Surveillance is tough work. Depending on the job, the U.S. Department of Labor tells us that working conditions can include any combination of the following: stress, considerable time spent on the feet, danger, confrontations with angry or upset individuals, risk, physical discomfort, lethal hazards, fieldwork in high crime areas, monotony, constant alertness to threatening situations, irregular hours, and a heavy toll on private life.1 On top of the physical and psychological strain, a surveillance worker must also possess great self-discipline to control unproductive ethical impulses to look away, to perceive innocence instead of guilt, to see a friend not a foe, to accept the ineffable and resist the probable. Such care for the person being watched may not be so tempting as screwing around on the job, which for a surveillance worker could amount to the same thing as having an ethical moment. Whatever the case, the humanity of the surveillance worker has always been a weakness of surveillance systems, especially in the eyes of those overseeing the work.
