End Free Speech Now

Yet again, the British government shows that they regard 1984 as an instruction manual.

See, in the name of stopping terrorism, it’s very important that the government require social networking sites to retain all information created by British users so they can monitor it. For, I don’t know, potentially deadly image macros, or something.
This is on top of something that’s already in the works that says the government gets to store all e-mails sent in the UK as well as monitor all phone calls from landlines and mobiles. This database is planned to monitor for chatter that could give advance warning about terrorist attacks, like that day the trains got bombed in London four years ago, or… um… well, that’s pretty much the only major non-IRA attack in recent memory. Appending on this new idea about social networking sites is because the increasing popularity of these sites over the past few years has “left a loophole for terrorists and criminal gangs to exploit.”
Which just goes to prove, really, the government just aren’t taking this threat seriously. Sure, it’s all well and good to monitor social networking sites, blogs, phone calls, e-mails, your financial transactions and your vehicle’s movements, but doesn’t that leave the alarming loophole of everyday conversation? We need above all else to implant some kind of chip in people, something that will track their movements, monitor their body chemistry for poor diet and drug use, and crucially, record every word they say. Doesn’t it terrify you that right now, outside your window, two people are having a conversation and the government have no way of knowing what they’re saying? What if they’re plotting a terrorist attack? What if they plan to abduct a photogenic child? What if they plan to give cancers to our most beloved reality TV stars?
It could be happening right now and we’d have no way to stop them. That’s why we need to protest this ridiculous, short-sighted proposal that doesn’t begin to consider the real criminals getting away with speaking freely right now.