209 lines
8.9 KiB
Plaintext
209 lines
8.9 KiB
Plaintext
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HANDS OFF OUR BABIES !!!
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Ministers and hospital managers have finally came clean. For
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the first time, they've admitted publicly that they want to
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tag babies with barcodes the moment they're born. Every
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newspaper in the country has said what a wonderful idea this
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is. So have politicians from all the main parties. Selected
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babies have already been barcoded in Edinburgh's Royal
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Infirmary.
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Both the Murdoch press and the few titles still owned by his
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competitors have taken the same line. Some woman dressed as a
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nurse stole a baby in Nottingham. Therefore all babies should
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be tagged and coded. Otherwise it could happen again.
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At least one paper published a picture of a mother kissing the
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barcoded foot of her day-old baby. The implication is that
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mothers who don't allow their babies to be tagged like items
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in a supermarket aren't good mothers.
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This kind of nonsense is, of course, the stock-in-trade of
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advertisers, people trying to trick us into buying something
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or voting for them.
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Let's be clear about two things.
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Firstly, tagging babies has been in the pipeline for months.
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It's not a response to anything which has happened in the past
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few days. To say otherwise is to tell a complete lie. It is
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being introduced now because the media have made it acceptable
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now.
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The 'experiments' in Edinburgh (just who do these people think
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they are, using our babies for experiments?) were planned some
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time ago. Tagging babies was also mentioned in a conference in
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Cambridge in April, where an American 'expert' also spoke of
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keeping a register of babies' footprints.
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Secondly, tagging babies is not about stopping baby snatchers.
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If that were really the goal, it would make much more sense to
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tag doctors, nurses, hospital porters, fathers, etc. Or they
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could be given tags to carry in their pockets. Doors to
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maternity wards and nurseries could be made to open only for
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people carrying tags.
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Many government buildings use a similar system already. Who'd
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expect the Ministry of Defence, for example, to let strangers
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into the building, resting assured that no-one could take
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anything because all secret documents had tags sellotaped on?
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Obviously any whistleblower or spy could just cut the tag off.
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And any serious baby snatcher could do exactly the same.
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You might argue that alarms could be set to sound as soon as
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someone tried to cut off a tag. But if you still think these
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people are doing it for our benefit, just ask yourself:
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WHY BARCODES?
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Surely snatching one baby is as bad as snatching any other
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baby. Or is a nurse going to punch in the number of any baby
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who's being taken home legitimately, so the alarm won't go off
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when it's taken out by its real mother. Meanwhile a baby being
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snatched, not having been checked through, would set all the
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bells ringing. No, this isn't it: the nurse could just cut the
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tag off herself when the baby's ready to go home, saving all
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those costs on training, but with exactly the same effect.
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In that case, all tags could be the same, and there'd be no
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need for individual barcodes. It seems we're just not being
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told the truth......
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Quite a few politicians have said 'No expense should be
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spared' in guaranteeing baby security. That's the kind of
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thing politicians like to say. You'd hardly expect them to say
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'Baby snatching must be got down to an acceptable level.'
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On the other hand, a sceptic might think the whole point is
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for the Tories to give some more money to their friends in the
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private security industry. After all, they've given entire
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prisons to firms like Group 4, in return for Italian-style
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donations to party funds.
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But for once this doesn't seem to be it. A baby-tag costs
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about 10p. Introducing them in a big hospital like Edinburgh's
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Royal Infirmary will cost "thousands of pounds". For a
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maternity hospital, or a security company, that's peanuts.
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And yet the authorities do seem very anxious to tag and
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barcode our babies.
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WHY?
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Well let's just consider what else has been decided or
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'considered' in the past year or so.
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1) After being dropped three years ago, electronic tagging of
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offenders is coming back. Whereas in previous 'experiments'
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tags had to be plugged into the phone, now they can send
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messages to private security guards over the airwaves.
