Save the planet by giving up your personal freedom | PHIL WILLIAMS
I am not prone to waiting in line for the latest gee-whiz gadget, but I know that technology is often times pretty cool. I can appreciate that medical technology, advanced infrastructure, GPS and so much more have all served to make our lives better, and even safer. But I have my limits.
Sometimes I feel like an old curmudgeon as I cling to my Android phone. It’s the electronic version of yelling at the neighbor kids to get off my lawn ... and take your silly Apple phone-thingy with you.
Don’t even get me started on those Alexa talking boxes. Not doing it. I do not want a disembodied voice telling me how to bake a cake, or listening to my private conversations. It's creepy. It’s always listening. Like a sneaky neighbor eavesdropping and posting all of your private stuff on the neighborhood social media page. Nope, not doing it.
But putting that creeper-peeper-never sleeper smart tech in your life is a choice. Any time you want to unplug that unsavory little electronic smart aleck and take it out back to use it for target practice you can do so. If you want that little machine to watch you change clothes that’s totally on you.
But what if the government mandated it? What if the government decided that it wanted to monitor your activities for a “compelling government reason?” Invasive technology sounds really cool until some bureaucrat realizes that they can put it to use for their agenda.
Climate-change activists embrace new-tech like nobody else. Every bit of invasive technology that comes down the pike suddenly has green energy advocates jumping on it like a spider-monkey on a banana. They couch it as “necessary,” “reasonable,” for the “greater good.”
After all, saving the planet means sacrifice. What’s a little bit of our personal privacy compared to saving the planet? The sneakiest versions of big-tech-green-voyeurism always come at the expense of the general public.
In August 2022, a major heatwave swept across the Rocky Mountains. With temps in the 90s, thousands of Colorado residents were suddenly locked out of their “smart thermostats.” Around 22,000 people had signed up for discounts in a voluntary program that gave them wonderful Wi-Fi-based thermostats.
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Sounds cool, right? No, it was hot. Very hot. The fine print said that when the system was in peak-load capacity the utility company could lock them out of their own thermostat. Reports came in of homes reaching nearly 90 degrees. I’m going to bet that several of those thermostats were forcibly removed from the walls. But hey, it was for the planet.
More recently, the California Transportation Department started asking folks to sign up for a shiny new program to monitor driving habits. It appears the vast majority of funds for roads in the Golden State come from gas taxes and, with fewer people buying nasty fossil fuel, California may be facing a deficit.
Caltrans will pay $400 for volunteers to test a system designed to charge three cents per mile. It's simple! Just put a device in their car that sends all of your driving information direct to the government, so that they can send you a bill. What could go wrong? After all, it’s for the planet.
But nothing beats London, England. If you want to drive in Mayor Sadiq Khan’s London you had better get on board with saving the planet. Mayor Khan took a bad idea and imposed it on the entire capital city.
Officially known as the Ultra Low Emission Zone, or ULEZ, this government scheme purports to lower air pollution in the city by taking pictures of cars using traffic cameras. If you are deemed to have a vehicle that does not fit the list of government-approved low-emission green-energy save-the-world transports, then you are fined the equivalent of roughly $15 per day.
The overreach is made worse when you consider that approved vehicles are generally newer and more expensive. Good little commuters “voluntarily” give up their non-compliant vehicles in the government sponsored “scrappage” plan.
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Grants help defray the costs of becoming an approved driver. You can also donate your non-compliant vehicle to the Ukraine because there’s nothing better than exporting your problems to someone else.
London’s daily commuters in older vehicles get fined. Every. Single. Day. The whole plan? Well, it’s not going too well.
ULEZ cameras run 24/7 and so far they’ve installed 3,455 of them and the resistance has begun. Websites now show people how to avoid them, which ironically means burning more gas taking a circuitous route to avoid the planet-saving fines from the ULEZ police.
Lately, a group calling itself “the Blade Runners” has been targeting these techno-spies with power saws, filming themselves cutting down the cameras and then posting their blade running on the internet. They’ve generated quite a following.
The transportation office in London issued a statement saying that vandalism is never acceptable. Agreed. But then they refused to read the room and doubled down, saying, “Anyone driving a non-compliant vehicle within the expanded zone will be detected and we advise everyone to check whether their vehicle is compliant and to consider the various support that is available to help transition to greener modes of transport.”
They love their invasive tech in London. But hey, it’s for the planet.
Somehow the idea of “voluntarily” giving up a measure of privacy so that government can monitor your behavior and “help” you to meet the needs of the next progressive agenda never seems to be a problem for liberals.
You might want to whisper because that Alexa-thingamabob may be listening. But hey, it’s for the planet.
Phil Williams is a former state senator from District 10 (which includes Etowah County), retired Army colonel and combat veteran, and a practicing attorney. He previously served with the leadership of the Alabama Policy Institute in Birmingham. He currently hosts the conservative news/talk show Rightside Radio on multiple channels throughout north Alabama. The opinions expressed are his own.
This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Would you rather keep your freedom or save the planet? | PHIL WILLIAMS