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Does the US Patriot Act undermine Americans' freedoms?

Results so far:

Yes
74% 188 votes Total: 255 votes
No
26% 67 votes

My father insisted on me reading the book 1984 by George Orwell about 12 years ago when I was being home schooled for that one year. I quickly realized that the reason for his wanting me to read it was due to the parallels between what Orwell wrote about in the 1930's inspired by the actions of the Nazi's, and what was happening with the Clinton administration in the 1990's. It was a satirically written warning about how a totalitarian government slowly takes complete control over its populace. Now with the passing of the Patriot Act during the Bush Administration we draw far nearer to that reality. This concept of watching our neighbors and reporting any "suspicious" behavior is highly suspect to me. The Nazi's had a program called the Hitler Youth which trained children to spy, even on their own parents for signs of disloyalty to the party. This is what made it so difficult for people who opposed Hitler's regime to have any impact at all upon the people of Germany to stop the atrocities taking place. In the novel people who fought for freedom were labeled "terrorists". Now already freedom loving people who have shown absolutely no sign of violent tendencies or plans have been labeled as terrorist organizations. As the war on terror continues I fear that this government is going to continue invading into our lives until the lovers of freedom feel they have no choice but to echo the sentiments of Thomas Jefferson. "When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for a people to advance from that subordination in which they have hitherto remained and to assume among the powers of the earth equal and independent station to which the laws of nature and nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the change." Quoted from the rough draft of the Declaration of Independence found at http://www.ushistory.org/decla ration/rough.htm. I thought it sounded better to make my point than the words Jefferson eventually settled on for the final draft. However by the time we have been pushed to that point, a push that has been happening slowly over the last fifty to one hundred years or more, this Patriot Act and others which will inevitably follow it, will have decimated any chance we might have at regaining our freedom. Today it is terrorists. In less than one hundred years, maybe even less than fifty, it may be the resistance movement trying to take back the freedom we are slowly


Below are the top articles rated and ranked by Helium members on:

Does the US Patriot Act undermine Americans' freedoms?

Yes
  • 1 of 21

    by Elise Warren

    "Those who are willing to give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither, and will lose...read more

  • 2 of 21

    by Nikolaus Federmann

    The Patriot Act is a direct assault on American freedoms and values that once made this country great, but today such...read more

No
  • 1 of 10

    by Lou Rountree

    Americans will have to stop swallowing the politically motivated idea that the Patriot Act is in place to undermine t...read more

  • 2 of 10

    by Jim Shortz

    I would argue that our cars are much more dangerous than our homes. Back in the 90's I was riding my cousins bike whi...read more

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