I don't think the transparent reality would work. For thousands of years people are known to gather in the back of the woods to hatch plans that must be kept secret before the execution. That's just how people want to deal with a part of the things in their lives.
The secret might be a terrorist plan, a plan to open a new business, a plan to rob a neighbouring village or a plan to arrange a surprise birthday party. You never know, but people like their privacy. Even before the internet and telephone people could talk to other people to arrange things to come, while in the outside it just looked like the folks are walking around the town.
A transparent government and officials would be nice but I think that would never happen either. There are always matters that must be processed with confidentiality in the first stages, or the system just wouldn't work. Consider the old-fashioned hard-boiled journalism: people will talk if they can remain anonymous and confidential, and by talking they can prevent something worse from happening.
Limiting the secrecy of government/public sector affairs to a certain, absolute period of time might work, though. Things should be public as soon as they're finished.
I think that equal anonymity and confidentiality is better than the current world where most people are not anonymous and the powers to be can snoop on the rest and yet retain their own confidentiality in their actions.
Thanks for the reply! Would I be mis-representing things to say that you feel that the need for privacy/hidden communication is predicated by the fact that it has beneficial purposes as well?
The world might certainly be a very dull place if nothing was private - no more surprise birthday parties as you mention, for example - but perhaps there would be equal and opposite benefits to shared knowledge/information?
The situation regarding whistle-blowing itself requires that there is something worth reporting, which wouldn't be the case if the knowledge was already available (unless, perhaps, the knowledge was available but simply not highlighted well enough for people to spot any malicious behaviour).
Totally agree with your final point - it's a very strange dichotomy that as average people are finding less and less privacy, those with privilege or power are the ones who are afforded it.
The secret might be a terrorist plan, a plan to open a new business, a plan to rob a neighbouring village or a plan to arrange a surprise birthday party. You never know, but people like their privacy. Even before the internet and telephone people could talk to other people to arrange things to come, while in the outside it just looked like the folks are walking around the town.
A transparent government and officials would be nice but I think that would never happen either. There are always matters that must be processed with confidentiality in the first stages, or the system just wouldn't work. Consider the old-fashioned hard-boiled journalism: people will talk if they can remain anonymous and confidential, and by talking they can prevent something worse from happening.
Limiting the secrecy of government/public sector affairs to a certain, absolute period of time might work, though. Things should be public as soon as they're finished.
I think that equal anonymity and confidentiality is better than the current world where most people are not anonymous and the powers to be can snoop on the rest and yet retain their own confidentiality in their actions.