The Library of Congress archives everyone’s Tweets

by Dr. Samori Swygert

We live in a highly sophisticated and technology driven society.  Many of us have become desensitized to the intrusion of privacy by various governmental agencies.  We’ve seen civil liberties dwindle away piece by piece under the Patriot Act.  Many people are comfortable with the sacrifice or trade-off of civil liberties for the promise of national security.

Edward Snowden, William Binney, and other whistleblowers have divulged the various means in which the government conducts “data mining.”  This is a process in which any and all desired digital data is collected, intercepted, screened, stored, warehoused, and archived for retrieval at any request.

Well, the Library of Congress and Twitter signed an agreement in which the Library of Congress collects and stores all Tweets from the users of Twitter.

This may be old news to some people, but this may be new news to many people.  The following is a direct excerpt from the Library of Congress website : “This month, all those objectives will be completed. We now have an archive of approximately 170 billion tweets and growing. The volume of tweets the Library receives each day has grown from 140 million beginning in February 2011 to nearly half a billion tweets each day as of October 2012.”

I think the important message in all of this is that as consumers and patrons, we need to truly understand all the implications of the privacy agreements before we click “ok” or “agree” at all times.  Many service providers of software, telecommunication, and other digital services have disclosures that we should think about seriously.  Many companies have established contracts with the government to hand over your personal data (if requested) to specific government agencies.  We’ve seen this resurface with the email and cellphone providers in this Edward Snowden versus the NSA debacle.

Twitter is made for individuals to publicly express their opinions, interests, and perspectives.  However, I think it’s important to keep this in the back of your mind as you think about posting various statements and pictures on the internet.  We all can use a reminder, but I also believe we need to remind our kids and adolescent family members about internet etiquette, appropriateness, and integrity of character.

We’re in the age of “selfies,” “cyberbullying,” and “doing it for the Vine!,” but always remember Big Brother is watching, Third Party Cyber Voyeurs are lurking, and what you say and post can potentially come back to haunt you in the future.  Don’t forget about the young black male that is serving time for threatening the President on Twitter.

This is also extremely important in era when unemployment is high, job and education competition is intense.  You don’t want your future judged on a knee jerk Tweet, drunk Tweet, or indecent photo that you posted.  I think  sociopolitical commentary is okay as long as it’s respectable, logical, and devoid of violent rhetoric.

Here are some links from the Library of Congress for reference and to share with your children:

http://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2013/01/update-on-the-twitter-archive-at-the-library-of-congress/

http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2013/files/twitter_report_2013jan.pdf

California’s new crib to prison pipeline proposal

Reported by Dr. Samori Swygert

The school-to-prison pipeline is now expanding its eligibility criteria for its future inmates.  According to articles on NPR and the Daily Mail, Carson City, CA is set to pass a law on May 20th that would charge kindergartners with a MISDEMEANOR for BULLYING.  

Reports say that the city council members are in unanimous agreement for the new law.

Let’s not make any mistake about this, this is very serious!  We’ve already seen how two police officers in Portland, OR arrested a 9-year-old girl and processed her with fingerprints and mugshots.  What we’re witnessing is the streamlining and tailoring of policies that are steering youth directly into the penal system. We often talk about the “school-to-prison pipeline,” but this is almost starting a “crib-to-prison pipeline.”

Based on my readings, the proposals start at a $100 fine for the first offense,  $200 for the second offense, and then a misdemeanor charge for the third.

This proposal and others like it, automatically position a child for social and academic failure.  I’m not even addressing the criminal record, but these will be documented in the children’s academic files.  These strikes and infractions on their record will lead to future profiling of these kids.  In turn, many kids may be potentially denied admission to certain academic opportunities, programs, and special schools based on behavior they may have exhibited from kindergarten into early elementary school.

I do understand that bullying is a serious issue, I won’t deny that.  America has experienced some very tragic stories on the results of bullying.  We’ve heard of kids and even college students that have committed suicide; and in some cases, the victims of bullying have resorted to taking payback into their own hands by killing their violators. However, I feel that this is something that should involve interactive dialogues and family and community intervention.  Kindergartners typically mimic what they see in their immediate or domestic environment, but their mimicking has nothing to do with their true intrinsic character.

The proposal will umbrella physical, verbal, and cyber bullying.  This also brings the issue of interpretation into questioning.  The criteria would have to be very clearly defined because a child may “perceive” or “feel” like they are being bullied, but the other child can just be more assertive or aggressive in social activity, while another kid may be a very shy, timid, and a bit more sensitive to aggressive behavior.  Feelings and perception are subjective and don’t bare true fact or evidence of bullying.  The thought that a child may receive an “academic scarlet letter” based off perception is very dangerous.

This city proposal underscores the importance of consistent positive parental role modeling and family bonding.  Moreover, this also illustrates the importance of families being involved in PTA meetings, school board meetings, and city council meetings.  We must be more proactive and  involved to intervene in measures like this.  Lastly,  this demonstrates the importance in filtering many forms destructive media that constantly bombards our TV, radio, and internet.  Think tanks are working to criminalize from the crib and penalize the pediatrics.  I do not believe that penalty-based punishment is the best measure to reduce bullying among children.  The proposal also extends to the age of 25, so from the ages of 4-25 years old, Carson City will be accruing a lot of penalty-based revenue and criminal charges.

What are your thoughts?  What other alternative methods do you think the city should have considered to thwart bullying?  Click here to review the Carson City proposal on this issue