Privacy In The USA

As human beings and citizens of the world, everyone values their privacy. It is a right that is often looked over and taken for granted by most. Since the beginning of time, there have been concerns about individuals’ rights to privacy and their personal information remaining confidential. Our founding fathers had concerns about this which is why, “…this right has developed into

Privacy is defined and interpreted differently depending on the person or persons involved. The one thing that is agreed upon is that privacy in all forms is a right and shall receive equal protection for all people under the laws of the constitution. This includes the right to our personal affairs to be let alone, financials, medical records, opinions, privacy of worship, privacy in our homes and intimate interactions. However right to privacy extends far beyond our personal lives and information being left alone and out of the public eye. In the past privacy was not something that was thought of so

"59 Radio Address about the American Right of Privacy. February 23, 1974." American Reference Library - Primary Source Documents, Jan. 2001, p. 1. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=mih&AN=32360825.

The American people, including many big corporations such as Apple, disagree with the government collecting the personal information of the American people. President, Barack Obama, stated that intelligence committees and all congress members were briefed on the Patriot Act and its contents (Obama). The congressmen knew what the Patriot Act did involving the personal commutations in the United States. Nevertheless, the Patriot act was voted into being a law almost unanimously in the senate, 98-1, and 357-66 in the House of Representatives (Patriot Act). When Ed Snowden leaked that the NSA was obtaining personal information and how it was handled, the American people became shocked and outraged towards the government, and created a tension from the American people towards the government.

Privacy is what allows people to feel secure in their surroundings. With privacy, one is allowed to withhold or distribute the information they want by choice, but the ability to have that choice is being violated in today’s society. Benjamin Franklin once said, “He who sacrifices freedom or liberty will eventually have neither.” And that’s the unfortunate truth that is and has occurred in recent years. Privacy, especially in such a fast paced moving world, is extremely vital yet is extremely violated, as recently discovered the NSA has been spying on U.S. citizens for quite a while now; based on the Fourth Amendment, the risk of leaked and distorted individual information, as well as vulnerability to lack of anonymity.

While I trust the government and support their policies, you, the federal government, have failed us Americans. When attempting to gain information for an investigation, nearly 22.1 million innocent Americans have been exposed to the public with their personal information hanging by a thread, according to the Washington Post. You politicians may assume that justice is served by providing victims with incentives of extra security technology, but the federal government should not be allowed to gain information from personal devices for their investigation. Furthermore, the use of malware to hack these innocent Americans is an invasion of privacy, ruins devices and their data, ensues lawsuits and their costs with unnecessary breaches, and may even put people’s lives at risk.

In 1787, the constitution was born. The constitution has been America’s guideline to the American way of life. Our US constitution has many points in it to protect America and it’s people from an overpowered government, our economy, and ourselves. The only thing the constitution doesn’t directly give us, is our right to privacy, and our right to privacy has been a big concern lately courtesy of the National Security Agency (NSA).(#7) Although our constitution doesn’t necessarily cover the privacy topic, it does suggest that privacy is a given right. Some people say that the right to privacy was so obvious, that our founding fathers didn’t even feel the need to make a point about it.(#9) It also didn’t help

The First Earl of Chatham, William Pitt, in his Speech on the Excise Bill, claimed that “The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the force of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the wind may blow through it; the storms may enter, the rain may enter,—but the King of England cannot enter; all his forces dare not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement!”

Privacy or lack thereof, in present

The American culture focuses more on the individual.  Typical Americans always want to be independent.  Traditionally, they never appreciate anything that they have, are selfish, and ignorant to other cultures.  On the other

Surveillance cameras are needed for public places in order to ensure safety of all individuals. The government, for the most part, is on Americans side and wants to ensure Americans protection. Safety in shopping centers, in traffic, and on the streets is a huge issue in America today. Despite what the majority of Americans believe, officers do care about the people in the cars and want to ensure their safety at all times. Privacy is not dead in America, people have violated the trust of others and as a result have lost complete privacy.

The privacy of American citizens has been long debated ever since the N.S.A. was revealed to the public on what it was doing. Since then, American citizens have been arguing over what the N.S.A. should and shouldn 't be doing. This has lead to the government changing some things, but not everything and causing the American citizens to get upset and wonder what is and isn 't being watched. We go through on a daily basis wondering if our next phone call, that next email, our websites we browse and even our next text message is being monitored by the government and if it is will it get flagged as something they deem worthy of investigating into. This constant fear has us wondering what we should and shouldn 't be posting on various social media sites, taking pictures of or even talking about. By questioning what the N.S.A. is doing, we leave ourselves pondering what the government should do to adjust what control the N.S.A. should have, the activities it should be conducting, who they should be monitoring and what gets flagged as warranting further investigation. Many people believe that the N.S.A. should have restrictions placed on it that prevent it from having complete access to everything, in which if they are going to be able to access anything they want to they need to inform the public on what information they are going to get and how they use it as without this information being

The government's involvement in the daily lives of Americans is a high contested issue--where do our rights end and invasions of our privacy begin? Though it may be true that the government should not control deeply personal decisions, such as the decision to marry or the freedom of a woman to control what is done to her body, there are times when decisive executive choices must be made without leaving the responsibility to the common people. This fact does not work against America’s goals of democracy and self-sufficiency, but rather proves that our government can support these goals by taking action to solve serious nationwide problems.

Privacy is an especially equivocal idea, in particularly because invasion of privacy is a concept that is arguably questionable. Privacy has been defined as the right to be left alone without unwarranted intrusion by government, media, or other institutions or individuals. While this definition serves as a quick start to the right of privacy, there are still several interpretations as to what may or may not constitute as an invasion of privacy. What one person may believe to be an innocent curiosity, another may feel as though it is an deliberate invasion of privacy. Often these disputes make their way into courtrooms and are subjected to controversy and evaluation.

Privacy either encourages or is a necessary factor of human securities and fundamental value such as human embarrassment, independence, distinctiveness, freedom, and public affection. Being completely subject to mutual scrutiny will begin to lose self-respect, independence, distinctiveness, and freedom as a result of the sometimes strong burden to conform to public outlooks.