Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Point: The Priavy Battle

Privacy is an Inalienable Right
By: Brian Restuccia


Recently the issue of personal privacy in relation to the government has become an issue that is at the forefront of the political process. Laws like the PATRIOT Act and the warrantless wire tapping that have been eroding the constitutionally erected walls of privacy that the individual is endowed with in the United States of America. Proponents of this point often argue that if a person is doing nothing wrong, they have nothing to hide and so should not mind if someone is snooping around in their business. I recently came across a paper by Daniel J. Solove of The George Washington University Law School entitled "I've Got Nothing to Hide" and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy that deals with just such an issue.

The linked paper above is definitely worth a read for anyone interested in or concerned with the privacy issues that we are facing today. Solove teases out interesting subtexts of the "I've got nothing to hide" argument, that it generally amounts to an individual not caring what happens, so long as it doesn't happen to them. That the data being gathered by these privacy breaches is in fact not very personal, unless you really are committing a serious crime, and that the trade off in privacy may prevent another terrorist attack.

Since September 11, 2001 the population has been more willing to turn a blind eye to the egregious attacks on their privacy by the government. This paper does much to reinforce the belief that privacy is a right, not a privilege to those that "have nothing to hide". The author points to The Trial by Kafka for a literary metaphor to the current privacy squeeze we see ourselves in today. I have not read this book, but I certainly plan on doing so now, given this recommendation.

Beyond this article, I think that it is less patriotic to live your life in a petri dish for the government than to question their activities when you feel you, or another citizen, has been wronged. If you don't have anything to hide, when the government asks to encroach on your life, you should push back, demand a warrant, to make sure that the government doesn't have anything to hide. We need to remember that the United States of America is not simply the president, or congress, or judges, or the countless agencies encircling them. The United States of America has endured beyond transitions in political persuasion and power struggles between the various branches because of its people. Our unique culture is something worth fighting for and protecting. It is becoming more evident that it is up to the individual to look out for their neighbor, when the government is becoming increasingly concerned with looking at your neighbor. With the FBI, NSA and other organizations involved raising the stakes in the privacy battle, this is become very difficult. Perhaps Benjamin Franklin said it best when he noted, "Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither liberty nor security"