Beware of “Big Brother”!

In 1949, George Orwell (1903~1950) published his book, 1984. In that notable work, “Big Brother” was a warning about where totalitarian power might lead. Today, many Americans point to China as proof that the warning came true. But I think the real picture is more expansive and is an unsettling one that needs to be taken seriously in the U.S.

The Situation in China

China has more than 1.4 billion people—about 17% of the world’s population—and that massive nation has long been governed by an authoritarian leader who subjects them to extensive surveillance.

Local governments there have developed facial recognition software that can be used with the hundreds of millions of surveillance cameras across the country. In northwestern China, the Uighur people, suffering under religious persecution as Muslims, have been under widespread surveillance. But journalists and dissidents have been targeted as well.

Surveillance in China is widespread because of four forces that reinforce each other: the totalitarian political structure; the huge population requiring automated control; urban, digital infrastructure that makes surveillance easy; and tech companies integrated with the state. The combination of those four forces makes China unique.

As my A.I. buddy Claude says, “A surveillance system doesn’t need to touch everyone equally to be effective. It needs only to be capable of finding anyone, at any time, and everyone knows it. The knowledge that you could be watched changes how people speak, gather, worship, and dissent.”

China’s totalitarian leaders built the surveillance system deliberately, by design. That sets it apart from what is happening, and what may increasingly happen, in the U.S. But the tools are the same. Cameras, databases, and software that can track a person’s movements don’t care what kind of government is using them.

The Situation in the U.S.

While there are certainly great differences between surveillance in the U.S. and China, “Big Brother” doesn’t have to be linked to a centralized state with a totalitarian leader. That surveillance can be done with the aid of private networks that the government can freely borrow.

Flock Safety, an Atlanta company founded in 2017, is the private company that produces Flock cameras. As of August 2026, it had alone had about 120,000 cameras in 49 states. Those cameras record roughly 20 billion images every month.

As an ardent Democrat, I rarely find myself agreeing with Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). Yet his warning during a Senate hearing on Flock Safety’s AI-powered surveillance deserves attention. That September 23, 2026, hearing was called, “Always Watching: Flock’s Nationwide AI Surveillance Network.”

Mr. Hawley stated that the current surveillance system in the U.S. is “unlike anything we've ever seen in this country before.” What troubled him was not simply the number of cameras, but the fact that they are linked together, searchable, and increasingly powered by artificial intelligence.  

The issue is no longer whether Flock cameras and A.I. technology work. Rather, it is a matter of whether a free society should accept constant surveillance—and whether such monitoring can and should be considered a violation of our basic human rights.

Supporters emphasize that the Flock camera systems can, and do, help recover stolen vehicles, locate missing persons, and solve serious crimes more quickly than could otherwise be done. And to an extent, that may well be true.

But civil-liberties groups such as the ACLU have argued that expansive surveillance systems can, among other things, chill free speech and political participation, deter attendance at protests or controversial meetings, and create risks of government abuse.

When a conservative Republican such as Mr. Hawley and civil liberties advocates across the political spectrum raise similar concerns, the issue transcends ordinary partisan politics.

Let’s Not Allow “Big Brother” to Impair Our Human Rights

So, while China’s “Big Brother” is centralized, one party watching through one system, USAmerica’s is emerging from the bottom up, thousands of small eyes watching and sharing what they see.

Since Orwell’s warning sounded in 1949 still rings true all these years later, we USAmericans need to take seriously the current surveillance threat in rather than only pointing our fingers at Beijing.

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Note: This blog article was drafted largely after (and because of) reading the excellent piece by Michael Chancellor at this website:

https://goodfaithmedia.org/hidden-eyes-why-flock-surveillance-cameras-must-come-with-oversight/

[I also appreciate the research and drafting assistance provided by Claude and Copilot.]

Be Sure to Vote! (from today to Nov. 3)

The extremely important mid-term election is on November 3, just two weeks from today (10/20). This is a far more important election than most nationwide elections that doesn’t include voting for a President. In 2024, the nation inexplicably elected a Republican POTUS with a majority of the Senate and House. Now is the time to turn the Senate and House back to normality.

The Precarious Senate Races

The Democrats need to flip only four seats to gain the majority in the Senate. That is certainly within the range of possibility. I have written before about two of the six Democrats most likely to flip a Senate seat: Adam Hamilton in neighboring Kansas and James Talarico in Texas. 

Sherrod Brown, who served as a Senator from Ohio from 2007 to 2025, has a good chance of being elected to that post again. He has a small lead in most of the polls at this point. In addition, Roy Cooper is running for the open Senate seat in North Carolina, and he has a sizeable lead in the polls, and Mary Peltola is leading in the polls for Alaska’s Senator.

While it is more doubtful, Josh Turek has a shot at being elected in the red state of neighboring Iowa. He was born with spina bifida, a congenital condition affecting the spine and mobility. He became a world‑class wheelchair basketball player and won a gold medal as a member of USA’s wheelchair basketball team in the 2016 Paralympics.

So, while these are all close races, it seems entirely feasible that voters might elect at least four (or more!) of these six candidates. That depends partly on Democrats voting in large numbers. Since there is such a strong possibility of their winning the House, many Democrats may think it is not necessary for them to vote.

But in the states just mentioned, it is extremely important for Democrats to vote—and I urge you Thinking Friends in Kansas, Texas, North Carolina, and Iowa to do so. (I can’t think of any TFs in Alaska or Ohio, and if I have forgotten someone in those states, I apologize and ask you to refresh my memory.)

What about the House Races?

