Bellelo "State Of Play"

In any form of democracy privacy is needed for it to flourish. Since privacy involves bodily and social autonomy and self-determination, as well as the ability to create zones of intimacy and inclusion that define and shape our relationships with one another, control over information is, a key aspect of violating individuals’ right to privacy. This creates problems for the individual and the society as a whole which will lead to the destruction of democracy. If the individual is not granted privacy there is a whole bunch of problems that could occur for the individual and society. Problems for the individual would include lack of subject knowledge of data collected, blacklisting, witch hunts, discrimination and guilt prediction, selective advertising, inversion of the onus of proof, covert operations, unknown accusations and accusers and denial of due process. Problems for society would include pervasive climate of suspicion, adversarial relationships, focus of law enforcement on profiled subjects, inequitable application of the law, stultification of originality, increased tendency to opt out of voting, and other civic duties, weakening of society’s moral fiber and cohesion, and repressive potential for a totalitarian government. In State Of Play, the scene in which Congressman Stephen Collins tells the whole story between him , Sonya Baker, and PointeCorps to reporters of the Washington Globe is an example of how being deprived of privacy will lead to the destruction of democracy. Throughout this scene we see PointeCorps and Collins’ break their band of trust and start to invade others privacy. This soon leads to the death of four people and a very corrupt democracy.

As I analyzed the scene, I could tell right away that there was no such thing as privacy anymore. The shots in this scene move very quickly giving the audience a since of how hectic and distorted things have become. Also, when Collins’ is explaining himself his words are overlapped and much information is said showing how much needed to be said for the reporters to understand. Lastly, while Collins’ is speaking they flash back to Robert Bingham several times getting into his army uniform and assembling his gun. This is important because it all relates back to the question why is privacy needed for a democracy to flourish? Which we soon learn is the ultimate consequence of the destruction of privacy, the death of innocent individuals.