How Are You Situated?

There was a song years back that claimed, "God is watching us, from a distance."

Actually, God is the inner watchman; GPS is the Intelligence (read:military)-based Big Brother keeping an eye on us from a distance. 

I remember, growing up, the threat of local surveillance was an effective challenge to do the right thing since, even if your neighbor wasn't watching, God was.

Now, the threat is that, not only are we being watched (via hidden cameras), we're being tracked (via cell phone signal every three seconds to the tower), recorded (via Internet's permanent record) and even monitored (via app) for what we think we're enjoying on the privacy of our smartphone.

So, I guess we are very cautious about wrongdoing these days.

Wrong again, Tonto. People, generally speaking, naively go about their business (read:texting) with little thought or worry as to the consequences of their actions. The technical diagnosis is "moral hazard," as in the hazard caused by someone's insensitive immorality.

Frankly, Scarlett, the crime for the morally hazardous is getting caught and having to finally face the consequences. 

Whether a congressman, or cheating spouse, you are playing with fire and I don't mean the lightning bolt from heaven.

As America's funniest homeland videos (read:docu-drama news) has it, not only people but organizations operate as "morally neutral," which is another way of saying no conscientious attention to moral/ethical shortcomings. Isn't it nice to know that some things, like God, don't change? No matter how much education is offered, ignorance is bliss, until that is, it's embarassingly in full display.