Let's All Teach Children It's Okay To Spy On Their Parents!

[thelivingphoenix]

http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.js ... Id=2322077

This is an actual "toy".  You can guess what I think about this.  Not only can your kid listen in on your phone conversations, but they get broadcast to an FM radio.  What the listening range would be is anyone's guess, since it isn't listed.

This, to me, is incredibly Orwellian.  Anybody remember the "child heroes" in 1984 that were praised because they turned in their parents for saying something "incriminating"?  Taught by the Party to spy on their parents and turn them over to the state?

Hate to do this, but...:

"And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death."--Matthew 10:21

In a day and age where child services can come into your house and take your children from you on the basis of a phone call or simple hearsay, this is pretty dangerous.  What business does a 10 or 14 year old have spying on the phone conversations in their household or in anyone's household, for that matter?  Is it really okay to teach kids to spy on their family?  In my opinion, loyalty to your family is more important than loyalty to the state in most cases.  The last thing we need is a breakdown of the family structure and everybody start spying on everybody else.  But, I guess they're just trying to condition them while they're young that living in a "big brother" state is alright and that everyone should be microchipped and spied on 24/7.

Discuss.

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

It kind of seems like parental involvement is expected.  "Soldering is required."
Though true when I was in that age, I wouldn't have an issue with that.  I'd just wait till the parents went to some party to get drunk then sneak in and do whatever.  Hell, I used to bug the phone anyway.  I had this crappy phone modeled after a comic character, and by playing with it I could listen in on conversations.

It was great.  It was like I had picked up the phone and had it to my ear, though the phone was on the receiver, the speaker was ticked as if it wasn't.  No one had a clue.  Best is I turned the little thing, whatever that is where the holes on the phone are where the speaker is, and it was my volume nob
I was a great little spy.

Then again it costs like 9 bucks, is the size of a dime, and won't work for shit.  From what I've seen these days parents are too afraid to have privacy else make their little brat pout.  If a parent is dumb enough to buy this, they're dumb enough to deserve what happens.  If a kid is smart enough to buy this and hook it up - he or she will be smart enough to spy on the phone anyway.

Screw big brother.  We're far too indigent to allow it.  I'm more concerned about the parents using this on their 14 year old's phone.

 

[Dissonance]

This, to me, is incredibly Orwellian.  Anybody remember the "child heroes" in 1984 that were praised because they turned in their parents for saying something "incriminating"?  Taught by the Party to spy on their parents and turn them over to the state?

Oh come on, it's not like kids didn't have a way to spy on their parents phone calls (and other things) before this came about, and they sure didn't turn them over to anybody then.

In a day and age where child services can come into your house and take your children from you on the basis of a phone call or simple hearsay, this is pretty dangerous.  What business does a 10 or 14 year old have spying on the phone conversations in their household or in anyone's household, for that matter? 

It's not a matter of 'business'.  In fact, I hate that word in the way you're currently using it because it's so damn archaic.  It's never a matter of business in thie day and age, but rather a matter of ability.  If a person (of any age) can do something, they will.  If you don't want them to do it, you need to move to stop them.  Whoever has the stronger will wins.  That's how things are with our generation, and I prefer it to the way previuos generations did it.  'Old morality' is generally not applicable anymore and quite annoying to boot.

Is it really okay to teach kids to spy on their family?  In my opinion, loyalty to your family is more important than loyalty to the state in most cases. 

Loyalty to what each individual wants to be loyal to is what's important, not some kind of automatic default to family.  Of course, the actual concept of loyalty is absolutely retarded anyway, but that's another story.

In general, you're overreacting.  :3

 

[thelivingphoenix]

As far as parental involvement, I know of plenty of kids between 10 and 14 (boys, mostly) that know how to solder.  Not really a hard thing to learn how to do.

I don't think it's "old morality" at all.  I think parents get a little too carried away with what they let their kids do these days and don't teach them to have respect for other people's privacy or their belongings, which is my main issue here.  Do you just say "yeah, go and listen to your older sister's phone conversations with your little gadget, that's perfectly acceptable"..?  I don't think so.  It's not okay to give a kid free license to listen to whoever's conversations they want to in a household because it doesn't teach them to have respect for other people.  It teaches them that "okay, whatever I want to do is acceptable simply because I want to do it and self-satisfaction and happiness are most important no matter whose privacy or belongings I'm bothering".