In some states, such as Missouri, the election outcome is so predictable that there seems to be little use to vote. I am in the sixth district, which voted for Trump by 80% three times in a row. There is no possibility that a Democrat is going to be elected as the Representative from that district, and there is no senatorial election. So why vote?

Copilot tells me that in the upcoming election, 390–405 seats are effectively safe for one party or the other. That means that only 30–45 seats are meaningfully competitive. Voting doesn’t mean much for those of us who don’t live in that small number of competitive districts. But voting anyway may eventually lead to a more purple district.

Vote for the Candidate or the Party?

I have a good friend who has made it clear on Facebook posts that he votes for the best candidate, not for a political party. Similarly, another Facebook friend recently wrote, “I vote, quite faithfully actually. But don’t count on me to be faithful to any one political party! What I care about are policies, ethics, and relational practices.” And a person I don’t know posted, “I choose the side that feeds the hungry, shelters the homeless, educates the forgotten, and treats every person with dignity.”

That is quite different from my position, which is “vote Blue, no matter who.” So, let’s consider this matter a bit further. Why wouldn’t we want to vote for the best candidate rather than for one who and a D or a R after his name?

In the past I have been a supporter of some Republicans, especially of Mark Hatfield (Senator from Oregon from 1976~95) and John Danforth (Missouri Senator from 1976~95). I’ve also held positive opinions of Margaret Chase Smith (Maine Senator, 1949~73) and of Ben Sasse (Nebraska Senator, 2015~23).

But now, with maybe a couple of exceptions, Republicans seeking to become a U.S. Senator or Representative are so under the control of the POTUS, it is hard to see why anyone concerned about the good of the country, and especially about the underprivileged, would think voting for a GOP candidate is the right choice.

So, the midterm elections begin today, and I encourage all of you U.S. citizens to be sure to vote—and to vote conscientiously.

 

Encountering Truth

According to John’s Gospel, Jesus said, “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (8:32, NIV). This article looks at the relevance of those words from these three vastly different perspectives: the 16th century Anabaptists, a 20th century German theologian, and a 21st century novel.  

Emil Brunner’s Emphasis on Truth as Encounter 

One of the most important theologians of the twentieth century was Emil Brunner. Born in Zürich and a lifelong resident of that Swiss city, Brunner (1889~1966) published a seminal book in 1938, and it was first released in English under the title The Divine-Human Encounter (1943).* 

One of the most important books I read in seminary and studied more deeply in graduate school was Brunner's Revelation and Reason, the 1946 translation of his original German book published in 1941 and titled Offenbarung und Vernunft.

In that significant book, Brunner emphasized that humans can know God only by means of revelation, not by discursive reason alone. What God reveals is not information to be grasped by the intellect. Rather, God's revelation is God's own self, who is known primarily by personal encounter. 

Chapter 24 of Revelation and Reason is titled “The Two Conceptions of Truth,” and the “Thou” truth as emphasized by S. Kierkegaard and M. Buber is the truth that comes from “personal encounter” (370-1). That is also the nature of truth which comes from “personal knowledge” as emphasized so strongly by Michael Polanyi in his 1958 book with that title.

When I first studied Brunner and Barth in seminary and graduate school, I found Brunner's theology more compelling because he affirmed truth as encounter and held that affirmation while leaving room for faith and reason to work together.   

Brunner and Barth agreed that God is known only through revelation. They differed on whether human beings have any capacity to seek and to find God’s revelation. Brunner said yes: there is a “point of contact.” Barth said no (“Nein!”), because that would make revelation depend partly on us humans. 

The Shack’s Emphasis on Encountering God 

Wm. Paul Young’s novel The Shack was originally written for his six children. It was first published in 2007, initially by the small, newly created Windblown Media after conventional publishers had declined it—and surprisingly, it became an international bestseller. I recently read it for the second time and was highly impressed with its theological depth. 

Mackenzie (Mack), the central character, is a nominally religious man with traditional theological/doctrinal beliefs. But the book is about his encountering the truth of God by meeting and conversing with “God the Father,” portrayed as a large Black woman, with the Holy Spirit as the fairy-like Sarayu, and with Jesus as a very human-like man who liked to do carpentry work.  

Of course, the bulk of the book must be interpreted as “myth” (in the theological sense), which means, of course, not a “false story” but rather the use of narrative to disclose truth that cannot be stated propositionally.

As Copilot, expresses it, “Mack’s weekend in the shack is not meant to be read as a historical event; it is a narrative vehicle for revelation, healing, and encounter—Brunner’s Wahrheit als Begegnung in fictional form.” (I thought that was a clever way to depict what The Shack was saying.)  

Mack’s spiritual growth and deep comprehension of truth came through the deep encounters with the triune God in the “shack” that he discovered in the woods. The truth he learned from those encounters was quite different from the doctrines he had accepted as a rather perfunctory Christian believer. 

The Sixteenth Century Anabaptists 

The Anabaptist movement began in Zürich, the same Swiss city where Brunner was born. From the start, that modest beginning in 1525 emphasized discipleship, following the Christ they encountered in the Bible and in their somewhat mystical experiences, rather than by studying theological doctrines.  

It has long been said that there is no "Anabaptist theology,” for their movement was about doing rather than writing about theological doctrines. Although I have a Ph.D. in theology, I am happy to be a progressive Anabaptist now, placing emphasis on encountering truth and on seeking to follow Christ faithfully.  

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* The German title was Wahrheit als Begegnung. A second German edition was published in 1963 under the same title, but the English translation, issued the following year, is titled Truth as Encounter: A Study in the Theology of Truth.