Yet another story about how happy Danes have become with surveillance. It’s the second story about ‘the tendency’ in few months in DK. I’ve been called by two different journalists within 12 hours for a comment (both of which I transferred to my good friend Anders who actually appears in the article). Now suddenly everybody agrees that surveillance is good and creates comfort and security. If we disregard the journalist urge simply to say SOMETHING different (I guess that’s why my BigMother perspective is popular in the Danish media) and often make up the ‘news’ themselves (as it might be in this case), I wish to use the chance to rehearse one basic observation that sparked BigMother. NOT that surveillance is good per se. But how most public debate is swamped cliché inertia. Just as the Big Brother notion have had disproportionate cultural power by offering a handy and shared image of the consequences of surveillance gone bad (actually: coupled with fascism), don’t be surprised is everybody starts saying that surveillance is for the common good, heightened general ethics, greater awareness of others or what have you. Bottom line: don’t trust you visceral reactions to ‘controversial’ issues. Chances are that they depend on a single experience you have come to generalize or simply that your opinion is THE opinion in your segment. It’s quite banal; but just realize it next time you discuss politics ;-)