Woo! Someone else sees the benefits
It was the 2nd of June 2011. A young 13-year-old girl dressed in her school uniform with her backpack on, left her loving family to walk by herself to school in the quiet, peaceful suburb of Boronia. Little did innocent Bung Siriboon know, she wouldn’t make it to her school that day. She wouldn’t spend her recess and lunchtimes with her friends. She would miss her classes, and she wouldn’t make it home to her parents that night. Days went on, months flew by and a year passed and still to this very day Bung isn’t inside the safety of her home and her family.
She was abducted that June morning, and her attacker has still not been even identified to the police nor any sign or knowledge of her whereabouts. Imagine the pain, the fear, the sick feeling in the stomach that her parents and family would have felt, not knowing where their sweet innocent child was, or who she was with, or whether she is still alive or whether her corpse is rotting in the dark someplace unknown. That is the reality that Bungs family has to face every single second that their child isn’t home safe in their arms.
Bungs’ long suffering family, and the countless number of other brokenhearted families missing their loved ones after they have been stolen from them, are the innocent victims to this communities need for privacy. This communities need for complete anonymity from ‘Big Brother’ and the selfish paranoia stemming from the fear of being watched every second of the day.
They, ladies and gentlemen, are the helpless victims of those who are against the installation of more CCTV cameras in public places whose advanced technology has the power to enable scenarios to be reviewed instantly, events to be played back when appropriate or needed, and to be used to monitor the severity of developing situations. This right here is the technology that can bring other victims like Bung Siriboon back to their homes, to their beds, to their families and to their friends, and at the same time saving numerous lives from assaults and abductions from our streets.
It is clear to even the most ill educated child that this country must immediately install more CCTV cameras, so that no more families need to suffer like Bungs’. So that the young men and women of this country don’t wind up in the same predicament as the beautiful Jill Meagher, who whilst walking along Sydney Rd to her home and loving husband, was raped and murdered in the early hours of the morning of September 22, whose gutless killer was caught by police with the help of CCTV recorded footage. These cameras must be immediately instigated into the public so that no more families need to leave a courtroom followed by the accused acquitted on the lack of evidence against them.
Because, my fellow teachers and classmates, whatever system we have ‘protecting’ us in place now, it’s not working.
Closed-circuit television cameras are currently being used by many organizations. Whether you’re in Chadstone, Fountain Gate, McDonalds or the 7/11 down the road, it is a guarantee that a CCTV camera is monitoring your movements and actions. I’m sure everyone here would agree with me in saying that these cameras are a necessity in identifying any criminal actions like theft or assault. I’m sure anyone really would agree that cameras in shopping centers are a deterrent to those fools who think it would be a real clever idea to steal a pair of shoes or some other item from any retail business. Yet we still have ignorant individuals out there who contest the employment of CCTV cameras, which can save lives.
Local Melbourne newspaper, The Age, reports Melbourne’s CCTV system includes 53 fixed sites and two mobile vans monitored at a perpetually staffed central control region. 53 fixed sites and two mobile vans to monitor the 86162 residents in the City of Melbourne. Now I know that I do not have the most competent brain when it comes to mathematical equations, I do know how to divide a number by a number, and so after doing all the math, albeit using a calculator, I have come to the result that one camera of the 53 fixed sites monitors over 1600 people in the City of Melbourne. You definitely don’t have to be Einstein, or myself, who pretty much stopped paying attention in Math’s in year 8 to know that the ratio of just one fixed camera sight to more than 1600 people is an absolute outrage.
The main purpose of CCTV cameras is to monitor and to protect. These cameras will be used as a tool in conjunction with police to make this city, to make this country, safer for our families, our brothers, our sisters, mothers and fathers. Safer for us to be able to walk down what should be our streets at night without the fear of being subject to vicious assaults, abductions, murders and tortures.
In 2010, the Drugs and Crime Prevention Committee released an inquiry regarding strategies to reduce assaults in public places within Victoria. The inquiry showed that 52% of assaults in Melbourne’s CBD were single victim/single offender assaults. That percentage is calculated for only incidents in which the offender has actually been identified. So, I ask you now, how many others? How many other men, women and children out there have been assaulted in this city without their offender being caught? How many of these poor innocent victims have been too afraid to speak out, to ashamed to tell anyone? How many of these individuals reduced to nothing, reduced to empty shells filled with fear from their attacking or assault, could have benefited from their twisted attacker being caught on CCTV footage?
It is our time to change things. It is our time to fix the city we all live in. It is our generation that’s supposed to be technologically advanced. It’s time that we live up to our name. We have a technological solution in our hands, and we need more people to wake up and realize that whatever we have now has not worked and will not work.
