Transparency

There was a time in my life when I was persecuted.  I had at the time challenged an authority which years has not proved pure.  Yet, at the time I was. as I perceived, and others perceived it, persecuted, I was as discreet and secretive as was normal for the times.  I was not more open than the majority by any means.  If anything  I was quite 'closed' and 'other directed'. I had little time for chatting and didn't talk about myself, my family, my actions or those of others except in my family and with intimacy to others who were close friends.
In retrospect my persecutors were quite paranoid about me and others in general. They' 'played their cards close to their chest'.  They let little be known about them and were private to the extreme.  I noted that these men and women who were hurtful of me had this trait.  I further noted that the most evil rulers of the world such as Stalin and Hitler were most secretive. Totalitarian states were such. In contrast in democracies one can learn all manner of things about leaders.  In open societies sexual behaviour, religious and political affiliation are 'open'.  Yet there are those who are very 'closed'.
I concluded to, like the blacks compared to the whites, that I did not have the means despite my inclination to be private from those who today admit to spending millions on finding 'dirt' about Ralf Nader when he campaigned against concealing engineering flaws in the car industry hiding the 'acceptable death rates' per vehicles from consumers.
I realized that I did not as an individual have the resources that CEO's and Government leaders, Police Forces and Military Juntas had for hiding information. Further I didn't have even a minimal capacity necessary for any criminal in any society.
From this I concluded that I couldn't 'hide'.  The blacks said that the white social workers and police were writing everything about them because they lived on the streets.  They were public people because they didn't have large mansions to hide in. They didn't have estates. The did have "help' and often the stories of the help fueled the underground.
Today the rich have lawyers so that they are 'above the law'.  The law occasionally throws one of it's members to the wolves like Martha Stewart or Ojay but mostly so that it could maintain it's role of protected the most wealthy and powerful most of the time from the law that was made for the rest.
With this in mind I figured all I could do was be open and inclusive. In all my relationships I'm 'truthful' to a high degree because I know that those who can will find out all about me and anyone who in any way challenges their power and priviledge.  I'm a public man in this sense and am happy to live in a glass house with the windows open to save me the trouble of cleaning up glass from the windows broken where the light shone out.  I'm not sure about showing light much anymore, enjoying candle light much more than neon.
Further I learned that since those who are most dangerous to me, having the greatest capacity to kill, maim, ostracize or remove me even on whim I should endeavour to avoid threatening them. However I notice that what threatens them is anyone who doesn't serve them and agree with them, whoever they might be who are above and outside the laws that the rest of us are to live by.
I am therefore open in my speech, writing and behaviour and am routinely informed of what is offensive to them.
I mostly learn what is offensive to them by watching what they 'cover up'.  There is no fault in 9-11 but there is in what is an obvious 'cover up'.  There is no fault in killing 'Saddam Husein" but there is in a 'cover up.  There is no fault in making a mistake about weapons of mass destruction but there is in cover up.
The 'effort to conceal that which is already pulbic is the trail of crumbs which lead to the house where children are shoved in the oven.  I don't seem to look at what is said but more at what is not said and even more at what is 'un-said'.
My communist friends learned what was 'politically correct' and what was 'appropriate' only by seeing who was removed from the pictures each year of the soviets together.  The soviet picture would have some person who represented some idea 'wiped out' .
In the church this was 'heresy'.  What was 'said' was of little relevance but what was not said had more relevance and finally when the church did an about face and attempted to 'un-said' ideas, those where the key ideas which had the greatest power and held the essence of proof in their potency,
In any year there are billions of news events but a channel of news should be devoted to only those events and persons and saying which are being 'removed' 'officially'.  This 'rewriting' is most interesting. It's not the 'deconstructionism '. It is something different.
It calls for 'transparency.  Transparency is not something 'privledged'  We are as 'sick as our secrets'.  We are not transparent before God and the idea of living 'greed lies' and 'conventions' is the basis of 'gossip' and the power of 'gossips' .  It puts all pwer back into the secret society even as that soicety claims it is no longer secret.  The best lie is a better lie.
I would suggest an act of minor 'transparency' such as 'self disclosure' about an arcane aspect of one's self or one's nation and watch the faces of those around and the comments of the those present and judge perhaps the most 'closed' have the greatest 'sin' or 'that which one must hide."  The rich have always had bats in the attic and very strange sexual practices.  Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It's not unreasoable to consider it possible they are statistically similiar to any other grouping of humans.  1 percent may be perverts.  30% suffer addiction.  Those with chemical addictions are at greatest risk for other awkward perversities.  Eventually they may settile down and with the power they control conceal their past and right pleasant lies which they'd like their children and their citizens or company to believe.  They white wash.  Indeed lies of the kind often get called 'white lies'.  Eventually all lies seem sordid and grey and those who must lie to maintain power seem weak and pathetic.
I have already concluded I cannot conceal anything really.  Even thoughts and ideas can be extracted these days.
The social network is a prison of a sort as it allows so much more to be recorded about all.  Just as lists of terrorists are compiled those who might buy milk are too and finally those who would by lies.  Armies or audiences can be found as easily.
Transparency is a way to avoid having the items of your garbage whatever that is and we all have it, even those who are utterly stupid, common and boring and have an issue with their body odor , have things they'd rather conceal about themselves.  A private eye can simplyt go through their 'garbage' outside their house or the taxman can go through your tax records or visa or master card or a gps detector in your phone can plot your preferred locations.
The question is would you rather have me tell your children the 'truth' about you or would you rather tell them yourself.  I think the future will be a race to release information.  I think the future will be one in which we trust the person who was 'transparent' first.  It might not even be important what they said they put in the kitchen garbage but rather that they were truthful and forthcoming about the declaration of contents.
Dr. Carl Jung developped a word association test in which he charted the time between the speaking of a word and the response.  The longer the delay the greater the psychological drama.  I personally think that what he learned in the Psychiatric Asylum has great value politically.
(uneditted - freudian slips remain)