Have you ever been monitored? With the development of the technology and living standard, people started to focus more on the security of the environment they live in. This semester, Cheshire Academy installed many video surveillance cameras on campus, but lots of students have different opinions about this new movement. In my point of view, cameras are necessary to influence the crucial safety problems in the school, but their usage is still doubtful ethically due to the privacy of the residents on campus, and their quantity should be more appropriate.
We can not deny that the existence of the surveillance cameras would have some important or even potential effects to the security of Cheshire Academy. First of all, most of the gates of students’ dorms were locked. Nonetheless, I noticed that sometimes during the cleaning fair or special events when students all came back together, the doors would be opened and sticked with magnet on the wall. The opened door provided the opportunities for strangers to come in, which was extremely dangerous to more than two hundreds young teenagers. The cameras would be like some electronic eyes for the security personnels to help them eliminate the dangers around students. Second of all, the surveillance cameras may also reduce the theft and the damage of the public facilities in school. Theft has happened before on this campus. The boarders came to school with their properties and the concerns of their families. Apparently, no one wants to be stolen by people who live around them, but pitifully, we still have to admit that the precautionary measures are necessary. Moreover, cameras could also prevent students from damaging public facilities or show the facts after the damage. For example, one of our dorm parents made lots of decorations for Christmas last year, but one day, all of them were pull off. We felt angry and sad for this unkind behaviour. If the surveillance cameras were there, the damage would probably not happen at all. Also, people could know about who threw the decorations away. Therefore, the beneficiary of those cameras is everyone who lives under their protection, for not only tracking the facts, but also reducing the possible incidents.
Nevertheless, this is also a double-edged sword problem. The surveillance cameras not only record the dangers, but also everything of our lives, so I suggest that their quantity and placement should be reconsidered. Take myself as an example, one of the cameras in my dorm is right on the ceiling out of my room. It means once I open the door, someone who seats behind a screen may see everything in my room. During the study hall, when I opened my door as the rule, it made me feel really annoyed because of the camera above my head. This is not singular. There are four surveillance cameras in my dorm, and all of them are recording every minute of our “home”. I argue that students have the right to protect their personal space away from the public monitoring. The dorm should be where provides students a feeling of family, instead of a sugar-coated “jail” under twenty-four hours watching. Is not it ridiculous that a small single floor dorm of high school has four surveillance cameras? The cameras in this school have no dead angle, which means one camera has the ability to monitor two hall ways, and that one camera should be enough for my little dorm. Cameras connect students' daily life, and our privacy is as important as the security to the school. Therefore, although the surveillance cameras should not be abandoned, Cheshire Academy's staffs need to think about reducing their quantity and replace them.
Besides the pros and cons of these new residents in the school, there are still some unknown questions for us to think about ethically. First, is there any staff who watches the cameras everyday? If the answer is positive, then why? It is because I do not think it is indispensable to watch students’ life all the time as enjoying the soap operas. Second, who has the right to watch them? Does Cheshire Academy give everyone authority to monitor? Monitoring is a sensitive problem about privacy. I argue that the one who applies to watch the surveillance camera or the video needs to at least have some valid reasons, such as threft or big damage, because the cameras should not be the tools to control students. Third, how clear are the cameras? If the they are used to track or prevent accidents, then the pixel density that can support the catching of movements should be enough. Recording extra details may only add nervous atmosphere into a normal school dorm. There is no doubt that school installed the surveillance cameras in sake of students' safety. However, according to Anaïs Nin:" When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons." (Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol.4:1994-1947) You may say surveillance cameras are far less serious than religion or politics, but they have something in common. They are both what people should not accept without thinking. We should not just face a bunch of new cameras with complaint or praise after the fact has already arrived. The cameras invaded our privacy while protecting us from the dangers, and we need to think independently on this and negociate with the school in order to treat the cameras in the right way.
Surveillance cameras are not just as shallow as install and recording. They can help improve residences' living quality and pass beyond their privacy lines at the same time. Now, what students should concern are the reasons, arrangement and supervise behind those dark and ubiquitous eyes. Think about them, and communicate the the administrators of the cameras. Once we solve those questions, the surveillance cameras might be the most duteous and lovable guards around us.
Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol.4:1994-1947
---the use of video surveillance cameras on Cheshire Academy's campus in order to promote safety and security.
Pros
1Putting cameras in dorms is useful, in case Strangers break in
2Money and important stuffs have been stolen before on campus, so it would be easier to know what happened.
3someone Damaged the Public facilities in dorm before, and cameras would be helpful to track the whole thing
Cons
Privacy--room
Is there any one who watches the cameras everyday?
Who has the right to watch them?
How clear are they?
Where are they? Only every dorm?
How many of them?
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