Save America Ministries

Announcer: This is Viewpoint with attorney and author Chuck Crismier. Viewpoint is a one-hour talk show confronting the issues of America's heart and home. And now with today's edition of Viewpoint, here is Chuck Crismier.

Chuck Crismier: Seventy years ago, George Orwell in his 1984 book envisioned telescreens that constantly watched and listened to citizens. But today, people willingly invite similar surveillance into their homes by purchasing internet-connected smart TVs, voice assistants, and small smart appliances. Today, instead of being forced by a dictatorship, consumers are buying these connected devices themselves for convenience. Wow. Welcome to Viewpoint. I'm Chuck Crismier. It's conversation with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms. One article says, from smartphones to smart TVs, everyday tech becomes the telescreen of the day. In 2024, George Orwell's dystopian vision of constant surveillance feels less like fiction and more like a user manual, said one. While the original novel warned about state-controlled telescreens, today's surveillance comes packaged in the sleek, convenient devices we voluntarily bring into our homes. A chilling reality. Our smartphones, smart TVs, and connected cars have become the modern equivalent of Orwell's telescreens, creating a surveillance infrastructure more pervasive than anything Orwell could ever have imagined. The transformation of personal technology into surveillance tools, is it accidental? It's fundamental to today's economic model. Big tech companies have been built building trillion-dollar empires on data collection, making privacy protection directly threatened to their business models. The convenience of modern technology acts like a digital drug, making users reluctant to abandon services even when they understand the privacy costs. A digital drug? Whoa. The surveillance economy has become so entrenched that even well-informed users find themselves trapped by particular necessities, practical necessities, and social expectations. And that creates a vicious cycle where surveillance begets more surveillance, with each new device adding another layer to the monitoring infrastructure. The line between dystopian fiction and law enforcement is blurring at an alarming rate. We'll talk more about that here today on Viewpoint. Recent developments show how behavioral detection techniques from online gaming are being adapted for real-world surveillance. Smart devices with always-on microphones and cameras provide the perfect platform for this monitoring. The community points to examples like vape detectors in schools that secretly include microphones, demonstrating how surveillance capabilities often exceed their stated purposes. Law enforcement vehicles and public cameras increasingly incorporate advanced modern technology. While connected cars and smart TVs gather data about our private lives. The infrastructure has become so comprehensive that avoiding surveillance requires near total disconnection from modern society. And so the story continues. Today on Viewpoint, we're going to be talking about that and I'm glad you've joined us. It's conversation as always with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms. And indeed, we're living in an amazing world. When I was born, I would never have ever, ever, ever contemplated anything like what we're seeing today. I remember in high school when I read the book 1984. And it really gripped me, it grabbed me and I remember to this day those surveillance cameras, the TV screens, and so on that were monitoring and the government could understand everything you say at any given time and you couldn't turn it off. Wow. Ongoing surveillance. But today, we have a system, a situation in which surveillance has become a way of life. In fact, it's become virtually a way of bragging about new conveniences, and about how easy it is to control our circumstances around us, whether you're talking to Alexa or Google or whatever, it's getting your information. Always on, always always there to help you, unknowingly there to help others at our expense.

Announcer: And so today on Viewpoint, we continue to talk about this and I'm glad as always that you have joined us.

Chuck Crismier: Conversation with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms. Now, here's the interesting thing about this. When you think about it, God is the ultimate surveillor. Did you know that? I was just thinking about this even as I was opening the program here today. God is the ultimate surveillor. But we don't realize that. Now, he's not the surveillor for our convenience in and of itself. He's a surveillor because he's God. And he knew the end from the beginning. He is the Alpha, the Omega, the beginning and the end. He knows our downsittings and our uprisings. He knows the numbering of our hairs according to the scripture. And yet he knows us personally. He doesn't know just information about us. He knows us personally. In fact, the scripture says that there is nothing hidden from him with whom we have to do. Absolutely nothing hidden from him. Now, that may be shocking to think about and indeed it is, because what is done and what we think is done in private or said in private, actually is being heard by God. And he understands it. He knows exactly what we're saying, what we're thinking. The devil doesn't know what we're thinking, but he knows how we think because he thinks the same way. He's in rebellion against God. So he knows how we think, and so he knows how to take advantage of us. He doesn't have to do surveillance per se. All he has to do is take the situations in which we're in and manipulate them for his purposes. That's what happened in the Garden of Eden, isn't it? Exactly what happened in the Garden of Eden. He didn't surveil the situation. He just knew Eve was in the situation and so he just engaged her with a little conversation, 'Hath God said?' Well, the same is true in your life and in my life. It just is. And that's why, friends, we are faced with this challenge continually every single day and increasingly so as we see the Day of the Lord approaching. We're faced with challenges of the need to overcome. The need to overcome that which is challenging us either by the world, the culture, the flesh, or the devil. And these are all things that are surrounding us and ever present in our lives. And therefore, we are called to resist them. We're called to remain steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for us knows we know that our efforts are not in vain in him. But God sees everything. If we really understood that, it would probably make a difference in the things we choose to say, the things we choose to do, the entertainment we choose to watch, the just about everything in our lives would change if we really realized and were cognizant that God is seeing it all. Right? That being the case, what are you going to do about it? What am I going to do about it? Because this is this is the arena in which we live. That's why I wrote the book.

