First post in a long time

Back in the day before myspace and facebook and all those other social networking sites out there, I was one of those angsty teenagers on xanga and livejournal. Back when blogs were just online ranting boards for you and your friends instead of quirky themes for desperate aspiring would-be writers to snag some kind of book deal. Anyhow for one reason or the other I fell out of habit a while a go, and looking back at everything I thought to myself - how could I ever possibly think that THAT was good writing? So, from thus forth, I personally declare that I denounce everything I've ever written in a blog before this date. That's what I WOULD have said, but then I realized I could just delete everything. So delete I did.

I know I'm supposed to be discussing 'Panopticism,' but I guess some old 'blogging' habits are just resurfacing. 'Like an old caged animal seeing the sunlight for the first time and stretching it's limbs.' HA. Had you. That's something only silly 15 year old would write.

Anyway, onto Panopticism. I never got the packet, because I wasn't present for the first day of class. BUT. I do have several things to say, based on what we talk about in class. And my ever trustworthy friend wikipedia. SO. From wikipedia I have this definition:

"A Panopticon is a circular building with an observation tower in the center in an open space surrounded by an outer wall made up of cells for the incarceration of mental patients or convicts. The purpose of the design is to increase the security through the effectiveness of the surveillance. Placed in a cell, inmates cannot see each other through the concrete walls and their cells are flooded with light so that everything they do can be observed by the central tower. Foucault explains an additional function of the central tower in his book, the "Birth of the Prison," "We have seen that anyone may come and exercise in the central tower the functions of surveillance, and that this being the case, he can gain a clear idea of the way the surveillance is practiced." In this way, with the inclusion of the public and non-institutional members, the disciplinary mechanism of observation is decentered, which has the effect of increasing the efficacy of the disciplinary mechanism."

At first glance, I would assume that this 'circular structure' with increasing hierarchies and inhabitants, in this case the 'prison,' functions to display a social structure, or 'system' if you will. I was going to say something about power structures in social groups, as a function of cultural value, fitness, social norms, and class. It was going to be a grand rhetoric about why people do the things they do, and seemingly unknowingly accept many things for no apparent reason without asking - WHY. However, based entirely on the wikipedia entry (sorry Shawn, I'll read the actual packet I promise) and the cues in 'Southland Tales', the definition seems to revolve SPECIFICALLY around surveillance. And not just surveillance of an oppressed mass by a strict elite leadership (well, mostly anyway). It is a surveillance that is open to anyone, who happens to be observing from the surveillance end.

There are several assumptions I need to make. First, I saw that Foucault died in 1984 (thanks wiki), which was before the time of mass surveillance as we know it (cameras, media monitoring, fuck you patriot act) was massively implemented. Thus, his writings deal primarily with the 'prison' model. In his prison model, there is always the CHANCE that one of the inmates is being watched. In modern society with mass public camera surveillance, this goes on mostly taken for granted by the general public (unless they are severely paranoid or are planning something extremely devious). In the prison model, assuming unruly behavior results in some kind of reprimand or negative consequence, it encourages the inmates to act in accordance to the set of norms put in place by the 'overseer.' The modern mass surveillance model is a little more ambiguous.

In 'Southland tales', whenever a scene occurred in a highly public place, most of the public went about their daily lives, while the only ones consciously troubled by surveillance were those who had something to fear from it. However, it is interesting to note that in that society, they have military snipers in higher places open to plain site for anybody in the public to see. In case of any troubling behavior, the sniper has every right to shoot any member of the public they judge as unruly. This is something the populous seems to have accepted, as several characters are sniped from afar, yet (other than being startled at the scene), normal people are seemingly untroubled by this.

The difference between being under surveillance from afar, and with those you can directly see, is mostly interpersonal relationship. When you interact with another person, you constantly receive almost instant feedback from the person you are interacting with (whom is also observing you). When under surveillance, you can not be sure whom is watching, what they're thinking, or judging, or how they are responding by what you are doing. This uncertainty causes those who are conscious of this to act in ways that THEY believe the overseer desires. However, in BOTH cases, the individual acts as a response.

I'm done for now. I don't even know if I can get into the class yet. So then that'll have all been for a waste.