Imagine living in a world where an unblinking digital eye watches your every text, move and even your facial expressions. While many individuals think the government needs advanced technology and AI to keep everyone safe and organized, letting them use it without any limits is a huge problem. Due to these powerful leaders who care more about control than our freedom, this technology ends up violating our privacy and taking away our basic human rights.

 The government should not be allowed to develop advanced AI because, as real world state propaganda campaigns show, rulers will weaponize this technology to manipulate public perception and protect their own people. Rulers care more about staying in power than protecting our actual freedom. Because of this, giving them unrestricted access to advanced AI means it could be turned into a weapon against regular citizens. One example from APNEWS is Iran using AI to mock America and create false narratives. “Pro Iran groups are using advanced artificial intelligence to create slick internet memes in English to try to shape the narrative during the war against the U.S and Israel” (McNeil). McNeil helps create a sense of what is actually happening with the use of these new technologies and how other countries are using it. How the government's overall accessibility to this new technology should be limited.  Another example from APNEWS “According to AI researcher Neil Lavie-Driver, "This is a propaganda war for them…their goal is to sow enough discontent with the conflict as to eventually force the West to cave in” (McNeil).This proves that rulers use AI systems strategically to weaken their opponents and control public emotion, prioritizing political victories over human rights. Which overall expands their accessibility to do more harm than good proving that sooner or later the technology we use today will be weaponized by other countries along with our own.

  Beyond using artificial intelligence to control political narratives, a greedy class of politicians and corporate billionaires actively collaborate to monopolize personal data for immense financial profit. Rich corporation leaders and political leaders make things even worse. Tech billionaires and politicians team up to form a greedy ruling class. They use AI and personal data to make massive profits and silence any regular person who tries to speak against them as an example of this.  “The NHS granted Palantir, a US tech firm, “a €330m contractor to help build the FDP (Federated Data Platform) installing AI systems to integrate scattered health datasets”      (Booth). This proves that political leaders and massive tech corporations have formed a financial partnership, handing over the data of millions of citizens to a private company. Booth provides another example of these states. “Reporters revealed an internal NHS briefing that granted Palantir staff unlimited access to non-NHSE staff to parts of the platform holding identifiable patient information before it was anonymized” (Booth). This directly proves the idea of elites accessing personal data. The corporation was given unrestricted access to private, identifiable human information without the public's consent. Which is exactly how they are profiting, by using Ai and advanced technology.

 While individuals would argue that advanced AI and surveillance technology are completely necessary because they keep communities safe from crime and make a massive society run smoothly. This perspective isn’t ignored because regular citizens naturally want to live in secure neighborhoods, and using technology to predict or stop danger provides safety and structure as a way to protect innocent individuals. However, the argument against government technology is ultimately pivotal because this promised “safety” provides a trap used by powerful corporate leaders to make citizens drop their guard. While technology might stop certain  crimes, it gives the state the unchecked power to track and manipulate everyone's daily life, proving that total security always comes at the direct cost of losing actual freedom. An example of this  “The tool uses “AI-generated forecasts to anticipate crime patterns and support real time patrol planning” to inform decisions related to officer deployment and day-to-day operations” (University of South Florida).  This proves the opposition's point that supports view AI as a helpful tool, designed to make communities safer and assist law enforcement in preventing crime efficiently. But  “Project Lead YoungJei Lee summarized the project as a “theory guided AI: turning crime forecasting into predictive policing” (University of South Florida). This directly exposes the true danger behind the safety trap. When a government rebrands surveillance as predictive policing, it is no longer just responding to crimes that happened, it is using algorithms to track, monitor, and control public spaces before any action has even taken place, leading directly to the unchecked state control.

Why the technology is wrong and violates human rights. When you know you are always being watched, you become afraid to think or act differently. This technology strips away your privacy, destroys your individuality, and treats human beings like predictable numbers and overall is used to dehumanize people. Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is a Writer who wrote the book Chain-Gang All-Stars. The novel talks about the pain and suffering people are dealing with inside the CAPE program, a series of battles about straight up  killing each other. In the book we see Hendrix describing what it's like being a link in the CAPE program. means, you speak, you get the pain. Speak and get a good shock. Use your voice and feel the hard lightning. (Adjei-Brenyah 64) Hendrix is explaining that these powered cuffs shock you every time you speak as a link so you don't have verbal interactions with others unless you want pain to come along with it. Later into the book a protester named Mari goes onto the battleground to help convince people the CAPE program needs to end. “The entire stadium could see when one of the officers pulled a weapon that looked like a gun from his side and shot a black rod into Mari’s

Neck.”  (Adjei-Brenyah 371) Adjei uses Mari as an example and connection to our modern world. Adjei also uses the character Mari as an allegory, and what speaking up can do to someone in a corrupt environment.  A real life example of the government using technology aggressively “Facial recognition is just one technology tool that ICE has deployed in Minneapolis, where thousands of agents are conducting a crackdown. The technologies are being used not only to identify undocumented immigrants but also to track citizens who have protested ICE’s presence, said three current and former officials of the Department of Homeland Security who were not authorized to discuss confidential matters.” (Frenkel) The words “but to also track down citizens who protested ICE’s presence”  connects to Adjei’s allegory of speaking up and protesting in a corrupt environment. It has the same meaning of when Mari was shot for trying to speak up but instead of just one it’s multiple people getting tracked down for protesting for a safer environment and to protect innocent people. Proving the points of government silencing with the help of AI.

Given these points Americans should be informed that the government’s use of technology manipulates citizens of their rights and new technologies being developed contribute to this. Even if the government denies these claims about the abuse of technology, the evidence previously stated proves any and almost all claims to be false provided by the government.  Even though many people believe that the government’s use of advanced technology and AI helps keep everyone safe it really is the opposite. That is why ultimately the government shouldn’t have the access to advanced AI and technology they possess today which creates more harm than good.