Are We Really Free?

Are we free?

28 th August 1963, Martin Luther King JR addressed 250,000 Americans, black, white, young and old with his famous “I have a dream” speech. He stated “From every mountainside, let freedom ring…and when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring…we will be able to join hands and sing …free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty we are free at last.”

This speech touched millions of hearts throughout the globe but as in 1963 freedom did not ring from every mountainside. Blacks and other minorities were still being persecuted. Almost 45 years later can we truly say that freedom rings?

The Human race are still victims of self entrapment and puppets of government propaganda. We are still creatures of habit living in George Orwell’s “1984” and “Big Brother is watching us”.

Britain is the most watched country in the world with CCTV in almost every town.

Gun and knife violence has reached an all time high in the last five years, for example in the last year gun violence has risen 2% in the borough of Haringey alone. This is happening against a backdrop of war and terrorism. Places like Tottenham in North London are slowly becoming the New York Bronx of the 1990’s.

While the war in Iraq continues, millions of Africans and Asians are starving as billions are spent of Arms. George Bush and Gordon Brown are the most powerful men in the world, but really and truly what example are they setting for the youth of today? As they claim to be fighting a war against terrorism, our inner city youths are fighting a street war with guns and violence, protecting their territory in exactly the same way that our leaders are doing but on a lesser scale.

We as individuals are photographed up to 300 times a day by CCTV, in most new housing estates CCTV is being fitted as standard. Some councils such as Newham are installing face recognition systems as a result of the ASBO culture. According to Gareth Grossman, director of policy at civil rights organisation Liberty. There is very little legislation to protect what happens to CCTV footage. A legal precedent last year established that the data protection Act doesn’t apply to CCTV unless it is being targeted on a particular individual. Most of us don’t even know we are being filmed. A recent survey showed that 90% of CCTV fails to comply with any data protection act.

Having looked at these statistics can we truly say that we are free? Freedom does not exist, it only exists in the sense that we can get up and do as we please but we really and truly we are being controlled, every move we make is recorded as soon as we step outside our front doors. Is this freedom? I say we are living in a man made bubble that creates the illusion of freedom, but we will never truly be free.