It's not the "toy" itself that bothers me; it's the ideas that come along with it that bother me.  At its core, it teaches a lack of respect for the privacy of others and that spying on people is acceptable behavior when it isn't.  A 10 to 14 year old doesn't have any right to spy on the conversations of other members of the household unless the parent says that it's fine and if the parent says it's fine, the parent needs to have their head checked a bit because later on that child isn't likely to have any respect for anyone else around them because they weren't taught anything different.  Most children who are given free reign to do whatever pleases them generally turn out to be brats of the highest order.

Where do you draw the line as to what a child is allowed to do and what they aren't allowed to do when it comes to respecting other people?  You can say "old morality" isn't applicable anymore, but more people live by it than live by your so-called "new morality" of "I can and  should do whatever pleases me simply because I have the ability to carry out the action and there isn't anyone who can stop me".

The overall concept of loyalty is retarded?  Never heard that one before.  Have fun proving that.  Gee, how degraded has society become when people think that the idea of loyalty is "retarded"?  Let's all just completely forget about loyalty, honor, and integrity and go back to being cave men.  Without loyalty, honor, and integrity, man is worse than an animal, because even animals have loyalty by instinct.  Loyalty to your family is instinctual and not something to be cast aside lightly just because you think it's somehow cooler to be "modern" and have no loyalties to anyone except yourself.

Any and all militaries are based on loyalty and if it was not for loyalty, there would be no countries and it would be general anarchy across the planet because everybody would be out to get everybody.  It's why the rangers have a creed of "no man left behind".  Society COULD NOT FUNCTION without loyalty without complete and utter chaos.  Your opinion that loyalty is overrated or "completely retarded" is guarded by your country's military which is supposed to protect your right to have that opinion.  Had they not loyalty, they wouldn't protect you or anything your country stands for.  Without loyalty, the entire planet is fucked.  If the police had not loyalty to each other and to their country and to the law, they wouldn't protect this country, the laws, the people, or anything else. 

You take away loyalty and you take away the foundation of any type of functioning society.  You would have no banks, no business, no laws, no family structure, no nothing.   

The idea that the concept of loyalty is retarded is in itself retarded.

 

[Venetia]

I'm ultra-anti-big-brother-1984 shit. I was raised a "conspiratorialist" and I'll probably die flipping off the government. But it's just as Sixty said, and I think you're reading too much into a silly toy. It's super easy to spy on anyone doing anything. I'm more worried about people microchipping their pets and giving little kids ID cards than about if a 6 year old wants to hear their mom nagging at their dad to bring home milk on the way home.

As more of our liberties are thrown out the door in lieu of safety, I become increasingly stubborn and anxious. But until I see a toy that implants into a kid or says, "Hey kids! Are your parents doing things illegal?? Then take Mr. Wacky Camcorder's tape and send it to 1010 Government St!", I'll assume it's mostly harmless.

 

[iceplosion]

I think people need to stop focusing on the toy itself and start thinking about the ideas that it represents.
It is morally corrupt to do this to children and this

As more of our liberties are thrown out the door in lieu of safety, I become increasingly stubborn and anxious. But until I see a toy that implants into a kid or says, "Hey kids! Are your parents doing things illegal?? Then take Mr. Wacky Camcorder's tape and send it to 1010 Government St!", I'll assume it's mostly harmless.

is the kind of thing that is a gradual process, it starts with something people can ignore, then when they become used to that it becomes something bigger, people will ignore it like the last thing and eventually there is little to no freedom.

I'd be hesitant to reference 1984 since although it can present an accurate image of what can happen it's so overused that no one takes it seriously anymore.
So instead I'll reference real life, the military commissions act is old news, Habeas Corpus has been abolished in America, so let's talk about something more recent:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/ ... index.html
People can now be ordered to break the law, is that not Orwellian enough for you? How about that you no longer have the right to privately communicate with other people?

It's not the toy, it's the ideas behind it, that something that should be unacceptable isn't, it's the kind of thing you can ignore and get used to but if you haven't noticed a trend by now then you're an idiot.