Announcer: The Power to Overcome.

Chuck Crismier: Friends, this is why Jesus said we need to be overcomers. I hope you'll get the book. It's We'll be right back.

Announcer: Once upon a time, children could pray and read their Bibles in school. Divorces were practically unknown as was child abuse. In our once great America, virginity and chastity were popular virtues and homosexuality was an abomination. So what happened in just one generation?

Chuck Crismier: Hi, I'm Chuck Crismier and I urge you to join me daily on Viewpoint where we discuss the most challenging issues touching our hearts and homes.

Announcer: Could America's moral slide relate to the fourth commandment? Listen to Viewpoint on this radio station or anytime at saveus.org.

Chuck Crismier: Welcome back to Viewpoint. I'm Chuck Crismier. Today we look at what should we say, the prophecy fulfillment of George Orwell's 1984. Now, it's very hard to read George Orwell's 1984 and not see it as some sort of a amazing revelation prophecy of that which was to come. And here we are. The things that he saw then, not as a Christian, not as a prophet, are being revealed today. Might God actually have used that, even an ungodly man, to help reveal to us what would shortly come to pass, two or three generations later, so that we could be prepared and understand? I don't know, and I can't say for sure, but it is fascinating to see what really has happened. I'm looking at an article right now, the headline says, "When Fiction Feels Too Real: Seeing Orwell's 1984 Warnings in Today's World." That's exactly what we're seeing. Exactly what we're seeing. We were talking about the article that came out from smartphones to smart TVs and the telescreen of 2024. Surveillance technology is evolving into explicit control mechanisms across multiple continents. In the United Kingdom, the UK, new laws force online identification and implement digital ID schemes. The European Union's check control proposal represents another significant step toward mass monitoring of private communications, and it's not just China. In China, there are cameras everywhere. In China, they just they're just expected. It's a surveillance state. It's a communist state. It's a state in which the state is the only reason for existence and all the citizens exist for the state. Therefore, they have state control, state surveillance, and so on. But how about the rest of the world? How about the so-called free world? Well, it's it's a world now where the watchers can turn the telescreens their telescreens off while the watched cannot. In other words, those in the high-tech realms can turn off the technology in many respects, but not the rest of the people. Living under persistent surveillance creates psychological effects that Orwell vividly described, but we're now experiencing firsthand. The knowledge that our actions, conversations, and even thoughts through our search history and communications are being revealed in how we actually behave. We passed a point of no return in trading privacy for convenience. The economic incentives are too powerful. The psychological addiction to convenience is too strong for most people to resist. The convergence of corporate surveillance capitalism and government monitoring capabilities creates a future that looks increasingly like the dystopian visions of both Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World. We face the constant monitoring of Orwell's nightmare combined with the pleasure-based control of Huxley's vision. Smartphones provide both the telescreen surveillance and the soma-like distraction that keeps populations compliant. And what makes our current situation uniquely challenging is that the surveillance isn't imposed by an obvious external enemy, but woven into the fabric of daily life through devices we choose to use. And then we sign the terms of service and agreements and privacy policies blindly, realizing they all take away our privacy. The conversation among tech-savvy users now reveals both deep concern about these developments and a sense of powerlessness to stop them. The telescreens are here. We just call them by different names. Fascinating insights and friends, as I have delved into this a bit, I realize that we're living in a time and we we swim in this water. We swim in the waters of surveillance. It has come on incrementally. This is how things change in our world, incrementally. They don't come on usually like a great earthquake, like happened in Colombia. They come on in smaller versions, like the fog coming in on little cat feet until you're completely enveloped by it. And so we're going to take a particular focus today concerning some special cameras that are out there in our country, in our world, that are causing the hair to rise on a lot of people's the back of their necks. Also, concerns about whether AI itself is using Wi-Fi to spy on us right now. So, here's what I want to do. I I want to kind of dig this deeper very, very quickly and a very in in a simple way before we go any further. And it goes to the metropolitan the Patriarch Kirill in Russia. The Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, just a year or so ago, he came out and made a statement that grabbed the world. A lot of people made fun of it though. But I'm not making fun of it today. Here's what he said, listen very carefully. You might not like the fact that it came from Russia, but maybe we should hear what he had to say. He said, "Every time you use your gadget, whether you like it or not, whether you turn on your location or not, that is your your cellphone, somebody could find out exactly where you are, exactly what your interests are, and exactly what you're scared of." That's what the Patriarch Kirill said on Russian news. He said, "If not today, then tomorrow methods and technology could appear that will not just provide access to all information, but will also allow the use of this information. Do you imagine what power will be concentrated in the hands of those who gain knowledge about what is going on in the world?" Such