By: Deborah Simmons
August 17, 2001
http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20010817-29228120.htm
[August 17, 2001. Washington DC: I have just talked with DC Councilwoman
Linda Cropp's office about the recently reported ID program for children.
I was told that the program HAS NOT BEEN FINALIZED yet. It sounded to me
like there was some back-pedaling going on; the explanation for the "mis-information"
was that there was a "mis-calculation" in the number of days which have
elapsed since the Council last took action on this measure. If the Council
does not take action to stop implementation prior to a certain number of
days passing, the measure automatically goes into effect, I was told.
The representative said that the Council is holding a special hearing
on this measure today, August 17, 2001. I will report on the outcome of
the DC Council hearing as soon as I find out what they have decided. Whereas
I had intended to encourage people to call the numbers listed in the following
article, this now seems premature and it would probably be best to wait
until the Council announces its decision. The person I talked to was well
aware of the Washington Times article and it was clear that this article
and others which have circulated recently precipitated the hearing today...Scott
McDonald<scan@networkusa.org>]
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Apartheid on the Potomac
The D.C. Council recently passed a resolution that will likely take
effect next week because there is no one to block it. Now ordinarily, there
probably would be no cause for alarm. But this instance is different. Correction:
Make that way different.
What Council Chairman Linda Cropp has done, at the behest of the mayor,
is given the nod to PR14-0262, or the Youth Identification Card Resolution.
The resolution amends regulations so that D.C. officials can begin what
should be called a branding program, like the ID jobs the nasty Nazis did
on the Jews. Or perhaps officials should call them Apartheid passcards.
You remember hearing or reading about passcards, don't you? Remember
South Africa's? Officially such records were called a computerized population
registry, and what that registry did was keep track of South Africans.
For
example, while South Africa's Department of the Interior maintained
the Book of Life files on nonblacks, the Plural Affairs Department maintained
the passbook system on millions and millions of black citizens. Data included
name and sex, date of birth and a photo - what Americans deem basic,
but very personal, vital information. But Pretoria's Big Brother didn't
stop there. The other data included race, address, marital status, school
or place or employment, drivers license info and fingerprints.
"The main purpose of the population registry was administration of the
influx control system, a system which channeled needed black workers into
the labor force to be exploited, and confined others to the desolate
homelands, according to a study, 'Computers and the Apartheid Regime
in South Africa,' by Stanford University's computer science department.
The passbooks, which every black person was automatically given at the
age of
16, coupled with the computer database, guaranteed one's instant identification
and one's history of government opposition. If these passbooks were properly
endorsed, the owner had the right to work or live in "white areas," and
lack of these endorsements or failure to produce the passbook resulted
in arrest and jail. Many were detained for months at a time without a trial,
and their families were not given notification of their whereabouts."
Now, while South Africa didn't start booking its youths until they were
16, the District wants to start at 2 years old. And while failure to produce
a passbook could have landed you in jail in South Africa, D.C. officials
want
us to believe that maintaining a central computerized database will
somehow improve the searches for missing and exploited children.
Now maybe, just maybe, you could fall for that hoax. Because sure, if
8-year-old Joel has his passcard slung around his neck, then everybody
would know who he is if he gets lost. But the missing-children thing can
be too
easily dismissed by two sheer facts of life. For one, the kidnapper
would probably snatch the ID and toss it. Also, no mother, except perhaps
one on crack, would let her child run around all day with an ID card containing
all
that vital and valuable information.
I mean really. Real moms and dads don't even give children their own
insurance cards, or large sums of money for fear of who knows what. We
ship them off to day care or camp and find ourselves using magic markers
to label
such easily replaceable things as their underwear and socks. And when
it comes to house keys we use safety pins, chains and everything else to
help ensure careless children don't lose them.
Only maggots and morons would consider otherwise. Morever, there is
a far more profound concern with these passcards. And that concern is privacy.
Isn't it enough that we have cameras watching us at the 7-Eleven, ATM and
Neiman-Marcus because of the bad guys? Isn't it enough that Big Brother
has cameras perched on traffic lights and streets lights - and inside police
patrol cars - because of the bad guys?
Indeed, at best the District's plan is a presage to racial profiling,
granting license to police to suspect a white guy in, say, a black neighborhood.
At its worst, it portends to be the ultimate peeping Tom.
To be sure, this proposal must be stopped dead in its wicked tracks.
Besides, you don't really and truly think the D.C. government, which
can't even maintain accurate records on such fundamentals as school enrollment
or worker payroll, missing-persons cases, or fleet management, is capable
of
handling and securing such complex technology and vital and very personal
information?
It's as if the mayor and the legislature want to relive the ugliest
parts of history: American slavery, when our ancestors were branded, shackled
and hunted like dogs; the Holocaust and the horrors that led up to it,
when our
ancestors were branded, shackled and hunted like dogs. Or perhaps they
want us to taste a more modern-day slice of racism: South Africa's Apartheid.
Which is it? Which do you prefer? Call D.C. Council Chairman Linda Cropp
(202-724-8000) and Mayor Williams (202-727-2980) and let them know.
Let them know that instead of spending precious dollars trying to turn
democracy on its head on the Potomac that they need to spend that money
on our schools. Tell them that instead of buying new cameras and more
technology to create a police state, they need to teach our children
how to build and use that technology. Tell them that our charter schools
need more money, and our libraries need more money and better facilities.
Tell them if they would teach our young people history the way it's supposed
to be taught, even our young would be revolting against such a frightening
idea. In short, tell them this ain't Nazi Germany and this ain't South
Africa.
Deborah Simmons is an editorial writer and columnist for The Washington
Times.
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Social security is the bane of individual liberty. - SAM
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