Juice15, 4/16

Foucault was a very interesting read and had many concepts and ideas that pertain to today’s world. The first quote we were given was “inspection functions ceaselessly” (94). This weekend I noticed how much this is true. For one my landlord came to our house and did an inspection. He looked around the house under every corner and area, but as he was inspecting the house, we were watching and inspecting him at the same time. At the baseball games this weekend there were scouts who watch your every move. They videotape your swing, time your running, watch you throw, every little thing you do is watched. As I begin to notice this I look out in the outfield and there are security cameras all over the buildings at the school. Everyone is being watched. Then I find out they have cameras set up at the field so anyone who gets online can watch the game from their computer. I have never really realized how often people are being watched and inspected in almost every aspect of life. This is why I agree with Foucault when he says we are a society of surveillance.

Another idea of Foucault is that “power should be visible and unverifiable.” I feel that there can be good and bad things about this. If power is visible it can deter a lot of things. The red light cameras on top of the lights deter me from running red lights because I don’t want a ticket. I feel that the power being unverifiable adds to the mystery of all this. People say that we can be tracked through our cell phone and GPS, but I have no idea who can really track us. The bad part about this I feel is that when all this technology is used to try and protect us it can create a false sense of security. We have all these wire taps, cameras and so on but these can never stop everything. Banks and stores still get robbed, banned things still make it through airport security and there are many ways to beat this system of power. But overall it does seem like we are imprisoning ourselves with all of this because we want that sense of security.