I've been seeing lots on the news recently about various schemes to protect women from predators when they are outside their homes but are they going too far?
So I'm talking about schemes whereby either police patrols or AI cameras or both decide that a male is acting "inappropriately" near a woman and send someone to intervene before a crime is committed. But I really dislike the idea of this level of monitoring - we already have the most heavily filmed society in the world and big brother levels of policing what we say, even in private: because of course someone else gets to decide if we are allowed an opinion and if its the right one. Just this week it was announced yet another impediment to free speech with the Labour government going hard against criticising Islam. And who the hell decides what is inappropriate anyway?
There have been outcries before about the suggestion that science could predict who will grow up to commit crimes and intervene in the formative years to prevent it/ this doesn't seem much different but because its labelled as protecting women (sod the male victims) its ok?
On the news today the minister going out with the police patrols in Colchester was basically saying it was ok to get as drunk as you like because its society's job to keep women safe from predators. I think that's a terrible message - why abdicate all responsibility to the state? And its not a great idea for anyone to get so drunk they can't look after themselves - not just women but men put themselves in terrible danger from getting totally out of it (traffic accidents, falling in the river, getting into fights, getting assaulted). So in my mind its labelling lots of behaviour before a crime is committed but also ignoring men's safety. Why can't they call it what it is - a total invasion of privacy on the spurious assumption that AI can decide who is good and who is bad?
Change my mind - I really can't get my head around this.