 

[Crystalgate]

I don't think this toy will have any drastic effect. However, it seems like a toy that is easy to misuse and I have a hard time seeing any proper uses for it. Apparently, the toy is supposed to be used by children age 10-14 in their own home. This already seems bad enough to me, but absolutely nothing says something cannot be used in a way it isn't intended to. It's probably easier for parents to bug their children than vice versa. Also, is there anything preventing it from being used on a pay phone or, for that sake, any other phone than one in your household?

Again, I don't expect any spectacular catastrophe from this toy, but I see nothing good coming from it.

 

[Dissonance]

I don't think it's "old morality" at all.  I think parents get a little too carried away with what they let their kids do these days and don't teach them to have respect for other people's privacy or their belongings, which is my main issue here.  Do you just say "yeah, go and listen to your older sister's phone conversations with your little gadget, that's perfectly acceptable"..?  I don't think so.  It's not okay to give a kid free license to listen to whoever's conversations they want to in a household because it doesn't teach them to have respect for other people.  It teaches them that "okay, whatever I want to do is acceptable simply because I want to do it and self-satisfaction and happiness are most important no matter whose privacy or belongings I'm bothering".

You must not know much about kids.

Unless you raise them in a sheltered Mormon village your kids will end up breaking free of the majority of the things that you try to teach them.  They will invariably do whatever they want and it's up to you as a parent to slam them down.  They're not going to mindlessly follow whatever mama and papa say.  In fact, it's more likely that they'll do the opposite of what you said simply because it's what you said.  Expecting them to follow your orders is unrealistic.

I'm not saying "give them a free license".  I'm saying "they will take their free license from you whether you like it or not and if you're a competent parent you'd better be damn ready to fight them tooth and nail to get it back".

It's not the "toy" itself that bothers me; it's the ideas that come along with it that bother me.  At its core, it teaches a lack of respect for the privacy of others and that spying on people is acceptable behavior when it isn't. 

I've found spying to be quite useful generally.  For example, at my workplace I have full access to my boss' desk and I occasionally skim it to see if there's any notices about me.  If he plans to do something concerning me that I'm not really looking forward to I then generally began to plant other options in his head via random conversation, and for the most part, he changes his mind while thinking it was all a coincidence.

But back to the actual issue, I would say that if the child suspects the two parents are talking about him while he's not around he has every right to know what's going on in the conversation.

Most children who are given free reign to do whatever pleases them generally turn out to be brats of the highest order.

There's a difference between being 'spoiled' and having 'enlightened self-interest'.  If my child turned out to be a whiny brat who shrieked and cried until they got their way I'd probably kill them myself.  However, if instead they turned out being a cunning little eavesdropper and manipulator who can use tact and bits gleaned from idle conversation to accomplish their objectives, I'd be quite proud.

Where do you draw the line as to what a child is allowed to do and what they aren't allowed to do when it comes to respecting other people?  You can say "old morality" isn't applicable anymore, but more people live by it than live by your so-called "new morality" of "I can and  should do whatever pleases me simply because I have the ability to carry out the action and there isn't anyone who can stop me".

Welcome to the Leviathan.

If you don't know much about the concept, let me break it down for you - Hobbes wrote that all people have complete and total ownership of everything in the entire universe, but to actually assert that ownership would create a worldwide and never ending war between every single person.  so, we trade away our rights to the world in which we live in order to have peaceful (if not mundane) lives.

The trick is being able to claim as much of the world for yourself as you can without arousing the ire of those surrounding you.  It's not about "doing whatever pleases me because I can and nobody can stop me wah wah wah" but rather "I live in a world where everybody gets a slice of the pie, and if I can take that guys slice without him noticing I should because if I don't somebody is going to come along and take mine".

The majority of people in the world don't - and can't - see their lives in this manner.  I assume you're one of them.  There's a minority that can, and these people generally use the system to better themselves.  If you can't see the world in this manner, then it makes it easy for others to use you for their own ends.  If you refuse to believe life is this way, then you're just open to their attacks.

Your very objection to this line of thinking is what allows it to thrive and exist.

