I just want to be free

[jenstar]

I don't want to live somewhere where the government is sticking its nose in to one's private business. I don't want to live somewhere that has CCTV cameras all over the place. I don't want to live somewhere where you have to carry ID. I don't want to live somewhere where entering the country involves red tape and being vetted and regarded as a future criminal. Where can I live? There must be somewhere - on an obscure island, or the middle of the jungle, or in the arctic wastes. Anywhere... but where?

[snoteater]

Try Mars.

[jenstar]

If only that were possible.

[luckystrike]

You should count yourself lucky living in the UK - but if you still are not happy, and are not appreciative of the security and safety that is provided for you, why not try a few months in the Democratic Rupublic of the Congo, Angola, Eritrea, Haiti, Nicaragua, Israel, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, and countless other countries around the world where the citizens are considerably less fortunate than us.

[BigDogsWang]

Touche!

[jake-the-peg]

Our forefathers fought long and hard for the sorts of freedoms not enjoyed in the countries that Luckystrike mentions.

Now the state tells us it must have increasing power over us to protect us from the danger that it has brought to these shores by meddling in the affairs of other countries.

And somehow this is great fortune!

George Orwell must be spinning in his grave - I can almost hear the clocks stiking thirteen

[libertie]

Frankly it does'nt bother me at all!  Really would'nt like to live anywhere else.

[Little Lady]

Well snoteater beat me to it! Not sure i would want to live any of those places that luckystrike mentioned mind. Maybe take stock of what you do like and have got and try and be more positive about life and things in general there are alot worse off places than good old britain i tell theee.........

[Quizmonster]

Your question reminds me, Jenstar, of the story - probably apocryphal - of the American professor who, in 1940, simply 'knew' that the USA was going to be drawn into a world war. He decided to work out where the safest place on earth was and move there. A remote Pacific island seemed ideal and he eventually settled for the island of Guadalcanal and went there. You may never have heard of it, but it became the scene of some of the worst of the US/Japanese fighting of the whole of World War II!

The devil you know truly is often much better than the one you don't.

[flaming]

As other EU countries having ID cards it was enevitable that our Government would want it. the people it's  aimed at won't be pinned down by the cards.  Can you imagine people already outside the law sticking up their hands for an ID card?  Some people will make a packet with forgeries.   But everyone who protests about anything can be asked to show ID.  a dossier can build up nicely about people in any  protest movement.  It will  be there for any future Governments to use as they think fit. Those who say 'I don't protest on the streets about things' ok, you haven't yet, but ask the people who have marched/ protested whether they thought they ever would.   

Also, most of us have been pinned down over the years anyway.  Noticed how anyone can pinpoint you within seconds by your postcode?  Money laundering rules require every second person to ask  proof of ID & address.  How many criminals and frauds have been caught by these rules being operated.  Not many, I'll warrant.    What's missing is an overall ID document which has to be carried around for police and government officials to have access to easily, with the net widened as to who can know your name and where you live even if you haven't done anything. the Government still won't be able to control  fraud possibilities re postal voting or know who's in the country illegally, at least not for about 50 years or so, as new births are registered and ID'd and un-ID'd people die.

The cost of it 'out of our pockets' is academic really, as the money 'in their pockets' is ours too, or was.

People ought to think very carefully about the benefits/disadvantages of this, as it's forever once it starts.  That means people's children and grandchildren... forever.