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In a move closely connected to rightwing Tory propaganda about
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the 'underclass', The Sunday Times has called for the tagging
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of "far fewer than 1% of the population" (i.e. less than half
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a million people). A pilot scheme begins in Manchester in
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January 1995. (In Tennessee, tags are already fitted to
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truanting schoolchildren).
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2) Home Secretary Michael Howard has considered having
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fingerprints taken from everyone. Another plan is to
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fingerprint Britain's 32 million motorists and to include
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prints on driving licences. The database would be run by a
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private company. Police chiefs are confident the plan will be
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in place by 1996.
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3) Transport Secretary John MacGregor has called for all cars
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to be fitted with a 'black box.' Cars would be tracked by
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satellite, and drivers would be charged according to which
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roads they drive on and for how long. (A version of this
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system is already in place in Oslo).
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Companies like GEC are hoping to employ technologies first
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used to track tanks during the Gulf War of 1991. To sweeten
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the pill, and to make more profit, motorists will be sold info
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services at the same time. The system will be tested next
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spring, and is due to come into force in 1998.
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4) Child benefit and pension books are due to be replaced by
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swipe cards in 1997, and benefit books will disappear
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altogether in 1999. Already pension books have been barcoded
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in parts of London.
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It seems likely that eventually all benefits will be paid into
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bank accounts. Post offices will be run in the interests of
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private banks, and many will just be shut down.
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5) The police are increasingly using DNA testing and some
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senior officers have called for the forcible testing of all
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adult males. (No date on this one yet, but this year's
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Criminal Justice Bill will allow DNA testing for all offenses
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the police record).
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6) City shopping centres are now routinely scanned by 24-hour
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video cameras. This information was first released to a wide
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audience at the time of the James Bulger murder. The
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implication was that anyone who objected to the general trend
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didn't care about toddlers being butchered.
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7) Soon TV viewers may have to pay for each specific programme
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they watch. They'll buy decoder cards for the Saturday match
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during the week. Already people using cloned cards can have
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their reception turned off individually by Sky.
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8) Britain's chief film censor, who thinks childhood is an
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'outdated concept', wants compulsory ID cards to be issued to
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all children. The pretext is to 'control access' to videos,
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fireworks, alcohol, cigarettes, etc.
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Baby tagging fits very well into this list of developments. In
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every case, the authorities tell us it's for our own good.
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We all know that the government only protects people to the
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extent that it's good for Business. Health Department
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officials are little more than agents of the huge drug
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companies; and their colleagues in the Ministry of Defence are
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little more than agents of the arms manufacturers. Transport
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bureaucrats give millions to construction companies and
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increasingly to security and electronics companies too. In
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short, it's there to keep us in 'acceptable levels' of poverty
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and disease, and to force most of us to work for the rich.
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They don't care about our babies being stolen any more than
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they care about our houses being broken into, or deaths caused
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by tobacco. They like it when working class people turn on
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each other and we live in fear. Nor would things be different
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if any other party were in power. Even if everything were
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nationalised we'd just be exploited directly by state
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bureaucrats rather than by the directors and bankers who
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currently tell them what to do.
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Recent calls to abolish benefits for single mothers show us
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that the ruling parasites feel strong. They're on the march.
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More and more information is being kept on more and more
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people.
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The mass media discourage us from looking beyond the next few
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months. But if we do, we see lines of information being
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established which are increasingly two-way or
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'interactive.'Surveillance, or keeping track of people,leads
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directly to control. The reason they want to tag babies is
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because it's easiest to start with them. It's got nothing to
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do with stopping them being snatched.
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We'll say it straight.
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Over the next 5 to 15 years, the rulers hope to keep tabs on
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us all by electromagnetic means. Corresponding types of direct
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surveillance would be horrific.The only thing that can stop
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this is Revolution. Against this World Society of
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Exploitation.
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Published by Some Opponents of Technofascism, Central
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Scotland, July, 1994
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