“Put the last one on that corner please.”
“Here?”
“Well, wait, move to the right, just a little bit.”
“Uh…here?”
“No no no, Mr Monahan, are you concentrated? move to the right please! Not left, okay?”
“I’m sorry, it’s my bad. But.. I feel so tired right now, because I already installed 99 videos today.”
“I know, but it is the last one, can you just insist one more minute?”
“Anyway, How about here?”
“Let me see…good! excellent! Perfectibilité! !Everything is all set! Let’s go to morning meeting together, we should tell everybody this wonderful news!!”
Well, my dear readers, Let’s stop here and think about one question.
“Do you think Cheshire academy students will allow surveillance cameras appear in our campus?”
“ No? yes?” Well, I don’t know. But, If you ask me for the answer, I will say: “YES!” Since the cameras can help us to avoid thieves, protect public property and make students be more aware of following the rules.
To begin with, placed surveillance cameras is a good way to avoid theft. Take myself as an example: Last year, I chose tennis in spring season. Mrs. Mauthe required us to wear T-shirt and sneakers when we come to class and play sports. But I am a day student—I can’t take my clothes and shoes with me for a whole academic day, so I needed to put them in the gym locker overnight. However, after school when I opened the locker, I couldn’t find my T-shirt! Not only was it one of my most favorite T-Shirts, but it was also quite expensive. It was not a good day! I felt very upset by this, and I told my adviser. She said she would help me to find the T-Shirt, but at the end of the day, we couldn’t find it and I was forced to face the fact that my favorite T-Shirt got stolen. If there were surveillance cameras in the gym, the thief might have been caught on tape, or there may have been some other clues that became available. Therefore, I strongly suggest that we should have surveillance cameras in the campus.
What’s more, it can also protect public property, because it is less likely for students to destroy public facilities when there are cameras watching them. For instance, the student center is one of the most popular places at Cheshire Academy—a place where students can go to enjoy their free time and hang out with their friends. But, at various times in the past, there have been some vandalism problems in the student center, with students damaging couches or leaving their garbage. If the academy were to install cameras within the student center, there would be less risk of this kind of problem as well, as people would be more responsible if they were being filmed.
According to a recent survey, surveillance cameras are a much more effective way of preventing people from breaking rules than, for example, a sign indicating such. For instance, if there is a “don’t walk on the grass” sign on campus, it is not very likely to prevent many people from walking on the grass. But, a camera can prevent it. One of the reason for this is that the camera works as a policeman, one will not only feel afraid to behave bad in front of the police, also feel shame of being reported out. The function of the camera for keeping off the grass is the same as protecting public facilities, people will always mind their behavior when there is an eye watch on them.
Admittedly, many will claim them installing the cameras in public is against privacy. It watches us talk, walk, laugh, eat, etc. However, what is privacy? Privacy is the personal secret that has little to do with the public interest—it is the personal information, personal issues, space, etc. At some point, the cameras do watch what we are doing in public. However, we expose ourselves less in public since we separate the home and the public place in our consciousness. Therefore, we do few private things in public—we should not be ashamed or concerned about our public behavior being recorded. The vast majority of what we do in public is, by definition, things we would not mind the public knowing. Therefore, we should not mind this being recorded if it improves our safety. Furthermore, a structure could be built to make it difficult for people to get access to these videos, even those who are working for police force or other government organization.
One good example of a place that has benefitted significantly from the addition of surveillance cameras is the city-state of Singapore. This area is small enough to allow for the entire city to be covered with security cameras—it has one of the highest rates of cameras per square mile of any city in the world (Lee). Singapore also has one of the lowest crime rates in the world, with the city getting 2nd place in Asia—which was also 2nd place worldwide—in The Economist magazine’s 2015 Safe Cities Index. In this index, only Tokyo scored higher, with Singapore’s government publicly talking about plans to use technology and surveillance as part of a “wider plan to become a so-called smart nation” (The Economist). Furthermore, in the same ranking, Singapore was ranked number 1 in “Personal Security”, which is the category that’s arguably most clearly connected to surveillance.
In conclusion, the cameras are good for watching in order to ensure security, protecting the public property and controlling students' behaviors. It is not used for infringing upon people's privacy since if it were the use, the cameras will be installed in a secret place where is hard to notice, and the people in charge of monitoring them will be well-trained. As the case of Singapore shows, increased surveillance can be an effective way of having a happy and safe society, which is clearly something that many people would appreciate.
Works Cited
Lee, Terrence. "Singapore an Advanced Surveillance State, but Citizens Don’t Mind." Tech in Asia RSS. 26 Nov. 2013. Web. 3 Apr. 2015. <https://www.techinasia.com/singapore-advanced-surveillance-state-citizens-mind/>.
"The Economist Safe Cities Index 2015." The Economist Intelligence Unit. The Economist, 1 Jan. 2015. Web. 3 Apr. 2015. <http://safecities.economist.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/EIU_Safe_Cities_Index_2015_white_paper-20.02.15.pdf>.
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