The overall concept of loyalty is retarded?  Never heard that one before.  Have fun proving that.  Gee, how degraded has society become when people think that the idea of loyalty is "retarded"?  Let's all just completely forget about loyalty, honor, and integrity and go back to being cave men.  Without loyalty, honor, and integrity, man is worse than an animal, because even animals have loyalty by instinct.

So some guy gives millions to charity.  Helps out at soup kitchens and orphanages.  Gets homeless people back on their feet.  Does a lot of good for society.  Great guy.  Then he suddenly turns around, takes a living baby, and eats him.  Bites into his ribcage, his arms, etc.  Devours him completely while he's still alive and bleeding everywhere.  Are you still going to see him as somebody worth being loyal to?

Probably not.  I would, though.

Our current concepts of 'loyalty' and 'honour' and 'integrity' are absolutely retarded because they don't take into account anything other than the worst extreme.  A person who may generally do good might murder somebody and he's suddenly branded a monster for life?  Let's completely ignore anything good he's ever done and simply only focus on the one bad spot of his life.  That stigma never goes away no matter how hard he may try, or how much he reforms himself.

People switch loyalties at a drop of a hat, including you.  I'm just not afraid to admit it.

Loyalty to your family is instinctual and not something to be cast aside lightly just because you think it's somehow cooler to be "modern" and have no loyalties to anyone except yourself.

If loyalty to our families was instinctual we would be able to have been separated from our family at birth and instantly recognize them again upon meeting them later in life due to a sense of loyalty we felt for them that we couldn't explain when we first saw them.

Loyalty to anything is learned, not natural.

Any and all militaries are based on loyalty and if it was not for loyalty, there would be no countries and it would be general anarchy across the planet because everybody would be out to get everybody.  It's why the rangers have a creed of "no man left behind".

If you want to manipulate a person into doing your bidding, call upon their sense of loyalty.

"Forget your own needs," tell them.  Think of the needs of the state.  The king, the government, the country.  Of your unit.  Of God.  Of whoever, really.  In the end it doesn't matter, as long as you can get them to buy into it.

It's the people who put as much stock in loyalty to arbitrary figureheads as you do that allow the world to be as shit as it is.

Society COULD NOT FUNCTION without loyalty without complete and utter chaos.  Your opinion that loyalty is overrated or "completely retarded" is guarded by your country's military which is supposed to protect your right to have that opinion.  Had they not loyalty, they wouldn't protect you or anything your country stands for.  Without loyalty, the entire planet is fucked.  If the police had not loyalty to each other and to their country and to the law, they wouldn't protect this country, the laws, the people, or anything else. 

Then let them be loyal sheep.  They can waste their lives serving some higher power (God or an institution, they function the same in the end) while anybody wise enough to see through that dream takes advantage of their hard work.

I'm loyal to very little because I've seen what loyalty does to people and how people who are loyal get shafted, often without them knowing it.  Our world is full of two kinds of people - users and the used - and if given a choice, I'd rather be a user.

 

[Venetia]

It's not toys they had as kids that ultimately cause people to easily shirk all their liberties for the sake of "safety", it's the life in which they were raised.

The only reason anyone fights for freedom is the sting you feel when you realize you have none.

Most Americans live nice, cushy lives. They're afraid of the big, bad terrorists, and they're scared of the boogie woogies the government claims are trying to break their peaceful little lives. So they say, "Help us, Uncle Sam! Chase away the bad feelings! Here, you want my freedom against search & seizure? Take it! You want to wiretap me? Sure! You want the ability to beat the living shit out of me for no reason? Ok!! Just PLEASE let me go on living my nice, comfortable life in my nice, ignorant home."

That's like the people who buy 3-year warranties on their DELL Computers. Sure, now they can blissfully and ignorantly be protected against a possible EMAIL ERROR or an evil FAILED CD DRIVE by taking it into the shop, but all in all, if they'd just learn how to work the damned thing, they could save tons of time & money and be able to mod it themselves without worrying about the warranty being broken from simply opening the case.

