Seen and Not Heard: Surveillance, Technology, and the Normalization of Self-Censorship in American Society
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2013
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Haverford College. Department of Political Science
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Thesis
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Award
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eng
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Abstract
The increased use of surveillance has greatly impacted the relationship between technology and free speech in America. In my thesis I demonstrate that extensive surveillance can lead to widespread self-censorship in American society. The debate about the effects of technology on free speech is defined by the tension between how technology is both the means of free speech and the means of surveillance. Surveillance creates a panoptic affect that manifests in an environment that is hostile to free speech, thus stifling it by normalizing self-censorship. I engage in depth with Michel Foucault’s work in Discipline and Punish regarding surveillance because the current state of surveillance has similarities to Foucault’s Panopticon model. The Panopticon model applies because it allows the government’s “gaze” to enter into the formerly private spheres of communication and interaction. By examining Foucault in light of the development of modern technology as well as current political situations, my premise is that the normalization of self-censorship is a more efficient and pervasive way of stifling free speech than direct censorship. Comparing American society to the Panopticon also brings forward the question of the presumption of guilt, revealing that self-censorship is a reaction to being treated like one is guilty of deviancy. Self-censorship as a social norm would bring the free exchange of ideas grinding to a halt, weakening our society as well as our government. Normalized self-censorship has the same result as the oppressive censorship tactics of a totalitarian government. Many important theorists have established that without free speech, collaboration and innovation dies. This is due to the correlation between free speech and free thought. The opportunity to express and test the truth is important to self-governance and the formation of social selves. Self-censorship poses a danger to American society because it poses a direct danger to free speech. The importance of free speech to American society is such that the prospect of widespread self-censorship is a formidable threat. Additionally, the nature of normalization is such that once it reaches the absolute stage, we, as members of society ourselves will also be subjected to it and therefore unable to identify it. Regardless, it will leave behind the behaviors it engenders, i.e. self-censorship.