyond reason to expect this technology to be implemented without debate. Can anyone remember a real meaningful debate occurring concerning surveillance cameras before four million of them went up in London?

With the Bush administration's new ability to implement any surveillance programs it now wishes without oversight, and rabid neocon lapdogs calling for the heads of anyone who questions them, a Pandora's box has been opened that threatens to turn America into a big brother panopticon state."

Full article may be found on Infowars

(13) jacqueline, August 8, 2007 1:03 PM

Please

Everyday America looses more freedom.Do you really think those cameras wont be used against you at some point??.. Crime? Muggers will just wear more covering and cameras cant go into every doorway. What next? electronic tattoos and implants..

(12) mike, August 8, 2007 10:13 AM

ever here of 1984?

Rabbi you seem to be forgetting that, it won't be rabbanim behind those cameras but crooked goy politicians and cops.
You might feel secure in America but hasn't history taught us that even the biggest and most 'civilized' nations turned and became murderers and oppressors...especially towards the jewish people. Do we really need that kind of Ayin roah upon us?

(11) Debora, August 8, 2007 3:44 AM

Wisdom

Wisdom packed in this video conducted by You Rabbi Yaakov Salomon, became "must listen" for me.
Thank You very much, You have great influence on my life!
God bless

(10) sjhepner, August 7, 2007 11:24 PM

Enough already...

Big brother isnt Ha Shem...but we should go through Life with the idea that Ha Shem is watching over us...protecting us and hudging us... hopefully...

Thank you for your ideas...the divine recorder is always on...

(9) ralph, August 7, 2007 11:03 PM

I agree

Shalom;
I agree that the cameras are in public territory, not in our homes, and public territory is never private. God bless...

(8) Anonymous, August 7, 2007 5:17 PM

This is Wrong

This goes against all my sensibilities as a human being. This will inevitably lead to worse intrusions and less freedoms.

(7) A, August 7, 2007 2:58 PM

did you think Freedom was free of accountability?

The cameras are there for accountability and it will work both ways - if you have nothing to hide, you shouldn't have anything to worry about
Why, but WHY do so many but especially Americans think that Freedom is 'to do what you want how you want' ?
why do you think safety has gone astray? maybe because liberal laws have allowed for 'freedom for all for anything' without the basis of what we Jews fortunately learn on Pesach, we learn the difference between freedom and licence. And when we live this ideal, we feel 'Jewish', neither American nor any other nationality
Things ARE changing, again and still, and yes, against the Jews too, again and still, as has been written 'in every generation...'
so instead of tonnes of 'spying eyes' on us, there will be the newer more affordable technology available, cameras on us
Maybe, just maybe if we as jews did more to convince the world to behave in ways that we wouldn't need the cameras, then we wouldn't need the cameras
We Jews, again and still, are accountable for shinning more light on the world
Let's do it.

(6) Anonymous, August 7, 2007 12:36 PM

I loved it!

I would reckon that "Big Brother" watching reaches back to the Garden. I wish people were more aware of this fact, or at a mininum stop being deceived that their "deeds" are secret. Worse yet for some, kept on His file. When we don't govern our personal lives, our freedoms are taken away, as seen in the world's major cities. Smile for the camera! Oh, and the comment by "Scary". You are exactly right, this type of security is precursory to groups' and individuals' privacy being addressed. Just watch.

(5) Joey, August 7, 2007 12:31 PM

I agree with Rabbi Saloman

I really don't see what the problem is with the idea of cameras being in the street, because, really, what are they going to find, other than people doing crimes? Anything you don't want people to see, you aren't (or shouldn't!) be doing in a public place anyway. Now, when you get into issues of one's home and everything, things get a little trickier, but on the street? I really don't care who's watching me, to be honest.

God bless.

(4) Yana, August 7, 2007 10:49 AM

George Orwell Also Knew

"Nineteen Eighty-Four (or 1984) is a dystopian novel by the English writer George Orwell, published in 1949. The book tells the story of Winston Smith, and his degradation by the totalitarian state in which he lives.

Telescreens are featured in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. They are television and security camera-like devices used by the ruling Party in Oceania to keep its subjects under constant surveillance, thus eliminating the chance of secret conspiracies against Oceania. All members of the Inner Party and Outer Party and a few proletarian settings have telescreens."

Britain now has devices which are almost like the ones envisioned by Orwell in 1948. There are now CCTV cameras that allow surveillance officers to talk back to offenders which have been tested, and are expected to be implemented on a wider scale soon.

I for one DO NOT applaud Big Brother watching us.

(3) David Cohen, Houston, August 7, 2007 9:17 AM

Who needs civil liberties, anyway?

