It's the year 1984 on the Chinese Calendar apparently

[CitizenBBN]

Or will be really soon.

http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2018/09/...-everyone.html

We've discussed this elsewhere, but this is just stunning. The Chinese are very close if not there to tracking basically the movement and activity of every citizen in their core nation (they probably aren't getting this done yet in the outskirts but it's coming).

Buy too much booze? Jaywalk? They know it, and it reduces your "social credit score". Obey the rules and your children get better schooling opportunities, don't and they are punished.

Post on social media too much? Too many video games? No travel approval for that vacation you wanted to take, or maybe you lose out on that apartment you wanted near work.

This is serious, for real. they have 200 MILLION cameras online, and this article says it will triple to 600 million in less than 2 years. With facial recognition software and phone/electronics tracking and filing of every shred of everyone's movement and activities.

It's a level of efficiency even Orwell didn't fully anticipate. In 1984 the Proles were largely ignored by the party apparatus, as they weren't a threat. Not so with China, they will control everyone with an efficiency far beyond two way TV screens and training children to turn in their parents.

China has an historic tendency to turn inward on itself, becoming obsessed with its own "All Under Heaven". I have to wonder if this is part of that tide turning once again. Of course simultaneously China is making fast inroads in trade and foreign influence, but I wonder if this will work against that in the long run. It may reinforce it, giving them total power over their economic might at the most minute, individual worker level.



Fwiw, this is why dismissing our own "deep state" is so foolhardy. CIA director Brennan, who makes a living accusing others of treason now, lied outright to Congress, our direct representatives, about the NSA collecting mountains of data and recordings of our conversations and movements, and yet there was minimal outrage and this guy is still treated as a respected thinking instead of being in jail as a criminal.

Are we really so far behind China? Sure it's less palatable here, so it's more quiet, but Google and Facebook and surely the NSA know everywhere we all go every day with our phones. Every liquor store, every shop, every civic meeting. All that data is there, and we're also bringing facial recognition and tracking online as well, just not as robustly.

As college indoctrinate the next generation with the abhorrent notion that speech should only be tolerated if you agree with it and it doesn't offend you, and branding anyone who disagrees as a racist and guilty of "hate speech", is it too far fetched that the fact that you went to a "subversive' or "racist" meeting gets used against you? It's already happening on college campuses, with students singled out and punished for it.

The Chinese at least are honest about it, they sell it as a feature and reward for their citizens. I have a feeling we have plenty of reasons to worry here b/c clearly those in power think they know what's best for us, and they seem really good at covering their tracks.

[KeithKSR]

It will take a while to go 1984 in rural areas of China. Some of those areas are still in the late 19th and early 20th century.

[CitizenBBN]

It will take a while to go 1984 in rural areas of China. Some of those areas are still in the late 19th and early 20th century.

IMO we'll be surprised. I read an article on the re-education camps they are using in the Muslim areas in the west, and they are putting shocking amounts of resources into it. They are willing so spend vast sums and employ huge numbers of people to control an area that economically is all but meaningless.

it's wonderfully totalitarian, in the real sense of the word not the way it's used by people in this country. The use of vast resources just to get that last 2% of compliance.

Other than the horror of it all it's interesting to see it happen just like a sci-fi novel.

It's happening here too, it's just much more covert.

[KeithKSR]

It's happening here too, it's just much more covert.

Is it really covert, or hidden in plain sight? Everyone has a cellphone, video cameras are everywhere we look, smart TVs are becoming common, even appliances are going WiFi. This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our lives being constantly monitored. The government may not be as big a worry as tech companies like Google, Google currently tracks our electronic footprints in ways many people cannot imagine.

[CitizenBBN]

Is it really covert, or hidden in plain sight? Everyone has a cellphone, video cameras are everywhere we look, smart TVs are becoming common, even appliances are going WiFi. This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our lives being constantly monitored. The government may not be as big a worry as tech companies like Google, Google currently tracks our electronic footprints in ways many people cannot imagine.

Freedom dies not with a bang but with a whimper.

[KeithKSR]

Freedom dies not with a bang but with a whimper.

Maybe, not even a whimper.

[kingcat]

Good subject. Although we like to argue otherwise at times, it has no party affiliation either.
"Deep state" can easily be substituted with "deep pockets"

I believe it's about the "haves" wanting to maintain control of the "have nots" and using political divisiveness (and many other issues) as a subterfuge.

[CitizenBBN]

Good subject. Although we like to argue otherwise at times, it has no party affiliation either.
"Deep state" can easily be substituted with "deep pockets"

I believe it's about the "haves" wanting to maintain control of the "have nots" and using political divisiveness (and many other issues) as a subterfuge.

The "deep state" is very real, and yes does lean more to the left in Washington due mostly to career self-selection, but the overall issue here is the "deep elites", of which the deep state is just their sheep dogs herding us sheep, and those elites are on both sides and their goal is to keep themselves in power far more than moving forward with an ideology.

even most of the ideology is just a sales job. Those who dont' even look at such things are sheep, but if you look at them and think one side is telling you the truth and the other is the mean nasty people, then you're a sheep too IMO, b/c in truth BOTH sides are using those things as tools just to get your support keeping them warm and dry and rich.

In the end it's these elites, in the US the triumvirate between big government, big business and big labor, that is more interested in keeping the club exclusive than in actually helping anyone, liberal or conservative.

the refreshing thing about China is that they make no bones about it, and their one party totalitarian state means there is only one message. Service to the state, being a good citizen, etc., and btw if you aren't then you're going to the modern internet version of the gulag or prison camp. They don't even need camps, b/c you just can't get an apartment or a car loan etc. if you misbehave.

It's really fascinating to watch Orwell and Bradbury, Huxley and the rest all come to fruition in our lifetimes. It's deeply sad of course, but it's like Jules Verne's predictions of submarines and other technology coming to pass. These guys saw it all decades ago, where it was going and how, and they were really pretty dead on accurate in many ways.

[kingcat]

I think it leans slightly to the right personally but that’s neither here nor there.
The term Deep state is just another corporate subterfuge. That doesn’t change the basic truths of the matter however. Whatever one suspicions, that suspicion is just as likely to be the true problem

Divide and conquer is alive and well, not to mention an active and accepted part of current day politics. It’s our premiere entertainment. To control is to conquer.