You want to know what's teaching our kids to scramble for false security at the cost of their liberty? Their parents' OBSESSION with safety! I'm more disturbed by kids being forced to wear knee/elbow pads when they're on the monkey bars, or how entire lines of toys are taken off the market because it has SMALL PARTS. Parents that sue companies that make HAND SANITIZER because they don't have child-resistant lids, when it was the PARENTS' FAULT for putting the damned sanitizer where their retarded kid could reach! It's seeing jungle gyms and metal slides removed from parks because some kid broke their arm on one. It's seeing toddler beds with pillow-padded bumpers.

Parents are just forcing their children into being afraid of everything. And what do fearful people do? Seek security from the big, strong, unafraid people. Unfortunately, the big, strong unafraid people when you're an adult is the government. And Uncle Sam likes to grab up all the power he can, right up from underneath you. Bit by bit, until one day you wake up and realize, you've been in a crib your entire life.

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

Listen.
I was raised by parents who argued over government a lot.  My mother is completely fine with canceling flights to the South Americas, and building a giant wall, and making tax payers pay large taxes to uphold that wall and to fly all illegals from Mexico over the wall.  My father, not so much.  My mother is 100% fine with the government spying on phone lines and even broadcasts of citizens whose only crime is being a day late on their library card.  My father, not so much.  My mother is fine with kids going to the police and informing them that their parents are staling cable, my father thinks technically it's the right thing to do and yet thinks the kids are brats.  Free cable, whose going to turn that down?

So yeah.  I was raised by my mother.  She is 100% fine with the government doing anything to protect.  She's fine giving up liberties to protect an intangible "safety".  She's fine with the idea of bugs and taps and all sorts of devices being all over the place - her motto "If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear."  This is the message I was given when growing up.
Obviously I don't feel the same.

You can try to implant lessons and morals into a kid but that doesn't mean it'll ever stick.  I've been a massive thief throughout my life, yet the only morals I was taught is how bad it is to steal.  I was taught by my mother that the government can do as they will, and was lectured in it - yet here I am totally in the reverse.  My father never sat down trying to dissuade what was taught to me, yet I picked it up on my own.  The "ideas" this toy is implementing is no worse than a G.I. Joe who you can shoot and cause damage to - oh look your teaching kids guns won't kill you D:

 

[thelivingphoenix]

I'm ultra-anti-big-brother-1984 shit. I was raised a "conspiratorialist" and I'll probably die flipping off the government. But it's just as Sixty said, and I think you're reading too much into a silly toy. It's super easy to spy on anyone doing anything. I'm more worried about people microchipping their pets and giving little kids ID cards than about if a 6 year old wants to hear their mom nagging at their dad to bring home milk on the way home.

As more of our liberties are thrown out the door in lieu of safety, I become increasingly stubborn and anxious. But until I see a toy that implants into a kid or says, "Hey kids! Are your parents doing things illegal?? Then take Mr. Wacky Camcorder's tape and send it to 1010 Government St!", I'll assume it's mostly harmless.

Conspiratorialist?  I'll be a conspiracy factist until the day I die.  9/11?  7/7? Big brother?  They're some of the only things I study in my free time.  Extensively.

The thing is, the government and the "elite" do things like this incrementally and you rarely ever know that you're being conditioned to think and act a certain way.  Subliminal messages and getting a small portion of the population to accept something as voluntary, then deciding that since one third of the population likes it to just go ahead and make it law.  If you get a group of people to accept something, anything, as acceptable and okay behavior, it opens up a pandora's box of things that they can get you to accept down the road.  Give an inch and they'll want another inch and another inch and yet another.

Kids are being microchipped in Rhode Island by a school district right now without any approval from the state at all.  Sure, the chip's only going to be in their backpack and make it so the parent can check on their location and make sure they got to school and everything, that's okay, right?  I mean, what harm could come from putting a chip in their backpack?  Chips implanted in people are bad, but implanted in backpacks are okay, right?  No.  Because at it's core, this school district is teaching small children (1st through 4th grade) that the idea of their every move being tracked and cataloged is absolutely fine and normal when it is not.  Teach them while they're young that being chipped and cataloged and spied on is normal and we WILL have a big brother society by the time they're old enough to have any influence in government.

