To Care or Not To Care

What I find most disconcerting about all of the recent discussion with regards to our privacy within the information age; is that it it takes a whistle-blower to shed light on the topics. Why can't our institutions be honest with us from day one? Why are we living in an age of plausible deniability?

We see this same practice in many of our institutions, be it in the realm of politics or finance. Average every-day people are intentionally misinformed, or simply not informed at all regarding many of the systems that they live in. Although it is understandable, seeing as how all 7-billion of us in the world are much too busy raising families and working jobs; so that we simply do not have the time to understand monetary policies or geopolitics. But we never get to vote on anything: whether it was a war, funding the NSA's programs, or any process by which we could exact legislative revenge on the causes of the economic collapse. We are given a list of people every four years and expect anything to change when we elect the next one. (Even then, barely half of the country votes)

The question is: how much transparency should we demand from the governments and corporations that we live in? Where do we draw then line and say "you are taking things too far, it's time for some checks-and-balances baby!" And even when we, as the public, decide to draw that line; how would we do it? Normally we elect representatives who are trained in Law and Business, either by voting for them or paying for their products. But wouldn't we just end up back where we were? Is the answer to revolutionize our journalistic and media organizations instead, so that they hold those we vote for to a higher standard?

I believe that, like many issues, we need to be honest with each other. No more campaign slogans or carefully constructed media to sell us our daily doses of ignorant bliss. There needs to be a discussion -- not behind closed doors -- but a public discourse so that we can reach a compromise. Can we meet somewhere in the middle?