Prisoners to be implanted with microchip tracking devices

The Independent on Sunday has today (13th Jan 2008) carried a story on its front page stating that the government is seriously considering implanting tracking devices beneath the skin of prisoners. I thought at first this was just all conspiracy theory, but the fact that the Independent is reporting it has revealed to me that in fact this is very, very real. This technology is the ultimate techno turn on for those who would love to either implement or live in or both, a dictatorial fascist state. To my mind, anyone who is a morally-minded free thinker should oppose this oppressive drift towards state control with as much vigour as is humanly possible.

 

Is this real?!


That is pretty f**ed up. Next it will be bloody tracking devices in all new borns,

 

Here's a link to the article in the Independent.

and an excerpt:

I see this as a very scary step in the wrong direction, personally.

 

I'm certain that if this policy is allowed to go ahead it will be the thin end of the wedge.

What the hell is wrong with this government that it seeks ever more power and control over its people?

 

if you walk around with your mobile phone switched on you are already submitting to surveillance.

google "mobile phone tracking" and you'll find websites offering to locate any mobile on the major UK networks for £5 a month. Scary isn't the word for it.

 

In my experience of Hellmarsh, I saw many men and young people who would have benefited from a community order. There are too many people being sent to the pits of prison when they could be rehabilitated. What a waste of a human life. I support this microchip tracking device. I am aware many in this country still support the ethos of "Lock em up and throw away the key". Some things never change on that front.

Additional: I have nearly completed my three year sentence. I hope that by example, other young people can be spare the wrath of the Penal system and be rehabilitated. The judge probably predicted that I would be stood in front of him again within the month of freedom. He was wrong, but now I have possibly influenced his judgement for the better. Although there are people who should most definately be thrown into the pits of Prison and yes, throw away the key.

 

I dont like it. I cant believe they would even suggest it let alone be ready to go ahead with it.

 

With the constant debate for the Human Rights Act needing reform and the erosion of our civil rights having a micro chip implanted into you would be almost, if not impossible for the average person to challenge though it would be against criminals to begin with. Scary stuff. I believe we are starting to see all these oppressive measures beginning to be knitted together. Does anyone feel safer?

 

Anything to get a young kid out of the pits of Hellmarsh, is well worth it in the long run for modern society (With medieval ethical beliefs when it comes to dealing with criminals). It is foolish to rage stand up to the regime in these Victorian-built monolithic Hells. ^It is quite common for atleast five prisoners to be beaten up with battons by prison officers, per hour. It is called, "Control and restraint". Everyday, you are hated, despised, scoffed at and made out to be dangerous. Infact, there is nothing but hatred, despisement and no common compassion.

From the very moment you enter a local prison, you are forced to take your clothes off and crouch down so they can search for drugs or concealed weaponry, *for example a machete that might be concealed in your arse, for example.

When the young prisoner's only crime was stealing a few dozen tuna tins, a pint of beer and a packet of spearmints. It is not uncommon for many inmates to be placed in Max security, for crimes no more serious than common assault. It is these that need to be taken out of the pits of Prison hell, like infamous Hellmarsh, put out into the community on a three year community order with conditions. Because anything such as microchip tracking, may just, maybe, just maybe just might be the very thing that the prison system needs. It is practical for lesser offences.

For those who are guilty of murder and other heinus crimes, should by all rights be sent to Hellmarsh where they punishment will be metred out by societies lust for retribution. As one person put it, "If Society cannot get revenge, they lose all faith in the justice system.Period!"


*Prison logic
^100% legal. Even Parliament support such rough tactics to allow the law to gain the upper hand, the ace of spades and the hiarachy of all of British Citizens. Trivia2, One person once said, "I fought the law, the law one".

 

The issue isn't about the rehabilitating outside of the prison. It's that there are ways to already do this, such as ankle bracelets (that I'm sure you know despite their name are not easy to get off) that can serve this purpose. To implant something, that might even be able to listen to all your conversations is not a way to go about enacting change. Just use the present technology and change the laws on the books to help more people with rehabilitation instead of doing some surgical procedure that makes their personal wishes or opinions on what's happening to THEIR BODY have no value.

 

exactly, you said it better than i could have.

 

anyone here seen anything by alex jones or david icke?
this smacks of NWO/illumiati
time to take to the sky.....

 

Well, I'm sorry Reaperman, but I happen to think that Alex Jones and David Icke and other 'conspiracy theorists' have taken the whole thing far too far. Even though Gordon Brown recently said that the UN needs to become a 'New World Order', I believe that what we are seeing essentially is a multitude of western governments finding common cause with each other over the prospects of how to rule their prospective populations. That is more along the lines of a global 'gentleman's agreement' than the massed paranoia that Messrs Jones and Icke seem hell bent on perpetuating.

Unfortunately, this development of microchipping is going to fuel the belief in such craziness. However, and I say this especially because I launched this particular thread, this is not to say that we should dismiss such things as microchipping and a drive to some form of world government as 'conspiracy theory' and therefore nonsense, because as this situation demonstrates, it isn't, and the governments of the world DO need to be watched constantly, because I'm sure that even if current politicians do not intend the manufacture of an Orwellian society, they are slowly but surely, and inadvertently, creating a situation where some nutcase WILL attempt to create such a society.

Nazi Germany is the prime example of this, and the current US administration with its attendant 'Project for the New American Century' and its Christian fundamentalist support, is possibly displaying signs of being another.

We definitely need to watch this and other developments, but we also need to keep some perspective on this and avoid scaremongering and paranoia - that will only play into the hands of security agencies by encouraging them to further increase security measures against a possibly hostile 'fringe element' of society.

Unfortunately, massed public apathy, especially, I'm afraid to say, in Britain, has to a certain extent allowed this to happen, along with the continuing spectre of environmental degradation. People just really need to wake up and question authority more. The fortunate thing is though that the British 'alternative' culture is always bubbling under the surface ready to act when things go too far in the wrong direction, as the poll tax movement and the road protest movement of the early to mid-1990's shows, but if people in society were a bit less apathetic, then it needn't get to this level of confrontation.

A note to John, I presume you're talking about Belmarsh prison, and I sympathise. I can imagine it must have been really rough in there. On the other hand, microchipping is neutral essentially. Therefore it has two sides, one benevolent and useful, the other malevolent. Chipping might be a good way of improving conditions for prisoners, and it might help to keep track of pensioners with alzheimers etc, but there are lots of extremely pernicious uses that the technology can be put to as well, and I'm afraid that my inclination is towards the wider freedom of society and the preservation of important civil rights. Otherwise, we might all find ourselves one day imprisoned in a global slave state, all prisoners of the powers that be, and then the conspiracy theorists will have been proved 'right', and we'll be living in a dystopian society where freedom of expression is non-existent and without the means to do anything about it.

We need to act upon this now really, but not necessarily by going out ranting in the streets. More effective is actually bothering to discuss the issue with your local MP, writing letters to the press and raising awareness. Start a discussion in your community (I've started a Facebook group on the issue for example) or write an article for a magazine. The old traditional ways work best, initially. We can save the more radical stuff for when its really needed, hopefully it won't be.

 

This is a good idea that way we will all know where the crims are on google maps and GPS systems etc and avoid them - maybe make it so as rapists and that are put on GPS then we could home in and batter them the fuck to the ground