Cuckoo 4.15

Yesterday in one of my classes we also talked about Foucault and this concept of Panopticon. Bentham theorized the idea of the panopticon when trying to produce a method for a cheaper, more effective prisons and asylums. Foucault says that we should “induce in the inmate a sate of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic function of power” (98). Originally this idea conditioned the prisoner into thinking that they are always being watched. Without having the ability to see if there is someone in the tower they are brought to think that there is someone always there. We deal with the notion that we are always being watched today. Whenever we walk into a store there are cameras, sometimes these cameras are somewhat hidden even though we know they are there. Without having the ability to see the cameras we are forced into thinking that they are being watching even though the camera might be focused on another section of the store. This idea has been lost because through the media everyone is watching everyone. The camera use to have the same power as the guards in the tower, now with the media showing everything the camera has lost that power. Technology as a whole has taken the power away from one clear power, now we all have the capability of sitting and watching. We never know who is watching us as well as when and where they are. We have imprisoned our selves through everyone have the ability to watch everyone else. We have turned into a society of surveillance/ a panopticon.