Spy Watch

We're living in a surveillance society, so they say. Every where we go our movements, no matter how mundane, are monitored. Even the simplest transaction now seems to require the provision of vast amounts of personal data to officialdom. The whole concept of privacy seems to be under threat. Not, of course, that this seems to be worrying the majority of the great British public. Indeed, the erosion of our civil liberties generally doesn't seem to worry them. Indeed, a recent poll claimed that a majority of voters supported the introduction of new laws allowing the police to hold so-called 'terror' suspects for up to forty-two days without charge - a clear undermining of the basic principles of habeas corpus. Now, whilst this is, in part, undoubtedly due to the fact that people in this country are ignorant and ill-informed, taking most of their 'opinions' from the Sun or the Daily Mail, it is also down to the complacency of the middle classes. They're idea of 'liberty' is having the freedom to buy whatever they like. Consequently, whilst the continued destruction of our civil liberties passes with barely a murmur, increases in the price of fuel cause massive protests and displays of civil disobedience.

However, whilst the state and its agents seem to like taking your picture, they don't seem to like you taking any pictures. Just lately the media has been full of stories of police and local authorities preventing individuals from taking photographs in public places, usually on the grounds of 'security'. Clearly, as this seems to upset them so much, the only way to hit back at them in this battle over our freedom is to give them a taste of their own medicine. I propose that we start loitering outside of the headquarters of the various intelligence agencies, taking pictures of anybody going in or out of their main entrances. Whilst that alone should be guaranteed to get a reaction, what we should then do is post these pictures up on the web. Maybe we could create a new site - 'spywatch.co.uk' or something. If we can identify them, even better - 'name and shame' them as snoopers. If such treatment is good enough for nonces, then surely it is good enough for the voyeuristic bastards who poke their noses into our lives. Let's take it all a stage still further and start following these bastards to their homes, photographing and videoing them all the way. Watch their houses. Go through their bins. Report everything you find on the website. Trust me, this is the only way that we can even begin to wrest back our civil liberties from the state - by exposing and rendering ineffective their agents! So, get those digital cameras out and start making for GCHQ and Vauxhall Cross!