When money is traceable, surveillance becomes an inevitable part of daily life. True sovereignty is achieved only when individuals can exchange value without being monitored.
Discussion
I completely agree. Yet I feel that something is missing.
WHY is privacy fundamental for independence? We can see how people's action change when they think they are being watched. But many will argue that the change is for the better.
People and institutions can use this information against us. But that presupposes malicious intent and overreaching.
We need a clear philosophical explanation why privacy is fundamental to liberty.
If you are the owner of yourself, of your body, then naturally you are the one keeping an eye on yourself. Watching the steps of other mature, beings would be nothing less than perverse.
If you are just the property of the system, a mere resource used to drive the technocratic progress, captured in a golden cage, then surely that system wants to watch over its livestock.
A lot of the people seem to prefer the surveillance. They give a shit about privacy and prefer having control over other people via big brother.