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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Security or Liberty? Both!, 19 Mar 2004
The Naked Crowd's title comes from an example author Jeffrey Rosen uses to audiences and classes. He descibes an airport scanner that "undresses" you as you go through it, revealing not only potential weapons, but you in all your nakedness beneath your clothing. Rosen then tells his audiences that technology exists to easily obscure the face and other identifying parts of a person's body on the screen, but still be able, with complete accuracy, to see potential weapons. When given the choice of "the Naked Machine" and "the Blob Machine," there are always people who choose "the Naked Machine."Rosen examines how, in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, Americans have been willing to give up their liberty, not for security, but for the illusion of security. He explores the proliferation of closed circuit TV cameras throughout Britain, which has been shown to have no effect at all on security. He discusses how the public and politicians alike are looking for a technological "silver bullet" that will solve our security problems. He mentions in passing an article in The Atlantic Monthly, about the dangers of depending on slick technology to solve our security problems. Bruce Schneier's book Beyond Fear, expands on this theme and offers practical solutions to the problem, and I highly recommend it in addition to The Naked Crowd. Using examples from history, sociology, psychology, and the law, Rosen shows how we have come to this seemingly un-democratic state of affairs. The Naked Crowd is really quite readable and thought-provoking in a non-partisan way. He praises both Franklin Roosevelt and Rudolph Giuliani as effective leaders in a crisis, and doesn't mention Bush at all. An especially entertaining and revealing episode has Rosen interviewing Larry Ellison of Oracle in his Northern California mansion. After a final chapter about the trend of exhibitionism (Jerry Springer, weblogs) that doesn't add to his arguments, Rosen spends the epilogue proposing and discarding possible solutions to the issue of liberty vs. security. He finds that our best bet is probably to count on politicians to balance the two, rather than leave it to judges or technocrats. But he doesn't seem entirely satisfied with that answer, either, and leaves unsaid what is likely the real answer, which is to educate ourselves as citizens and stay on top of complex and changing issues and demand that our representatives protect both our lives and our liberty.
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