Unconstitutional

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." Benjamin Franklin

Unconstitutional is a very important documentary that details the assault on Civil Liberties that the passage of The Patriot Act made legal. Its passage, mostly unread when dropped in the middle of the night, at a time when people were feeling very afraid and vulnerable should serve as a warning of what can happen when we let emotions overtake our judgement and reason.

Having researched Second Life I am amazed at the kind of time and money people have invested in this virtual world, often at the neglect of their real lives. People seem to be more invested in their virtual "lives" than in what is happening all around them. Therein lies the problem that technology both creates and can work to remedy. New technologies allow people so many different routes for escape from the mundane, the everyday, the unpleasant news and events of the world that it makes it easier for people to turn a blind eye to what is occurring in the world. To me this sounds an awful lot like the film The Matrix in that people are so invested in the world that is "the wool being pulled over their eyes" that they do not notice the reality that is the world lying beneath the surface. However, new forms of media such as Virtual Guantanamo that are being infused into platforms where people go to "escape reality" and are themselves way to allow people to interact with realities that they otherwise would not be able to can help people to retain connections to what is going on in the world around them.

Although many people do not need to experience something in a virtual world in order to feel empathy or understand its importance, if this parallel world of virtual experience elicits a reaction and wakes people then I hope it continues.