The world found in 1984 could find itself a reality if we’re not careful. I remember in that book every room had a big flat-screen television which also had a camera built into it, and you never knew when government staff may be watching you. The main character would sit in the corner where the camera couldn’t see him. It was the only place in his entire world where he could have any privacy. Scary, but the world’s moving in that direction, though even I don’t like looking at it sometimes. Not too long from now our cars may be sending the government logs of everywhere we go. Our phones sending logs of everything we say and where we go and who we talk to. I don’t like it. I don’t own a cell phone, rarely drive my car, and try to live as privately as possible, even though it gets harder every day. I hope we’re always allowed to use cash, though today it’s getting more difficult to do so. Banks already log “suspicious activity reports” on you if you withdraw more than a few hundred bucks from your account in cash, or if you deposit significant amounts of cash. They want everything to be electronic, and it’s all logged. I don’t think it’s anyone’s business what I own, how much money I’m making, or anything of that sort. But banks send off all your information to credit agencies, and those agencies sell “reports” on anyone and everyone. You can get them for as cheap as $50. A complete breakdown of someone’s life. Their marriages, where they live, where they’ve lived in the past, if they’ve had financial difficulties, debts they currently have, who they owe it to and for what, what they own (so banks can know what collateral they have), family members (for contacts and references), employers (past and present), traffic violations, education level and where they’ve gone to school, and the list goes on. Doesn’t take much more than a Google search these days to get all that information. And what if someone’s crazy, like a stalker? Our entire lives shouldn’t be up for sale to anyone willing to pay money for the information! Even worse, this information is being sold about people RIGHT NOW and people don’t even know it. Some creep on the internet may buy information and know everything about you, and you don’t even know it!

Back in old times the people could rebel against the government if it became too corrupt. But how could you fight a super-technologic government? I have no clue. You’d have absolutely no means to organize. We can’t ever let the government get that powerful.