Opinion Part #2: Making A “Panopticon Prison”

September 16, 2014

[Opinion column written by Jonathan Starling]

In a previous OpEd I introduced the idea of the Panopticon, and how Bermuda’s fancy new CCTV system is making our island into a large panopticon [all-seeing] prison.

In this prison all of us are prisoners and may be watched at any time by the guard tower, in the form of CCTV.

We don’t know if/when we’re being watched, and so we all internalise the fear of being watched.

We self-regulate ourselves, internalising the State [and its police] within ourselves. In doing this we help serve the interests of the elite.

Being constantly conscious of being watched by invisible overseers leads to internalisation of control. It makes not simply a prison of our island, but it makes a prison of our very bodies.

Now, I’m sure many people would have read that OpEd and shrugged their shoulders saying ‘what’s wrong with self-regulation? If you’re not doing anything wrong, there’s no problem!’

There are different ways to look at this.

On the one hand, the presence of the CCTV sends the message that we’re all guilty – it’s guilty until proven innocent – rather than sending the message of a welcoming and cohesive society.

It sends the message of a fearful society that is anything but welcoming.

Surveillance is also an emotional experience that can evoke a variety of feelings: persons being watched can feel guilty without reason; embarrassed; uneasy; shameful; fearful; as well as secured and safe.

What creates discipline also erodes confidence. In fact, research has shown CCTV increases anxiety among the watched.
There’s also the very real issue of intrusion into our privacy.

It is now impossible to avoid surveillance in our island, and this is especially true in Hamilton, where today one cannot choose a route that would avoid surveillance.

In this sense, the island has become a particular space of coercion.

Backers of the system, such as Acting Commissioner Mike Jackman, are keen to spin this otherwise, saying CCTV is just a ‘crime-fighting tool, not a big brother intrusion into the lives of law-abiding citizens’.

The surveillance of the street, with CCTV, is only one aspect of the modern surveillance society we have today.

Perhaps even more sinister are the revelations of the interception, storage and monitoring of our electronic communications, be they phone, text or email.

A disturbing new capacity of the ‘new and improved CCTV’ system that Bermuda’s installing is its ability for facial recognition, and also, presumably, gait recognition.

This gives those monitoring the CCTV the ability to identify anyone.

While this is being advocated for the sense of identifying criminals, it also allows the State to track activists, political rivals or even personal interests [ones partner, for example], and monitor their habits and goings and comings.

The stated purpose of CCTV may indeed be to control deviant behaviour [and who determines what’s deviant anyway?], to reduce crime and provide a sense of security.

But they are an exercise in power, and beyond their stated intent, they also have more worrying consequences.

The consequence of increasing surveillance is that in everyday life people are more visible to invisible watchers than ever before. The private actions of the ‘gazed upon’ subsequently become the public spectacle of the ‘gazers’.

“He who is subjected to a field of visibility, and who knows it, assumes responsibility for the constraints of power; he makes them play spontaneously upon himself; he inscribes in himself the power relation in which he simultaneously plays both roles; he becomes the principle of his own subjection.” Foucault, Discipline and Punishment: The Birth of a Prison.

Gathering knowledge is a form of maintaining control and surveillance – by definition – involves the quest for information.

Camera surveillance is not merely a ‘crime-fighting tool’, they are also a vehicle for the realisation of an authoritarian vision of order, an exercise in power that reinforces the control of society in the interests of the powerful.

For its proponents CCTV has a reassuring function – it reassures consumers, tourists, potential investors and property developers – in other words it reassures capital and its interests.

- Jonathan Starling

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Comments (16)

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  1. San George says:

    Someone has always been watching. What matters is the selective prosecution – that has never changed. Law has never been a problem. It is the application of the law that creates injustice.

    The injustice is magnified when the victim is financing his own victimization by paying taxes.

    • Reaching Him says:

      One thing is a constant, if you don’t break the law you can’t be part of those “selectively prosecuted”.

  2. GREAT! says:

    When do all the negligent drivers get mailed traffic violations?

  3. Rhonnie aka Blue Familiar says:

    CCTV would only increase anxiety in the watched if they are doing something wrong, or if someone keeps saying what a bad thing CCTV is and how the ‘watchers’, like they aren’t our own neighbours, cousins, brothers, sisters, etc, have bad intent.

    This is the writings of paranoia and those who lean towards conspiracy theories. It makes for great movies, but it’s not realistic.

    • Reaching Him says:

      Exactly, I walk through Hamilton everyday. Most stores I go into have CCTV and I have never felt anxious or violated. Why because I am not doing anything wrong?