control, he said, from one place for bodes the coming of the Antichrist. Now, Patriarch Kirill said his church, the Russian Orthodox Church, was not against technological progress, but rather the development of a system that is aimed at controlling people and people's identity. So, the headline reads this way from the BBC, British Broadcasting Corporation, "Smartphone Users Warned to Be Careful of the Antichrist." Do I have your attention yet? In other words, there's something bigger. There's another way that we should process or perhaps should process this kind of information so that we understand the times in which we live. And if we really understood the times in which we live, we might take a different view concerning how to conduct our lives, not necessarily to get rid of all surveillance because we're not capable of doing that. Now, there are those who try to do that in different ways. We've had a person on this program not too long ago who had gone a great deal, who had built up a career in capitalism and so on, and realized it was taking over the person's life, and decided to get out of the system, so to speak. Now, I'm not going to tell you how this person decided to get out of the system, but the person did decide to get out of the system insofar as was reasonably possible. In other words, not to be totally addicted to the systems of this world as we understand them. Yet the same person still uses in some respect the technology in order to speak into our hearts and our lives. So, there's no way you can completely avoid it. So, that's not what our program is about here today. Our program here is not about how to just totally avoid all of this technology, but maybe you want to be a little bit more careful about what you agree to bring into your home, what you agree to agree to with your sign-ups for agreeing to certain policies and so on, on the internet or when you're signing your contract for your cell phone and so on. So, when fiction feels too real, seeing Orwell's 1984 warnings in today's world. That's where we're at. Now, that being the case, and we've already mentioned Antichrist, because exactly that's exactly what Antichrist and his spirit will do. He will use that which we use for convenience for his control. That's how it's going to happen. The Bible actually, in a very distilled way, says so right there in Revelation chapter 13 and 14, talking about when the false prophet introduces the counterfeit Christ, the Antichrist, a connection is going to be made for the control of the world. It's going to the control of the world is going to happen through economics. It's going to happen through an economic system that everybody will control every man, every woman, every child, every human being on the planet. It's the ultimate surveillance system that you actually will wear on your right hand or on your forehead, and it's called the mark of the beast. Because the beast is called that great final empire that seeks to replace God with humankind, to come as close as possible through digital technology to replace God. And that, I believe, is the reason why it's identified in the book of Revelation as 666, not 777, which would illustrate and and symbolize the absolute perfection of God. But this system, this beast system, will be as close as Satan can bring through human beings to become God in their own right. It's a digital system, and digitizing is everywhere. And it's happening even now to try to control the moneys of the world. We've talked about it with our special guest, Christian Briggs. We brought these things to your attention. How it's happening, it doesn't happen all at once, it happens incrementally. Here a little, there a little, gradually easing and making its way in until this part of it is accepted, the next part is accepted, the next part is accepted, until finally you realize you're completely overwhelmed. There's no way out. You're in the midst of a pea soup fog. So, what I would suggest that you do are two things. Number one, from an informational standpoint, get a copy of my book Antichrist: How to Identify the Coming Impostor. It's a fascinating book. Absolutely fascinating. No, we don't give the name. That would be foolhardy to try to give the name of the Antichrist. But we identify all of the factors that come together to help us to identify that individual so that we do not become absorbed in that system and be deceived. It's a $22 book, yours for $18 on our website, saveus.org. saveus.org. You can give us a call at 1-800-SAVE-USA, that's 1-800-SAVE-USA, or write to us at Save America Ministries, PO Box 70879, Richmond, Virginia 23255, writing a check, at $6 for postage and handling. That's Antichrist: How to Identify the Coming Impostor. Now, the other book is one that has to do with what you and I can do, must do, should do in times like these. It's called The Power to Overcome. That is not just informational, it's transformational, and of utter necessity, I believe, for every professing Christian in our country today. The Power to Overcome. How to be triumphant in terrifying and troubled times. How to be triumphant in terrifying and troubled times. So, it's a $25 book, brand new. In fact, it's so brand new that it hasn't even reached its official release date yet, which is September 1st. Therefore, it's only available right now on our website, saveus.org. saveus.org. You can give us a call at 1-800-SAVE-USA, or write to us at Save America Ministries, PO Box 70879, Richmond, Virginia 23255, writing a check at $6 for postage and handling. Now, if you get that book and Antichrist, or any other book at the same time, the second book will only have a shipping and handling charge of $2 instead of $6. So, you're going to save $4 that way. So, I urge you to do that. These books are not written for making money, they're written to try to help people be prepared because we're not prepared. Just not prepared. Everybody is taking business as usual, oh well, que sera, sera, whatever will be will be. Don't let that be you. We'll be right back, friends, much to talk about today.

