Big Brother for Sale

Who among us hasn't read George Orwell's 1984, either in high school or in college? One of my earliest recollections of the text is of wondering how the government managed to install so many devices in so many private locales and at what cost. Well, now I have my answer.

Just saw a commercial advertising the increasingly ubiquitous home security equipment now available for purchase and installation by concerned families. There is a distinct sense that we live in an embattled society wherein one's abode is, indeed, a fortress, or should be. What right-thinking parent would dare to leave their loved ones and valuables unprotected for even an instant? The need for 24-hour surveillance equipment should be self-evident, or should it?

Am I, in fact, as naive as Cheney believes the newly elected President to be? Is the threat of physical danger so imminent and all-pervasive that failure to take preemptive measures dooms those still foolish enough to trust in common decency as the rule rather than the exception? Is only might able to make right, and not vice versa? After all, King Arthur and his Round Table not only fell, they have disappeared into the mists of legend...

And yet, as much as I love cool tech toys, I cannot bring myself to actively participate in this widespread paranoia. I cannot and will not actually pay to invite Big Brother into my personal living spaces. Like Underdog, he's far too truly everywhere these days as it is (and I liked Underdog; BB not so much).