More power to the police

CP24 sent out a tweet last night opening up the discussion whether RIM should hand over information to police.  By information I am assuming they are refering to messages sent through Blackberry Messenger.   This topic has made it to the tables due to the whirlwind of looters swirling through England. This situation is not unique.  I believe the police there want RIM to open access to the BBM network in the hopes that they may be able to retrieve information pertaining to the direction that looters are heading and who is involved.

During the G20 in Toronto BBM and twitter were methods used to communicate what was going on.  I am in as much support of the violation of privacy rights being demanded by the "riot police" carried out by the corporate entities who we sign contracts with entitling "us civilians" to certain protection in terms of privacy as much as I am in support of police pulling over a car with teenagers because they were there.  While I don't neccessarily support the growing trend of civil unrest I do not support the growing trend of giving excess power to police forces as a method of combatting civil or uncivil protesting.When the G20 took place in Toronto the police had the same access to social and news media the people on the streets did.  And this did not aid them in containing the situation.  They had the same access to the countless people tweeting what was going on and where simply by following corporate media.  The end result was their kettling technique which resulted in no less than treating innocent civilians as criminals in the hope of squeezing out the 'trouble makers'.  The same thing is being proposed here in England.  Violating the peoples right putting them into one pot in the hopes of getting rid of the toxins.  I think as people we need to start looking at the implications of what we are really giving birth to here.  Yes there is a worldwide trend of growing unrest.  Yes there is a worldwide trend of mass protest occuring and its only going to continue as the lines between the people and the elite continue to divide.  Governments and people would be wise to see clearly that there is a divide and that those people whom some consider to be the bottom of the barrel are tired of the growing influence (financial) and power being giving to Corporations.  One of the biggest being the 'new democratic' type of government policing systems, look at the facts in terms of money being spent on security at these continuous protests and riots.  

As a citizen I am concerned with the willingness of some people and Corporate entities to continue to support this trend of handing over more power to police.  I am very skeptical about police power especially in the wrong hands.  Don't say it can't happen.  There is an old saying 'remember everything hitler did was legal'.  Look I am a law obiding citizen I can talk about countless stories of even here in Mississauga of profiling, unprofessional conduct etc etc  that is not the point the point is that it is dangerous to fuel a system which is on the verge of meltdown with a socialist type mentality.  And thats what this is pushing towards more government control.  The government can't keep their own houses in order and they want access to our tweets, text messages and bbm messages.  Sorry not floating my boat.  I believe in the rights of all people to their privacy and human rights not to be treated as criminals because the next group of rioters have shown up to the door steps.  Maybe the government cops should look into the problems that generate these situations instead.  They may even find a few in their own house. 

Protesting Blodgett