Announcer: There is so much more about Chuck Crismier and Save America Ministries on our website, saveus.org. For example, under the Marriage section, God has marriage on his mind. Chuck has some great resources to strengthen your marriage. First off, a fact sheet on the state of the marital union, a fact sheet on the state of ministry, marriage, and morals. saveus.org. Marriage, divorce, and remarriage, what does the Bible really teach about this? Find all of this at saveus.org. Also, a letter to pastors, the Hosea Project, saveus.org, and many more resources to strengthen your marriage. It's all on Chuck's website, saveus.org. Again, you can listen to Chuck's Viewpoint broadcast live and archived, Save America Ministries' website at saveus.org.

Chuck Crismier: Technology is not neutral. Just like our viewpoints are not neutral, technology is not neutral. Surveillance process is not only conducted by political or formal entities, sometimes it can engage in the subjectivity of actors to become a means of resistance used by the watched against the watchers. But it's not neutral. And we're living in a society of surveillance today. Technology is not neutral, it serves political interests as it enables political surveillance. So, nowadays, states easily identify, monitor, and track individuals with the help of various advanced technologies such as biometric data, fingerprints, IP addresses, satellite data, X-rays, intelligent video surveillance, and geolocation. Governments justify the use of these methods by pointing out certain threats such as terrorism, cybercrime, and other issues that are common to the global society of risk. Now, although the stated objectives are anticipating catastrophes and protecting citizens against such particular potential risks, the use of such technology has led to some ethical concerns. With the heavy use of technology, the eye of the state, which normally should regulate public life, breaches the private sphere of individual citizens, and therein lies part of the problem. So, here we are, 70 years after George Orwell wrote the book 1984 in 1949. It's been called a dystopian novel. 1984 portrays a fictional world where a totalitarian regime is equipped with advanced technological means of surveillance to suppress anyone suspected of holding oppositional views. Now, we used to apply that to such governments as Russia's communist or Chinese communism, and so on. But now we see that this has taken over the whole Western world, so-called the free world. So, many would argue that Orwell's worst nightmares have come true in today's surveillance societies, in which all actors practice surveillance against one another, and technologically advanced states and technology companies are in advanced positions. So, what does the word surveillance mean? What is meant by surveillance? Well, the word surveillance has its roots in the French language. It was adopted into English from the French word surveiller, which means to watch over. Now, here's the interesting thing. The Bible tells us that God is watching over us. Now, he wants to watch over us as his sons and as our as his sons and daughters. He wants to guide us with his eye. He wants to lead us in the way in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake, and so on. But he's also watching over us in the sense that he sees it all. He sees far more than any surveillance technology could possibly ever see. Even the motivations of the heart. In fact, his word is said to be so powerful as to discern even the thoughts and the intents of the heart. God sees it all. And if we really knew that, what would we do? First of all, it might change our behavior. It might change our hearts. It might help us to humble ourselves before him and actually be willing to submit ourselves to his word, his will, and his ways, and actually walk the path of righteousness instead of the path of the world, the flesh, and the devil. That's why we need the book. The Power to Overcome. That's why you need it because it helps to flesh out what that looks like and why it's so important. What does it mean to overcome? Overcome what? How is it that we overcome? We're so completely inured to the ways of the world, the flesh, and the devil, it's our way of life, it's our way of living. It's everything that we know for the most part. Most professing Christians do not know the way of the Lord. They go to church, they believe, they they have a Bible, maybe. Maybe they just have a cell phone that they use in place of their Bible. I'm not going to argue one way or another concerning that. I personally think that every Christian should own a Bible and carry one and should read the actual pages of the Bible. There's something about the touching of the pages that makes a difference. It just does. Psychologists know that, but we haven't figured it out yet. So, in any event, we need to understand first of all the need to be overcomers and secondly, how to do that. Again, the book just came out. Today, another package of 10 books went out. One of our listeners said, you know, I want to get to be