When the narco-dictator of Panama, Manuel Noriega, took refuge in a Vatican diplomatic mission in Panama City after President George H.W. Bush ordered an invasion to topple him in 1989, the U.S. Army hit upon an ingenious, if obnoxious, solution to drive him out the compound and into their arms – Operation Nifty Package. Soldiers blared music at the enclave that included the punk rock interpretation of “I Fought the Law” by the Clash and AC/DC’s percussive “You Shook Me All Night Long.”
The songs went on without relief, day and night, until after ten days the sleep-deprived dictator finally turned himself in. Many residents of the Buckhead area of Atlanta can attest to the effectiveness of this form of psychological torture. For two nights, a malfunctioning parking lot security tower at a shuttered Kroger grocery store has been flashing lights, shouting orders and playing music – at decibel levels approaching an air raid siren. That the system is blaring classical music is no comfort. One of its selections is Tchaikovsky’s composition for the ballet, The Sleeping Beauty – an irony not lost on people who haven’t slept in two days. “It’s beautiful when you listen and are looking at a play and it’s on your time,” one man told Atlanta’s 11Alive News. “But when you’re trying to sleep, it’s distracting.” Perhaps you’ve had a taste of this, being startled after emerging from a movie theater late at night when from out of nowhere a flood light turns on. Police lights begin flashing on top of a metal tower. A stentorian voice shouts an order at you: “PLEASE EXIT IMMEDIATELY!” There is a good reason why mobile, parking lot security towers are becoming commonplace in the lots of big box superstores, shopping malls, and grocery stores. These robotic guards keep watch with sensors, fish-eye cameras, see in infrared and regular light, and are equipped with AI to recognize and track human forms. These towers take no bathroom breaks and ask for no pay, but they do watch and record people who might be looking to break into cars, a store, or worse, harm an employee or last-minute shopper as she walks to her car. They can alert a human at a control station, who can call the police. That is a good example of how surveillance can keep us safe. And, on balance, it is a needed public service. But we should also face the music: Surveillance, for good and ill, surrounds us everywhere now. Few people will mourn their lack of privacy in the moment it takes for them to exit a retail outfit to get to their car. But this is also just one more link in the chain of surveillance in which we are being watched inside the store, in the mall, and by license plate readers all the way home. Comments are closed.
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