Privacy Charles Fied Privacy Analysis

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A well-entrenched axiom in modern society is a person’s right to keep his or her thoughts private. When this privacy of mind conflicts with another’s privacy of action or speech, however, a compromise must be found. A person’s knowledge about another individual is one such case. The person with knowledge may not want to share he has it, while the other individual wants to know who has information about her. Charles Fried in his essay “Privacy” suggests these desires for privacy stem from the recognition that being able to keep things private gives significance to sharing them (Fried 484). To Fried, choosing to share information is the foundation of any relationship (Fried 480-481). In contrast to Fried’s focus on the individual’s basic right …show more content…

As Fried points out, if all actions were considered public, “fear of disapproval or retaliation” might prevent people from doing things they would otherwise do (Fried 484). To build on this point, the true privacy of those actions is irrelevant if the potential actor does not know how much privacy he has; he would be forced to assume he has none. Only by knowing what actions he performs will be made public can a person be free to …show more content…

The inmate not only must know what could be known about him—that he is being monitored—he also must know who would know this. According to Fried’s own definition, trust is the “reliance on a disposition … to deal fairly with others” (Fried 481). Based on this, if the boss has no knowledge his employee is being watched—is relying on the parolee’s character—he trusts him. Consequently, the parolee can feel trusted, but only if he knows who has the information that he is monitored. This resolves Posner’s requirement that societal benefit be maximized, while also taking into account Fried’s need for individual

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