part of that overcomers project and I want to get that book. And so, we sent out the 10 copies today. They called this morning, we sent out the 10 copies today. And by the way, the window for that project is closing on Friday. So, I hope that many more of you will avail yourself of that opportunity to be, shall we say, a dispenser of that information, of that understanding. You can be a minister in your own right by handing out one of those books to those in your sphere of influence, including perhaps even your pastor, because pastors themselves are human beings. They're they're having to struggle too with the need to overcome. In some respects, the pastors have more to overcome than you do because the temptations are very great. The temptations to become people pleasers and not God pleasers, while in the name of God. It's a it's a very deceptive temptation. It's very common to pastors. They have ambition so they want to build little kingdoms for themselves instead of the Kingdom of God. So the attitudes begin to change. And then the people suffer because the pastor is not willing to teach the whole truth, only those things that he thinks the people will gladly receive instead of what they need to receive from the Spirit of God. So I'm just sharing these things openly with you. Every single one of us is is in a position where we desperately need to be operative in the power to overcome. The question is not whether we have the power to overcome, the question is whether we will exercise that power and understand its need. That's where the problem lies. Get a copy of the book, $25 on the website, saveus.org. You can call us 1-800, 1-800-SAVE-USA, or write to us at Save America Ministries. PO Box 70879, Richmond, Virginia 23255. All right, now. Is AI using your Wi-Fi to spy on you right now? Interesting question, isn't it? It doesn't need a camera, it doesn't need you to say a word out loud. It just needs a signal that's probably already bouncing off your rib cage as you read as you're listening right now because that signal has been in the room with you the whole time. You just call it Wi-Fi. And it's not a metaphor, it's not a pitch for a sci-fi show nobody green lit. Research have already proven it, not theoretically possible in a lab somewhere. Proven and published, and in one case, already sitting in more than two and a half million American living rooms. In fact, more than that. Forget every fancy sensor for a second and think about the plain Wi-Fi box you already own. Every signal it sends carries something called channel state information. CSI, for the acronym inclined. It's just the raw physical data describing how the radio waves' strength and timing is shifting as it crosses your living room, or throughout your house. Your body is mostly water, and water bends radio waves. So every time you walk between your router and your phone, the signal warps a little on its way through you. And that warp gets recorded whether you agreed to it or not. It's interesting, isn't it? So, this matter of AI using your Wi-Fi may very well be a reality beyond our wildest imagination. Now, buried below the surface in terms of terms of service is who else gets to see the data that comes from it. Xfinity's own policy states plainly that this motion information can be shared with law enforcement or other third parties in connection with a legal dispute or a subpoena with no additional notice required. So the same company that can't reliably get your bill right, now keeps sending a log of when you're home and how much you move around your own living room. Are you listening? Now, we don't have time to go ever deeper into any one of these items. But suffice it to say, that as I was recently considering George Orwell's classic 1984, I was struck just how eerily some of those elements feel to issues we're facing right now. Thought-provoking parallels between the book and current social and political issues in our country. These parallels highlight the potential threats to human freedom, government surveillance, and control of information that feel disconcertingly close to home. So, while the full totalitarian world depicted in 1984 has fortunately not materialized except maybe in China, these connections might be our wake-up call to safeguard democratic values against erosion, if it's even possible at this time. So, you can say, well, those those extreme surveillances depicted in 1984 with screens watching your every move can give you chills. Well, they should. One of the most iconic elements of 1984 is the government's pervasive surveillance of citizens through screens and other monitoring technology. Around the clock surveillance enables complete control and suppresses dissent. There are echoes of this troubling overreach and controversial legislation passed here in America after 9/11. You called it the USA Patriot Act, remember? The granted government power, new broad powers to monitor citizens. The act is justified as necessary to combat terrorism. What else is being used to justify ever-increasing surveillance? That's the issue. We'll be back.

