Very troubling thing I saw - armed guard station in a public library!
Yesterday Sue and I went to a meeting dealing with poverty (one put on and attended by some of my colleagues). It was held in a rather new public library in a poorer section of town (in Ybor City in Tampa Florida).
What was REALLY disturbing was that they had a guard station with an armed police officer in the foyer. An armed guard in a public library!
The area seemed rather peaceful and not run-down as generally portrayed for poor areas (especially those that are rough). There were more minority people at the library than I've seen in those in this county (admittedly, it's been YEARS since I've been to a public library in this county), and knowing the attitudes to be found in this state, I think that has something to do with it. (Also I learned today that in Florida, the police kill someone on average every three days - most of them declared "suicide by Cop" or suspicious - and nobody in the state has been keeping track or investigating!)
Add to that the fact that the FBI is trying to start a program encouraging students to spy on their (Muslim) peers and report anything "suspicious" (organizations like the ACLU found out and the FBI delayed rolling out the website/program)... I don't like seeing these things at all.
We're getting pushed into being a police state - and as long as people think "It's those HORRIBLE XXXXXXX that are being watched/controlled!", I don't see much chance of it stopping it until after it's too late. I mean... encouraging spying on peers, armed police in public libraries, what's next? Sub-machine-gun armed patrols in malls? Police observing college classrooms and heavily armed guards patrolling public areas in colleges/universities? Barbed wire and guard stations around reservations, Synagogues, and Mosques? They've tried to allow censuring of websites (through various means) already... I worry that, for instance, Al Jazeera and other reasonably accurate news sources will end up 'cut off' so we can't access the news they don't want us to see (especially anything that contests their propaganda against certain groups).
People need to wake up.
What was REALLY disturbing was that they had a guard station with an armed police officer in the foyer. An armed guard in a public library!
The area seemed rather peaceful and not run-down as generally portrayed for poor areas (especially those that are rough). There were more minority people at the library than I've seen in those in this county (admittedly, it's been YEARS since I've been to a public library in this county), and knowing the attitudes to be found in this state, I think that has something to do with it. (Also I learned today that in Florida, the police kill someone on average every three days - most of them declared "suicide by Cop" or suspicious - and nobody in the state has been keeping track or investigating!)
Add to that the fact that the FBI is trying to start a program encouraging students to spy on their (Muslim) peers and report anything "suspicious" (organizations like the ACLU found out and the FBI delayed rolling out the website/program)... I don't like seeing these things at all.
We're getting pushed into being a police state - and as long as people think "It's those HORRIBLE XXXXXXX that are being watched/controlled!", I don't see much chance of it stopping it until after it's too late. I mean... encouraging spying on peers, armed police in public libraries, what's next? Sub-machine-gun armed patrols in malls? Police observing college classrooms and heavily armed guards patrolling public areas in colleges/universities? Barbed wire and guard stations around reservations, Synagogues, and Mosques? They've tried to allow censuring of websites (through various means) already... I worry that, for instance, Al Jazeera and other reasonably accurate news sources will end up 'cut off' so we can't access the news they don't want us to see (especially anything that contests their propaganda against certain groups).
People need to wake up.