The Nude or the Rude
Privacy awareness is like Zen. You empty your mind and let the connectedness of everything come rushing in to fill the void. Zen masters see how the fish and leaves, wind and rain are all similar manifestations. Privacy enlightened people see the supermarket courtesy card, the passport, the cell phone and the secret database as different turns of the same great wheel.
Once you start, you can find a conspiracy anywhere. It reminds of me of reading a couple of books written in the 70s that alleged that advertisers were airbrushing secret messages in ads--death heads, naked women and obscenities. I opened up a magazine and lo and behold--I saw the secret messages. i found them everywhere; skulls in cigarette ads, intertwined bodies in car commericals and rude messages painted in background foliage.
The only problem is that they weren't really there. The power of suggestion is more addictive than cheap cocaine.
Once enlightened, a privacy crusader gleefully refuses their personal information everywhere. It's easy once you start and sometimes it's fun to hold up a line at the supermarket while you explain to the cashier and everyone else within earshot why these "courtesy cards" are one kiss away from the devil's buttocks.
It's harder to draw the line somewhere. Once you get the big picture, you see the hungry digital beast stalking your movements, noting your quirks and you want to deny him his next meal. Maybe by being obstinate, perhaps by lying. Maybe you wait until you're home and write an angry letter.
But we all have lives to live and people close to us that are easily embarrassed when we rail about the soulless machine sucking dry our spark of individuality and we stop, look around and realize that the world has moved to the right without telling us, marginalizing us on the fringe.
And we have a decision to make, do we let them strip us raw or fight for what we believe, one checkout clerk at a time.
Nude or rude?
Posted on December 08, 2005
