Totalitarianism is a political system "in which the state holds total authority over the society and seeks to control all aspects of public and private life wherever possible." In today's world, where society is essentially self-controlled by the means of technology, it would be rather easy to carry out a totalitarianism regime just by controlling the population's technology usage. Technology surrounds us in our everyday lives, representing who we are and where we live. If the government were to get there hands on technological use and control, the people could be completely controlled and mentally manipulated, in my opinion. All online activity and exchanges of personal matters through virtual means would be absolutely controlled and overseen by the government. However, because we as people, prioritize the usage of technology so highly, we would likely be okay with this degree of monitoring as long as we continued to have access to the virtual world in general.
This image of the world map represents the many countries in the world that censor internet websites and applications such as FaceTime (on your iPhone) and YouTube. As you can see, the western countries force little to no censorship upon the people (represented by green). All other colors represent various degrees of censorship with pink representing the strongest level of censorship. where a large portion of content in several categories is blocked, without any say from the large populations living within. I feel as though this is representative of totalitarianism nature and can lead to larger conflict if the people are not able to be independent and make their own choices even in the simplest ways, like using YouTube. North Korea is a prime example of a totalitarianism regime where there is absolute, total control of all media and access to Internet. In a world so dependent on technology, we must be consciously aware of our rights and enforce the representation of the people, especially as we are Americans.
I agree with your views on this matter because it is almost like everything we do is over technology. If you're ever in the need of a quick response or wanted to see what someone else is doing, you can easily go on your phone. So if the government began to monitor everything, it wouldn't totally affect everyone but some people would just have restrictions due to what they search. Everything has been so technologically based our whole lives that we wouldn't dare to live without this source.
ReplyDeleteSneha, the idea that the government can implement a totalitarian regime through OUR OWN uses of technology is a scary thought; but a realistic one nonetheless. The fact that we have government agencies such as the NSA, who have been proven capable to infiltrate our phone conversations only showcases the capabilities our government has already achieved. Imagine all that has yet to be uncovered and is happening directly under our noses?
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