"We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, largely by men we have never heard of."--Edward Bernays

"It is not necessary for the politician to be the slave of the public's group prejudices, if he can learn how to mold the mind of the voters in conformity with his own ideas of public welfare and public service. The important thing for the statesman of our age is not so much to know how to please the public, but to know how to sway the public."--Edward Bernays

A cookie for anyone who knows who Edward Bernays was.

Let the propaganda begin.  What about shows like The X-Files?  While that show was one of my favorites, I'm also aware that it largely could have been a propaganda machine (I mean, it aired on Fox, c'mon), but the propaganda had nothing to do with aliens.  What it did have to do with were conspiracies and conspiracy theorists and creating the mindset that anyone who believes in conspiracies is a little nutsy like Mulder and that conspiracies in themselves are always crazily unlikely, bizarre, and so far "out there" that it could only ever happen on your TV screen.  Eerily similar to September 11th was the pilot episode of The Lone Gunmen which depicted the conspiracy of a plane flying into the World Trade Center.  People think that propaganda is only present in the news and they wouldn't/couldn't ever use entertainment media like our TV shows and movies or even toys to condition us into thinking one way or another about any particular subject.  To teach us that "oh, it's not that bad" or "after all, it's to protect us against terrorists".

What made the show 24 so popular?  It didn't come out until after 9/11 and is terrorism-based.  It shows them breaking all kinds of laws to "catch the terrorists".  Warrantless searches, wiretapping, torture, etc.  What's the point?  To teach you that this behavior out of law enforcement and government is acceptable.  Conveniently first airing on November 6th, 2001, immediately after 9/11.  Instant overnight hit.  Why?  Because people were scared after 9/11 and wanted something to hold onto that said "we're gonna go get the big, bad terrorists and we don't care how we have to do it".

People simply do not understand how their minds are molded these days.  Anyone else besides me and probably Venetia know what "doublethink" is?  I guard against it on a daily basis because I know it's there, but if you don't know it's there, you can't protect yourself against it.  For example, I believe 9/11 was an inside job.  Now, I've shown my mom all the evidence in the world and one day, she's as convinced as I am.  The next day, she'll do an about face and tell me that it could've been Osama bin Laden or whatever all along and that we just didn't know and there's no way to prove it who it was, after all.  I say "Mom, you're doublethinking again.  Pick an opinion and stick with it.  Flip-flopping and confusing yourself isn't healthy."  People engage in doublethink because they're afraid that one of the opinions they hold is true and that the other opinion, while an obvious lie, is a safer reality to live in.

People take part in this all the time and they don't even realize that they're doing it.  The fact is, people are more able to be influenced by "unseen forces" than they would like to admit.  No one is as smart or unable to be influenced as they think they are, especially if you own an idiot box. 

To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself. That was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word 'doublethink' involved the use of doublethink.

Here in California, I keep getting letters from PG&E with them telling me "Hey, we'll give you $25 if you agree to let us remote control your thermostat! It's not big brother trying to creep his way into your house, it's perfectly okay and even voluntary".  It's voluntary today.  Auto insurance used to be voluntary.  People said years ago that it wouldn't ever be made mandatory, that it was a choice.  Health insurance is supposed to be voluntary, but depending on what happens with the election in the US, I don't know if it'll be voluntary much longer.  That's how these things start out... introduced as voluntary and eventually made to be mandatory.  There are some places in the US where you can't even smoke in your own home, much less in public.

Back to the toy, it is most certainly the ideas that are put forth by something as simple as a toy that are dangerous.  The goal is to ultimately get you to accept the behavior that it represents and even if you don't accept the behavior, they'll take "oh, it's just a toy" as a viable answer.  Even if you don't like it, they want you to be passive about it.  And of course, there's the likelihood that the makers of the toy are completely innocent and just wanted to make a buck and that's fine, but it's still something that shouldn't be accepted as being a toy.  Teaching children when they're young to spy on people and conditioning them to grow up to be part of a big brother society is what will ultimately bring us into a big brother society.  We're nowhere near 1984 level yet, but slowly it's getting there.

And just to clarify a little, in case some missed it, this toy also allows the conversations tapped to be transmitted to an FM radio.  So, not only is it okay to tap phone conversations, it's also okay to transmit them. 

 

[wallace074]

What luck that I find this the day I finish 1984!

