Photo: waragainstallpuertoricans.com
A recently published book, They Know Everything About You, discusses the loss of privacy in modern life. It shows how corporations, governments and the Internet have eliminated the privacy of virtually everyone on the planet.
The combination of high technology, internet data collectors, the Patriot Act and global surveillance have created a world where our phone calls, text messages, e-mails, tweets, Facebook chats, consumer purchases, credit reports, court records and medical histories are open to anyone who knows how to look for them.
The world of 1984, depicted by George Orwell, is upon us. Now consider that this Orwellian world, is exactly the world that the U.S. created in Puerto Rico. It was called the Carpetas program.
From the mid-1930’s until the 1990s, the FBI kept secret police dossiers on Puerto Ricans. There are 1.8 million pages of files: on Pedro Albizu Campos, the Nationalist Party and over 100,000 other Puerto Ricans. An additional 60,776 carpetas were opened on vehicles, boats, organizations and geographic areas.
The practice was so ubiquitous and widespread that it became a verb in Puerto Rico: as in “te arrestaron” (they arrested you), “te sentenciaron” (they sentenced you) and “te carpetearon” (they carpeted you). A political cartoon from the era captures the public sentiment: a man is getting a haircut. His barber says, “I know exactly how to cut your hair. I see it right here in your carpeta.”
Yo se precisamente como cortar tu pelo… lo veo aquí en tu carpeta.
The average carpeta contained roughly 20 pages but many were more extensive: the file on Pedro Albizu Campos filled two boxes with 4,700 pages. The information found in the carpetas included school transcripts; employment history; political affiliations; club memberships; bank accounts; property holdings; taxes paid; family and marital records; travel history; auto registration and license plates; meetings attended; publications written or received. They also included personal information: friends, business partners, sexual partners, mistresses, gigolos, debtors, creditors, personal letters (intercepted at the post office), recorded phone calls, photos, wedding lists, laundry tickets
To read full story ( and there is so much more..) visit: http://www.latinorebels.com/2015/05/13/big-brother-in-puerto-rico-how-the-fbi-knew-everything-about-you/
