The digital panopticon fails to register as surveillance because its subjects feel free

Evidence

Bentham’s Big Brother was invisible, but he was everywhere in prisoners’ minds. Inmates interiorized him. In contrast, the inhabitants of today’s digital panopticon never really feel that they are being watched or threatened. Consequently, ‘surveillance state’ is an imprecise name for describing the digital panopticon. Here, everyone feels free. However, precisely this feeling of freedom – which is nowhere to be found in Orwell’s state – is now the problem. — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics, 91

Categorization

• DEFINE: Shows why ‘surveillance state’ misframes the digital panopticon: interiorized watching vs. unregistered self-exposure.
• recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source
• XREF: connects to: Neoliberal power works so invisibly that the subject believes it is free — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New…, 44; Visible surveillance makes subjects police themselves without any force — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 315; Digital surveillance works because people voluntarily expose themselves — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New…, 32 (+5 more)

Related

• Digital surveillance works because people voluntarily expose themselves (similarity 0.85)
• Visible surveillance makes subjects police themselves without any force (similarity 0.83)
• Digital self-tracking makes each person a self-surveilling guard and inmate in one. (similarity 0.82)
• Digital surveillance outdoes the panopticon by being aperspectival and blindsight-free. (similarity 0.80)
• Neoliberal power works so invisibly that the subject believes it is free (similarity 0.80)
• Surveillance-based power operates by optics rather than force (similarity 0.79)
• The panopticon governs through prevention rather than detection (similarity 0.79)
• Surveillance of the whole population works without coercion and without being in the law (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Digital surveillance works because people voluntarily expose themselves #qualifies (0.82) — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics, 32
• Surveillance is repackaged in the language of personal freedom to gain acceptance #corroborates (0.82) — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 80
• Visible surveillance makes subjects police themselves without any force #qualifies (0.80) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 315
• Surveillance capitalism operates quietly through ambient technology that bypasses our awareness #corroborates (0.80) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1200
• Panoptic power derives from invisible omnipresence rather than real presence #complicates (0.75) — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 38
• Benign convenience helped surveillance capitalism escape political debate #corroborates (0.74) — Naomi Klein, Doppelganger, 276
• The panopticon governs through prevention rather than detection #expands (0.72) — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 275