An Orwellian nightmare - Dutchboy- JournalHome.com

2/2/2007 - An Orwellian nightmare

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Big Brother is about to take over. Not as massively as in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, but still. Yesterday the Public Transport Chipcard was introduced in the Netherlands, the Dutch Revenue Service are going to scan license plates of cars in certain places to fight the misappropriation of company cars, etc. Already, debit and credit card payments were tracked, which could serve the government to know where you buy your stuff, and maybe even what you buy, and now they can also track the movement of individuals in the public transport system, and they might know where you drive your car to. Right now, having the PT card, which includes a photographic image of the holder so it can't be passed on to third parties, is merely an option, but in 2009 it will become mandatory in all forms of public transportation.

I don't like this Big Brother attitude of our government, which is getting ever more intrusive. We are also required to carry ID cards at all times, which they claim, is important in the fight against terrorism, although I hardly see how knowing my identity stops people hell-bent on destruction, and the following step in the creation of Eurasia will most likely be a mileage levy on our roads, where scanners suspended over road entries read license plates to determine the exact mileage you cover so they can charge drivers for it.

That governments are eaves-dropping on email and other communication can hardly be called a secret. An example of that, which I heard on the radio a few days ago is the following. A Dutch chemistry teacher downloaded some info on water which he needed for a class. Years earlier, apparently, he lived on the same street as Amir Khan, the Pakistani who is believed to have stolen information that gave Pakistan and North Korea the atomic bomb, and so the chemistry teacher became a terror suspect and had his computer seized, and the Dutch Intelligence Agency went behind his back talking about him to the school board, before they saw what they were doing was crazy.

I'm taking the online espionage for granted, as I'm not doing anything illegal, but much to the annoyance of the Financial Department, I'm using my bank card at ATMs only (they're steadily coming up with new schemes to convince us to give up paper money), and once the PT card has become commonplace, I'm afraid I'll just have to pedal my way everyplace. Since last year every personal means of transportation except the bicycle has been outfitted with license plates. I'm also trying to stay out of trouble, as I'm refusing to carry around my ID all the time. Everytime you do something that inspires cops to write you a ticket, you get an additional ticket if you can't show them who you are, and they are reputed to be pretty sadistic about it.

Their latest claim by the way, is that all these plastic card make your wallet thinner and lighter. Not so. My wallet is drowning in plastic cards, from my ATM card to my healthcare card, to my donor card, etc., etc. Right now you buy a small really thin train ticket which you can toss away at your own discretion, while the card we all have in 2009 will be a permanent feature, and I hardly ever have more than five banknotes in my wallet at a time, so I don't see where we would gain anything!

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