According to the math of Gary Braun, I recently became a man. All of us within this age are living at an interesting time. To have strong memories of a past that included pay phones, newspaper vending machines and pagers.

But to also be alive to see face-timing on mobile devices, cars that drive on sunlight and libraries losing their relevance thanks to the advent of the InterWeb.

It is, without question, a great time to be alive and witness the changing of the guard and be able to know both sides of the divide of time that wil be discussed going forward.

But I also am curious if those after me will remember to study history. Not just the standard stuff they teach in school because knowing about the War of 1812 is important, but doesn’t help to grasp why facial recognition for your phone is scary.

The Proverbia Powers That Be have always looked for ways to control their subjects. In Ye Olden Days, the proletariat needed protection and paid for it through taxes and other payments to those with physical power.

People were willing to pay that price, but those in power weren’t continuously checking in to see exactly how many cows you raised, exactly how much your garden grew and more importantly, how much you made from it.

I think that’s why fairy tales are full of upset farmers, scared that some ‘tough’ has knocked on the door looking for ‘the King’s due’. But this was the necessary funding for the soldiers, a necessary part of living.

However, as we got more modern, the need for a direct ‘police’ force became less and less, but the people were sold that it was needed more and more. I’m not saying there wasn’t crime or criminals, but not to the extent that cops were needed on every corner.

But the marketing departments of The Powers That Be are better than basic logic and the result is a society founded on fear. There’s a separate post about when television news went away from informing and became more concerned about making a profit, but once that happened it was only a matter of time.

That change, that determination to generate money from what was once a public service, is the ultimate turning point but one I’m willing to bet wasn’t truly noticed by anyone at the time.

But the fear has only grown exponentially since. We’ve moved from writing checks to holding cash in hand to ATM machines to using your phone with the relevant info stored on it.

It’s this last one that scares me the most. The US dollar was once based on gold, but now it’s just based on…honestly, I don’t know what it’s based on. Probably the same imaginary paper that allows politicians to increase the deficit without worry that anyone will truly question their decision.

But moving to everything being digital means losing control of your cash. It should create the same fears the farmers had way back when that an invading army would take thier land. Only problem is I’m not at all confident in the people I’m paying to protect me and that’s the truth.