Reading that last post, I'm a little confused how your mom was doublethinking, but that's unimportant. This toy, have any of you bought it? Do you really think very many children would buy this? I think the few remaining "good parents" are smart enough to know not to but this, and those who aren't won't bother buying it anyway. The only scenario I can think of where a parent would buy their kid this toy and let them use it would be for fun. Hook it up to a phone and then call whoever and jokingly say something like "Oh, my kid is so great blah blah blah", or something along those lines. I don't think this is really that big of a deal.

But since this seems to be a big issue because it's sending the wrong message or whatnot, I see where you people are coming from who say that. But really, I think it's only a problem in theory. In reality (which is only in our minds harharhar =P), I don't think too many kids are going to get the message that spying is alright just because their parents bought them a toy phone bug, emphasis on toy. If any of you have bought this (which you probably haven't), you would most likely see that this is no high quality, professional phone tapper. This is just a toy, nothing more, it would seem.


As for 1984 and doublethink...
I see phoenix's point about how this isn't 1984 yet, but it seems to be getting there. But again, this is just a toy, and there's no such thing as the Though Police (yet) who are going to go come take you away because your kid heard you yelling at daddy or slandering President Bush and instantly reported it. We're not training our children to be spies, and we're not being watched by telescreens 24/7.
[Although, after reading 1984, I do feel like the Party could actually exist, and that we're all proles...O_O]

So yeah, in short: This is just a toy, it doesn't seem to be causing too much harm (there's nothing on the news, and it's still for sale). So I'd say quit worrying, quit complaining, they boots aren't coming for you yet.

Oh and, hi everyone!

 

[thelivingphoenix]

Reading that last post, I'm a little confused how your mom was doublethinking, but that's unimportant.

My mom was doublethinking because she was telling herself that what she knew to be true in her heart was an untruth and that what she knew to be untrue was in fact true.  When you take something that you know in your own heart is the truth and try to convince yourself that an alternative theory is true to make yourself feel better or to feel like there's nothing that you can do about it, anyway, that is doublethink.

No, the kids aren't likely to realize what the "message" is, but do we realize what the messages that are being transmitted to us every day via the television are?  Do we realize there have been subliminal messages on the Food Network?  We often don't realize that we're being trained and conditioned until it's already taken its intended effect.

They're working on passing bills that include "thought crime" right now.

HR 1955 Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007

This bill is vague enough to include "thought crime". 

(2) VIOLENT RADICALIZATION- The term `violent radicalization' means the process of adopting or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance political, religious, or social change.

What is considered "extremist"?  Who decides what train of thought will lead to violence and what will not?  Since this does not define what an "extremist belief system" exactly is, it opens itself wide to government interpretation.

Further down in the bill, it states that homegrown terrorists span all ages and races, alluding to the theory that in fact anyone can be a terrorist and that everyone is suspect.  It also states that any measure to prevent violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism should not violate the constitutional rights of citizens, but since the very definition of "violent radicalization" includes "extremist belief system" (which is not defined) is in itself unconstitutional, this bill already violates civil rights because an "extremist belief system" can be literally anything they say it is. 

As for important things appearing on the news, I don't watch mainstream news anymore because all that they typically peddle on channels like CNN are globalist agendas and the latest celebrity squabbles.  That bill I just showed you?  That wasn't on the news, either.  Neither was the groundbreaking measure taking place at a Rhode Island school district to microchip the backpacks of children.  Guns were confiscated in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and while it was on the news, it was portrayed as completely acceptable "under the circumstances".  Completely and totally unconstitutional and some people even deny that the confiscations even happened at all! 

As a rule, people are generally uninformed about what's going on in the world around them whether it is because they simply don't care, they block out what they do see, or they just don't have time to pay attention between going to work at 6AM and getting home at 5PM only to eat dinner, shower, do other random things, and go to sleep.

We're not being watched by telescreens, but they're definitely pushing for cameras to be put in your home.  Comcast wants to do just that.

