In my post about George Orwell's 1984, I commented that one weakness of the work is its supposition that power is centralized in the state. I argued, to the contrary, that power is more diffuse, and that a group of corporations has become our Big Brother. I must now include banks along with corporations, and I have a story to back up my claim. A relative of mine was asked a number of security questions by his bank (with which I am completely unaffiliated) in order to verify his identity. He was surprised by all of the questions, as he could not figure out how the bank was in possession of this information. One, in particular, shocked me: they asked him in which state I reside. Not only does the bank know we are related (which is not a given), but it also has personal information about me. Needless to say, I am pretty creeped out. We joked that the bank probably got its information from Mark Zuckerberg (the CEO of facebook). It is known, after all, that facebook sells people's information to corporations.
Don't worry about the size of government. Worry about the size of the "private sector"!
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