Last night on 48 Hours, or was it 2020 ABC,
no, it was Dateline the night before on channel 3
we watched a documented murder being solved.
A husband came home at three a. m. and,
discovering his wife stabbed dead
on the blood smeared kitchen floor
ran out the front door and dialed 911.
In a voice that sounded overwrought
and insincere he reported the crime.
As the person who discovered the body
and the shocked husband as well,
he was the first person of interest.
Bad money and/or bad marriage,
the usual motives for this type of crime.
The husband was tried and convicted
in the court of public opinion, and,
except for the snare of technological
surveillance, would have ended up in jail.
Security cameras, cell phone tower pings,
a timed and dated credit card receipt,
GPS locations, and a DNA rich scene
proved beyond a doubt he wasn’t home.
The same equipment that proved his innocence
provided proof of guilt for another man.
A trail of fuzzy images showed a man with a lot to lose
crossing the street, entering a house that wasn’t his
at an hour that wasn’t right, the middle of the night.
A man, a friendly neighbor, a pillar of the community,
president of the church council, Boy Scout leader,
a really good guy, nobody’s suspect. Justice prevails,
thanks to electronic tattle tales.
At this point the program credits run,
and late night news readies us for bed.
By midnight we drift into a well secured sleep.
encircled and protected by an electronic moat,
a network web of snoopers keeps us sort of safe.
We’ve come a long way since Orwell’s 1984
What was read as a dystopian novel in 1962
is read as a utopian novel now.
Safety seeking citizens are glad to be spied on
with cameras house to house and store to store.
We’ve lost our lust for privacy, and Big Brother,
not your mother, constantly knows where you are.