Notice how the article says that it's not a big deal and nothing to worry about.  Well, later, the government will probably say "well, if they'll let a private company have an eye inside their home, then why shouldn't be be able to have one in there, too?".  I mean, why not go ahead and let them set the precedent.  It may sound ridiculous, but probably one out of 3 people think that it's a great idea and would improve the quality of their cable service.  They only have to sway about a third of the population to make something a law; all they do is exaggerate about the support for this or that on the news and convince everyone that everyone else wants it.  Fixing the news to sway the population one way or another isn't hard to do.

 

[Dissonance]

The thing is, the government and the "elite" do things like this incrementally and you rarely ever know that you're being conditioned to think and act a certain way.  Subliminal messages and getting a small portion of the population to accept something as voluntary, then deciding that since one third of the population likes it to just go ahead and make it law.  If you get a group of people to accept something, anything, as acceptable and okay behavior, it opens up a pandora's box of things that they can get you to accept down the road.  Give an inch and they'll want another inch and another inch and yet another.

Um.

Everything in our universe without exception does this.  You don't think you've been conditioned by, for example, your religion to think and act a certain way?

When the government does it oh no it's bad but when a non-government source, especially one that cloaks itself with the word 'faith' does it, it's completely fine... right?

Everything in our world conditions us.  It's ultimately your choice what conditions you, but like it or not, you're getting conditioned one way or another.

People take part in this all the time and they don't even realize that they're doing it.  The fact is, people are more able to be influenced by "unseen forces" than they would like to admit.  No one is as smart or unable to be influenced as they think they are, especially if you own an idiot box. 

Including you, by the way.  Just because the unseen forces that have their hands in your brain call themselves "God" instead of "Bush" doesn't make them any less malevolent.

To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself. That was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word 'doublethink' involved the use of doublethink.

Hi Christianity.

You've spent all your posts talking about the government and private companies and the media doing these things, and while you're correct (for the most part) you're leaving out all the other sources of social programming, specifically the ones that affect you the most.

Maybe you're programmed even better than the rest of us :3

 

[Brimstone-x]

Child services, Police, Government ETC.
Nowadays there like Cancer, they can get you for ANYTHING.
If bet if you burped too hard, they would take your kid away.
You fart crooked, your arrested.
You use the word slant, when refering to a piece of wood, your arrested for discrimination against asians.
Society has got to climb out of its ass.

As for this particular issue. What they don't know won't hurt them.

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

ehh...

Wait what?

 

[bradleydfc]

Come on, I mean if the child was bought up with good morals in the first place it wouldn't want to spy on his or hers parents.
Let alone buy a toy.

 

[Sic Semper Tyranosaurus]

Child services, Police, Government ETC.
Nowadays there like Cancer, they can get you for ANYTHING.
If bet if you burped too hard, they would take your kid away.
You fart crooked, your arrested.
You use the word slant, when refering to a piece of wood, your arrested for discrimination against asians.
Society has got to climb out of its ass.

As for this particular issue. What they don't know won't hurt them.

So how hard do you beat your kids/did your parents beat you?  :hercule:

On topic, I see nothing wrong with this toy. I had one of those super-hearing googaws when I was small, and I could eavesdrop on my own neighbors two houses away. Put that in your conspiratorial pipe and smoke it.

EDIT: Hell, this isn't nearly long enough for a post in a Phoenix thread.

"And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death."--Matthew 10:21

I am quoting this simply because it reminds me of the fire and brimstone youth group I used to attend that insisted that UPC codes were a sign of the apocalypse. Moving on.

Do you have any idea how cheap-fuck those DIY kids' electronics kits are? This is far from professional spying material. It's made in China by people who make them on an assembly line. They're not tenderly crafted by government operatives to function optimally. The technology got cheap, and kids love spy shit. If you can sell cheap shit kids will find cool, the more power to you as a toy manufacturer.

I made a telegraph from a kit when I was seven. I used it to send Morse code to my brother in another room. My god, I could have established a sinister darknet of telegraph terror! No, no I fucking couldn't, because the bloody thing broke within a day!

 

[ShadowEternity]

Why would a child WANT to spy on their parents anyway?.. i mean if the kid was either perverted or just wanting to know what goes on in their parents lives... so pointless...

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

You had a very exciting childhood then, if you never bothered eavesdropping on people.  Congrats on having the most unique childhood ever.