Announcer: Have you ever considered what the early church was like? Many people are developing a heart longing for a greater fulfillment in our practices as Christians. A recent study showed 53,000 people a week are leaving the back door of America's churches in frustration. What is going on? Why has there not been even a 1% gain among followers of Christ in the last 25 years? Could it be that God is seeking to restore first-century Christianity for the 21st century? Jesus said, "I'll build my church." Is Christ by his Spirit stirring to prepare the church for the 21st century? The early church prayed together and broke bread from house to house. They were family, and it was said by all who observed, "Behold how they love one another." Incredible, but the same can be found right now. Go to saveus.org and click Cell Church. We can revive first-century Christianity for the 21st century. It's about people, not programs. It's about a body, not a building. That's saveus.org. Click Cell Church.

Chuck Crismier: All right, here we go, friends. You're going to flock now, pun intended, we're going to flock now to a whole new dimension of surveillance. They're called flock cameras or flock safety automated license plate reading cameras that have sparked intense bipartisan controversy across the United States. While law enforcement agencies champion the AI-powered camera network as a vital tool for recovering stolen cars and tracking kidnapping suspects, solving violent crimes, and so on. Critics, including civil liberties groups, condemn the technology as a form of unrestrained mass surveillance that logs the movements of every innocent driver without a warrant. Now, you can do that through the flock camera or you can do it through the manufacturing companies of our cars now, where location identifiers are mandated in those cars. What for? Surveillance. That's what for. Now, these flock cameras use computer vision to record license plates, vehicle colors, makes, and unique identifiers like bumper stickers, creating searchable location databases that are retained for 30 days or even longer. Reports have surfaced of law enforcement officers abusing the database to stalk ex-partners, while federal immigration enforcement and out-of-state agencies have used the network to track individuals. Municipalities, including Austin, Texas, Denver, Berkeley, and Littleton have faced fierce local opposition, leading some towns to cancel flock contracts, deactivate hardware, or face unauthorized reactivations by the vendor. Online citizen groups have even mapped out locations via crowdsource projects like DFlock. And the frustration has boiled over into physical vandalism nationwide with cameras being shot out, beaten with bats, sawed down, or protested on site by activists. So, what why is it people are so upset with those? Why is it that they're not flocking to embrace them like they embrace all of the surveillance into their own homes? Well, I guess because you can see them up there, you got these cameras up there, and people don't like it that it's out there. They don't mind if it comes inside their house, through their cell phone or through their smartphone or smart TV or their smart refrigerator or their smart this and smart that. Those are easily welcomed into the home for convenience. But they don't like them with cameras out there on the streets. Now, here's the interesting thing. The the Flock CEO, Garrett Langley, actually admitted to these problems. He did. Police officers across the U.S. are being accused of using Flock license plate cameras to stalk people. It's it's the abuse is a problem. But his explanation of what the company is doing about it may leave people unsatisfied. So, here here's what's what's actually happening. At least 50 police officers have been charged with or accused of using license plate readers for unauthorized purposes like stalking people. Forty-six of whom used Flock's system. Last May, police in Texas used Flock to look for a woman suspected of self-managing an abortion. The search included 83,000 cameras, 83,000 cameras, some in states where abortion is legal. And the sheriff defended it as a welfare check. It's always a way to justify. Always a way to justify. The driver, who later interviewed Langley, was a victim himself. He was boxed in by police cars outside a Kohl's store after a data entry error flagged his car, and he was that he was driving a stolen car. Unfortunately, the Flock misread the license plates. And in 71% of alerts sent to police in Roseville, California, misreading took place. In Milwaukee, an officer illegally ran a partner's plate 124 times. The detective assigned to investigate that officer was himself charged with a Flock misuse. Another media review found that police departments across the U.S. have used Flock cameras hundreds of times to search for specific people instead of cars, sometimes referencing a person's race or political affiliation. So, you can see that you can justify just about any kind of surveillance. There's always a reason. I want you to think about that, the words "always a reason." You can call it a rationale, that's what a reason is. Always a reason. I want you to think very carefully about the words "always a