The word panopticon derives from the Greek word for “all seeing” – panoptes.

“You had to live – did live, from habit that became instinct – in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every moment scrutinized.”

-George Orwell, 1984

In 2023 Atlanta based Flock Safety used the words “Detect, Decode and Deliver” to describe their suite of cameras used by police across the country.

This allitrative phrase harkens to the best selling dystopian novel “1984” by George Orwell. The fact that these cameras are becoming ubiquitous in the public sphere is what makes many think of Orwell’s novel. In 1984, the every move of the citizen is tracked, listened to, and decided if it is in opposition of the ruling governments interests. The government uses psychological means to ensure the people do not go against the grain. The government, through the use of “Newspeak” and “Doublethink”, rewrites how you think of the most basic violations of rights.

“The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation. These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from from ordinary hypocrisy: they are deliberate exercises in doublethink”

-George Orwell, 1984

When a company that tracks your every movement, details your goings to law enforcement, uses ‘safety’ in it’s name…. that is not coincidence. When you hear the technology defended as ‘Fighting Crime’, ‘Making the community safer’, these are contradictory to what the logical person knows to be true.

Surveillance is not Safety.