Oh dear....MOBESE is moving South!
You may or may not have heard about MOBESE, which is a massive surveillance camera system that monitors the streets for the Turkish police. The project was started after some success with similar systems in New York, Athens, and London. At the moment there are cameras in Istanbul and Ankara. Part of me likes the idea of police officers watching the streets and responding when something is wrong, and then the rational side of me screams "IT'S BIG BROTHER! THEY AREN'T THERE TO PROTECT YOU! THEY ARE THERE TO MONITOR YOU!"
Well MOBESE is moving south, Zaman online is reporting that plans are in the works for installing the cameras in Cizre, Sirnak, and Silopi as the FIRST PHASE of the project. Officials are openly stating that the cameras are being installed to find PKK sympathizers in the streets. Forget about fighting crime, trying to protect the people, let's spy on everyone and try to wrongly arrest even more people! If you ask me, the Turkish police would be a hundred times more effective if they were out walking the streets like police officers do all over the world rather than spend their time stopping every car that looks interesting on the highway! -sorry, I got carried away there...
What can be done? Sadly not much, they are going to install the cameras no matter what happens...however there is a group of people, aptly named NOBESE-(ahh! people after my own heart)- who are protesting the cameras' installment by performing in front of them. Their motto is "since we are being watched, why not perform?" So they perform in front of the cameras, partly to annoy (or entertain) the police watching, and partly to make a statement about how they feel about the system. So let's hope that a Kurdish chapter of NOBESE is started soon!
Well MOBESE is moving south, Zaman online is reporting that plans are in the works for installing the cameras in Cizre, Sirnak, and Silopi as the FIRST PHASE of the project. Officials are openly stating that the cameras are being installed to find PKK sympathizers in the streets. Forget about fighting crime, trying to protect the people, let's spy on everyone and try to wrongly arrest even more people! If you ask me, the Turkish police would be a hundred times more effective if they were out walking the streets like police officers do all over the world rather than spend their time stopping every car that looks interesting on the highway! -sorry, I got carried away there...
What can be done? Sadly not much, they are going to install the cameras no matter what happens...however there is a group of people, aptly named NOBESE-(ahh! people after my own heart)- who are protesting the cameras' installment by performing in front of them. Their motto is "since we are being watched, why not perform?" So they perform in front of the cameras, partly to annoy (or entertain) the police watching, and partly to make a statement about how they feel about the system. So let's hope that a Kurdish chapter of NOBESE is started soon!
posted by Delal @ | Permalink 