I cannot stress enough how important these cameras are. I am sick and tired of watching the news every single night and seeing one story after the other. People being viciously assaulted, children being abducted, young men and women getting assaulted, hit and run accidents, malicious rapes and horrific stories of murder; spilling innocent blood all over the city which I’ve loved since I was a little girl. The city I no longer feel safe in, the city in which I fear my loved ones being in at nighttime where the monsters come to prey.
There is a lot of negativity regarding the implementation of CCTV cameras. Most of the arguments seem to be that those who oppose believe that it would be too imposing on our privacy.
I ask you now directly, how much privacy do we have anyway?
According to the dictionary, privacy is the state or condition of living free from being observed or disturbed by other people. Privacy appears to be a very important entity in people’s lives. As with any other important matter, there are countless laws and regulations regarding our privacy and that of others. With these laws, come very serious repercussions if our ‘privacy’ were to be invaded. Yes, I do place privacy in quotation marks because ladies and gentlemen, I question whether we as people and members of this community undeniably have ‘privacy’. I stand here in front of you today, my teachers, my peers, and my friends, to question whether we, as according to the dictionary definition, are truly free from observation by other people.
I would like you all now to take a moment and divert your undivided attention to yourself now. I want you to think about all the details that make you, you. Think about your name, your address. Ponder on the details of the hospital in which you were born, think of your date of birth, your tax file number. Most of you here would be employed somewhere, and earning relatively good money, though I’m sure you would disagree. Think of the bank account number to where your money is transferred. Reflect now on the hobbies that you enjoy, the things that interest you. Cars, music, sport. Contemplate those things. All these details, all these facts and figures. They all add up to who you are; a person with a name, interests and hobbies, an occupation and a home that you live in.
Now, I want you to consider who else has this information; these facts, figures and details that all come back to you. Your school knows your name and date of birth, and like your friends, they all know where you live. Your workplace, they have your bank account details, your personnel file with your tax file number along with your address, date of birth, phone number etcetera. Now divert your attention to social networking sites. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram; think of all those sites. They have your name, your age, your hobbies, and interests. They have your friends, your sexual orientation, information on what you’re doing, who you’re with, who you’re dating, what you had for dinner last night. All these facts, figures, details and information in the hands, and the servers of an offshore company, displayed for people to view. To observe. To retain in their memory. All susceptible to theft from online hackers and cons.
So, how much privacy do you have now?
If you’re content with your workplace, your bank, your friends and your online profile having your personal details then you absolutely cannot say that you have a right to privacy when there are innocent human beings exactly like you being assaulted, attacked and abused because of a lack of exposure. A lack of guardians in the form of CCTV cameras and policemen being able to prevent yourself being attacked from these deranged beings or to put the sick twisted scum who damaged you in a jail cell.
How quickly will your opinion change if these cameras are to catch a monster preying on your innocent child, if these cameras foiled a terrorism attack. Ask yourself, if your loved one was in imminent danger and the use of CCTV cameras could save them, would you give up your privacy for the life of your loved one, or would you subject them to pain to keep whatever privacy you even have to yourself? We shouldn’t be wasting time discussing the pros and cons of CCTV footage. We as a community need to do what is right for our families and our sense of safety. We must reclaim our suburbs for our own and not let them come under the rule of evil hunters looking to spread pain and fear into our hearts. Enough stories on the news about the search for the next predator seeking their victims in our neighborhoods. The time of change is way overdue, we need to place CCTV cameras in every building, outside every retail shop, in every suburban area, down every street. The ratio of 1 fixed camera sight to more than 1600 people needs to change drastically if you or I want to be able to walk down any street at night without the fear of the monsters lurking in the shadows around every street corner.
Why do you fear these cameras if you have nothing to hide? These cameras are here to monitor corrupt and undeserved behavior. When used in unification with police, CCTV cameras record unjust actions in order to incriminate people and to act as a deterrent to further crimes. I cannot stress enough to you that they are used to protect us. If you haven’t done anything wrong, what police officer is going to care about what you do in your own time, they’re not going to care if you go the cinemas with your friends, and they’re certainly not going to care about the stash of food under your bed or your hidden copy of 50 Shades of Grey. They won’t judge you, except for perhaps possessing a copy of 50 Shades, but aside from that they are there to protect you; to make you safe. To allow you to walk down the street at night. The police will use these cameras to fight these sickening criminals victimizing the members of our community, so that they don’t have to go through the agony of telling your loved ones that you won’t be making it home for Christmas.
Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time. It’s time that this community put their own safety and the safety of others above whatever privacy they believe to still have. It’s time that this country of ours implement more CCTV cameras, so that no more families and communities have to struggle with the heartache of losing the ones they hold close. It’s time that we feel that sense of protection knowing that there is somebody not watching us, but watching over us.
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