      I actually wish that they were up when I was 17 and decided to steal 2 bikes from City Hall parking lot for fun. Had hey been there and I knew it I would not have stolen them. I got caught with those bikes after the owner of the second bike saw me steal it and followed me home and then called the police. Fortunately I learnt my lesson and after court, fines and community service that is where it ended. Unfortunately, not everyone learns that quickly. These cameras will hopefully stop the next bike theft, assault, or act of abuse.

    • Reaching Him says:

      Exactly, I walk through Hamilton everyday. Most stores I go into have CCTV and I have never felt anxious or violated. Why because I am not doing anything wrong?

      I actually wish that they were up when I was 17 and decided to steal 2 bikes from City Hall parking lot for fun. Had hey been there and I knew it I would not have stolen them. I got caught with those bikes after the owner of the second bike saw me steal it and followed me home and then called the police. Fortunately I learnt my lesson and after court, fines and community service that is where it ended. Unfortunately, not everyone learns that quickly. These cameras will hopefully stop the next bike theft, assault, or act of abuse. If not, hopefully at the very least those that do the crime will do the time.

      I just hope that Mr. Starling or a family never finds themselves needing answers or evidence from the very same people or system he criticizes.

    • Keepin' it Real!...4Real! says:

      you use the word “paranoia” i use the word “awareness”…obviously you are not aware, that’s probably why you are paranoid…if i tell you that, what you are seeing now, i learned of it years ago, and now i’m seeing it all come into fruition, “the why, how and who”…all the information is available to you but you WON’T find it on Corporate Media…therefore conspiracy theories are made up by non-believers, many times i’ve been chastised by skeptics, i’m just wondering why after you are informed of the truth you continue to conform to the un-truth…there has been a war on for your mind, and it seems as though they’ve succeeded…you better snap out of your mental slavery because we’re in the End Game of Agenda 21.

  4. 32n64w says:

    Mr. Starling makes the incorrect assumption that every camera is being constantly and carefully viewed in real time by one or more persons. This is neither correct nor possible. The manpower simply doesn’t exist.

    Unless in the case of a current emergency when operators have a developing issue to track in real time, the cameras are for the most part an historical tool providing a visual summary of the past few days or week(s) so if a criminal act should occur they can be reviewed as part of the information gathering exercise.

    • Young Bermudian says:

      Whether the camera is being constantly monitored in real time or not does not ease the possible anxiety many may experience. One does not know when they are being monitored; therefore I believe it is fair to say that one will always feel as if they are being watched. ‘On paper’ the cameras are only monitored if a criminal act should occur; realistically, how is this regulated? I believe it is quite naive to believe they are only monitored for this purpose. CCTV is definitely a great tool to use to capture crimes and possibly identify the culprits, yet it also confirms that we are living in a ‘concrete jungle’. Privacy should be considered a fundamental human right; a right we are being stripped of as it is being controlled by external forces.

      Great article Mr. Starling! Capital and its interest are definitely being reassured.

  5. Bermy greens says:

    That is a crock of poop I know a person who’s second job is to watch the cameras as they are recording ! So come on people we are always being watched !

  6. jt says:

    I feel no anxiety. Do you? Why?

  7. Charles says:

    ‘I’m not doing anything wrong so I don’t mind being watched’…. it’s that kind of passive acceptance of group surveillance that sees your civil liberties and your rights to privacy, as a citizen in what should be a free society, being relinquished.

    Your rights aren’t being taken – you’re giving them away!

    Businesses and residents have a right to protect their properties – hence the acceptance of CCTV systems in businesses and around homes. Wide-scale public surveillance is TOTALLY different.

    1984 anyone???

    Good luck.

    • Come Correct says:

      This equipment is also capable of facial recognition. In other words, if you have been on one of these cameras you are now part of a growing database. What’s next, drones?

    • sswhite says:

      “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”
      ― George Orwell, 1984

      Some wont get it until its too late.

      It is already too late.

  8. cromwell says:

    Starling is as usual provocative and deep in his political issues which many people would just like to ignore and talk about the paint on their car.

    His political left persuasion and his association with the PLP issue of the Bermuda police as part of British Colonial oppression has now emerged as an anti CCTV position.

    He is correct with some of his points regarding CCTV as a policing tool. CCTV does move crime away from the camera. It has been said before “When people know they are being watched they change their behaviour”

    Fear inside a dictatorial and police state regimes creates increasing levels fear,stress and paranoia as a matter of government policy.

    Why do you think people just want to get off the rock! How about some private time.

    Democratic social change as a consensus by Bermudians allows freedom.

    If all the partisan political parties continue their confrontation and fighting the political fear, anxiety and unhappiness will allow authorities who promote police state control policy to increase CCTV which will lead to observation inside your personal property.

    And yes Come Correct, the drones are already here in Bermuda.

  9. fred says:

    People willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both.