"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." -Benjamin Franklin

I think a lot of people might agree that there would be no problem with an ideal government having complete information on all its citizens, but America's founders realized that human governments (the only kind we have available at this stage in history) are made of humans, who are by definition imperfect. Combine this with the truism that power corrupts, and you've got a recipe for abuse.

Their solution, and I admit this is controversial, was to make government's powers limited, to limit it's potential for abuse.

What kind of abuse? Let's ignore for the moment the drive to monitor and punish one's political enemies, which anybody who has been paying attention to the US attorneys scandal must admit is already quite powerful, even with existing governmental powers. The way things are going now, do you think governments will collect all this information themselves? No! They'll outsource the job to private companies, who will provide that information to law enforcement and intelligence officials ... and to advertisers who can then direct even more carefully targeted messages to individual citizens to exploit their vices for profit.

Even leaving aside abuse, this policy, if enacted, would violate the ideals of American law, whose thrust has always been toward empowering the individual over government and protecting individual privacies EXCEPT in extraordinary AND very limited circumstances.

Historically, this country has never found circumstances so extreme as to warrant general surveillance of everybody, and it is important to remember that that includes even times when we faced a much more serious, EXISTENTIAL, threat to the survival of our nation. No existing or likely threat in our present experience compares to the invasion of our country and burning of our capital by the British in the War of 1812, the mass rebellion and destruction on our own soil of the Civil War or the constant danger of nuclear annihilation posed by the USSR in the height of the Cold War. And even during these times the US government did not seek to use all the possible means available to it at the time to surveil all its own citizens.

What's more, there are uniquely Jewish reasons to oppose such a policy. The gemara in Bava Basra assumes that there is no hezek ri'ah (lit. damage of seeing) on a public street in part because nobody's paying attention to any one individual for very long (as opposed to your neighbor, who has visual access to you -- in a relatively public setting (i.e., your courtyard, not inside your house) -- much more often and so must pay for a wall to protect your privacy. If in fact, there is an entity (the government) who has visual access to you at all times in a public setting, then there is good reason to conclude that that entity is doing hezek ri'ah against you. In fact, since the gemara assigns to the government the job of preventing hezek ri'ah by a third party, it is unfathomable to think that it would sanction the government itself committing such an act.

I pray that we not let fear drive us as a society any further from our true and best selves.

(2) Shaul Wertheimer, August 6, 2007 4:16 PM

ayin ro'eh?

You say that "Our sages knew that it would happen"... did they know what WOULD happen (ie. in the future); or were they commenting about what was ALREADY happening! Are there comments referring to what humans will do in 2008? Or to what Hashem has done from the beginning of time?

(1) Anonymous, August 5, 2007 3:13 PM

Scary

I'm proud to be an American, and I love my country - the USA. I'm all for fighting terrorism, to protect our freedom and do whatever it takes to keep our nation safe, and free. I'm not leftist, no Democrat, no liberal... God is always watching, which can be scary when we sin, comforting when we don't. But having human governments watching our streets constantly with their cameras? History changes so fast, in the wink of an eye. What if, some day, GOD FORBID(!), things changed, and the government turned against the people, or a part of the people (say, the Jews? Evangelicals? who knows)... America would, in that case, cease to be America. And we would have digged our own grave, but allowing BIG BROTHER to watch us at all times, invading our lives everywhere.

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About the Author

Rabbi Yaakov Salomon

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Rabbi Yaakov Salomon, C.S.W. is a noted psychotherapist, in private practice in Brooklyn, N.Y. for over 25 years. He is a Senior Lecturer and the Creative Director of Aish Hatorah's Discovery Productions. He is also an editor and author for the Artscroll Publishing Series and a member of the Kollel of Yeshiva Torah Vodaath.

Rabbi Salomon is co-author, with Rabbi Noah Weinberg, of the best selling book "What the Angel Taught You; Seven Keys to Life Fulfillment," (Mesorah), and is also the co-producer of the highly-acclaimed film, "Inspired."

Click here to order Yaakov Salomon's new book, Salomon Says: 50 Stirring and Stimulating Stories.

In these marvelous stories -- brimming with wit, understanding, a touch of irony and a large helping of authentic Torah perspective -- we will walk with a renowned and experienced psychotherapist and popular author through the pathways of contemporary life: its crowded sidewalks, its pedestrian malls, and the occasional dead end street. This is a walk through our lives that will be fun, entertaining -- and eye-opening. In our full -- sometimes overfull -- and complex lives, Yaakov Salomon is a welcome and much-needed voice of sanity and reason.

His speaking, writing and musical talents have delighted audiences from Harvard to Broadway and everything in between. Rabbi Salomon shares his life with his wife, Temmy, and their unpredictable family.

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Big Brother may really be watching.

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