That’s apposite in the flood of “for your good” stories that
surround the world of so-called “big data”. Including this one: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/data-is-not-a-dirty-word-20121213-2bc9j.html#ixzz2FOP2LQUI from Peter Martin, writing for Fairfax.
There’s a good reason that Peter Martin is no Ross Gittins:
Martin is so easily blinded by the light, as he has been in this profile piece.
In the name of “your own good”, Kim Carr – whose ministerial duties have been
whittled down (presumably because nobody wants anyone like him to be the
smartest person in the room), has discovered A Cause: Big Data in the Service
of Citizens.
For a start, I’m wary of powerful people with
catch-phrasey causes. I do sling personal money at causes from time to time,
even if people who know me may consider the Rural Fire Service and SES to be
merely self-interest. But when someone with a position of power gets fired up,
I worry, because they downplay downsides.
Identifying the downsides is one of the handful of roles
that journalists can still rightly claim: “Here’s someone with A Plan: what’s
wrong with it?” is one of the most legitimate questions any journalist can ask.
Peter Martin fails.
The gist of the Fairfax story is that Big Data will let
governments do a better job of identifying those who need help, before they ask
for it.
I can’t argue with the idea that people need help. Without
the Australian health system, my wife would now be dead AND I would be
bankrupt. An American friend of mine, watching our progress through a serious,
severe and chronic immune-system disorder that needs ongoing chemo and has
required three surgeons this year (one involving replacing about 40 cm of
artery), tells me we long ago passed the million-dollar-patient mark, were we
in America.
But mining their interactions with government?
A thousand times no.
Prove to me that Senator Carr has only the purest motives;
prove to me that no Australian government in my lifetime could ever have
motives other than Senator Carr’s; demonstrate that his ideas will save lives
or families; I will still say no.
It’s not only the Philip K Dick “pre-crime” associations
that the idea brings. It’s a simple matter of corruption.
There is no way on earth that the Senator, the government,
or all the functionaries employed to protect the data, can guarantee it against
misuse. Anybody needs only to see the
information on a screen, and they have a lever to use against an individual.
Some of them will.
And there’s no way to guarantee that the future of
Commonwealth data mining will be benign – because agencies like the Tax Office
are helplessly in love with Number 5’s statement: “More data! I need more data!”
And it’s always with the excuse “for your own good” – as it
is in the Peter Martin article.
Nietzsche was mad, possibly syphilitic, and certainly
contributed to a world view that is odious in the modern world. He was crap as
a physician of the psyche, but very good as a diagnostician.
“For your own good” is merely a way to exercise power. It's the price, to descend into the scatological, for which your arse is sold. Ask yourself: is the lube worth the pain?
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