reason." That's how all of these insidious, incremental advancements of surveillance take place. Every one of which is supposed to provide convenience, but actually destroys freedom. Smart speakers and connected hubs like Alexa and Google function as always-listening hot mics in living rooms and kitchens, mirroring the intrusive nature of Orwell's surveillance state. Always always packaged as consumer convenience. Notice the marketing. The marketing is about your benefit. It's not talking about, it's not warning you about the surveillance that is taking place and how you're giving up your privacy. It's about, "Wow, look what you can have. Look what you can do." The interesting divergence, the primary divergence from Orwell's dystopia, the book 1984, is voluntary adoption. The citizens of Oceania there in his book had no escape from the party's surveillance, whereas modern consumers actively purchase, set up, and opt into smart home ecosystems through privacy policies and terms of service that make true informed consent difficult. Why? Because those policies are long, and if you were to sit there in an Apple Store or wherever you're going to buy your cell phone or anything else, and you were to read all of the policies and so on right there, they probably wouldn't let you get by with it, they'd get you out of the store. They don't want to waste the time. Everybody signs it automatically. If you buy something and inside it gives you the opportunity, you can sign up for this, sign up for that, and you have an opportunity to opt out or not. And you have to sign something that says you agree to their privacy policies. Okay. Have you ever read one? Not likely. Therefore, you're just making informed consent with actually without actually being informed. In other words, you don't care. You don't really care because it's what I'm going to get, not what's going to be taken from me. Are you beginning to get the the picture here? This picture is a much more difficult and applicable picture than we would really want to entertain. And that brings us back to the words, "There's always a reason," or a rationale. Always a reason. Have you noticed the capability of human beings to justify almost anything? Let that sit in your mind for a minute, to justify almost anything. You can justify stealing, you can justify murder, you can justify sexual promiscuity, you can justify abortion, you can justify homosexuality, you can justify transgenderism. You can justify bestiality. You may not think so, but you can. People do. Everything can be justified in your mind and in your heart. So we can justify adopting and receiving any of these things that encroach on and actually steal our freedom gradually over time until there's nothing left. That's really what the book 1984 portrayed. There would be nothing left. Now he didn't perceive George Orwell didn't perceive how insidious the whole thing could actually be, and how people would welcome all of this into their homes, not just have it imposed upon them governmentally. But the government imposes it gradually as you welcome it. And here's a more important application. Please listen carefully. We can justify almost anything that God hates. We can justify almost anything that is not approved by God for his people. We rationalize. We think in our minds and our hearts. And we come up with a reason. There's always a reason. There's a reason why not to report the truth to the IRS on our tax return. And we justified it, right? That's what human beings do. There's a reason why people decide to co-sign for someone. When God says, "Don't do it!" warns three or four times in the Proverbs, "Don't do it! This is dangerous, don't do it!" We do it anyway. Always have a reason. There's a reason why people engage in premarital sex. There's a reason why people, the majority of people now, are cohabiting before marriage. Why? Because they've justified it, there's always a reason. One of the big reasons now is, well, it's just economically better or more feasible at the time. Always a reason. There's a reason why people commit adultery. Well, my husband or my wife just isn't giving me what I need, what I want, and I tried and I tried, and this man, this loving guy came along and he just swept me off my feet, and, yeah, there's always a reason. There's a reason why we don't read the Word of God every day and study it as we're told to do, because we don't want to. It's not convenient. You see how this works? Then there's a reason why we succumb to the ways of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Why? It's just more convenient. We flow with the punches. And then we don't realize the consequences that follow. That, friends, is why we need to get a copy of the book. The Power to Overcome. How to triumph in troubled times. $25 will put it in your hands. It's on our website, saveus.org. Call us 1-800-SAVE-USA, write to us, and become part of that overcomers project. The opportunity ceases on Friday the 15th. Send in your check, call us 1-800-SAVE-USA, go to the website saveus.org, sign up. $250 will put 10 copies of that book in your hands. Totally tax-deductible. And give it to those that holy spirit directs.

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