On Mon, 5 Jul 1999 12:08:49 BST Jon Agar
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Derrick and others -
>
> > Proposal to issue National Insurance (NI) numbers at birth
> > to combat 'welfare fraud'.
> >
> > I mischievously suggest that babies have them tattooed on
> > the back of the neck (see also Alien 3).
>
> See also Bentham's Principles of the Penal Code:
>
> "It is a common usage among English sailors to trace their family and
> bapitismal names upon the wrist, in distinct and indelible characters.
> It is done that they may be recognised in case of shipwreck. If it
> were possible for such a practice to become universal, it would
> furnish a new aid to morals, a new power to the laws, an almost
> infallible precaution against a multitude of offences, especially all
> kinds of fraud, for the success of which a certain degree of
> confidence is necessary. Who are you? Who am I dealing with? There
> would be no room for prevarication in the answer to this important
> question".
>
> I have a paper on the history of British identity cards which notes
> in passing that politicians and civil servants in the 1940s knew of Bentham's
> suggestion. Indeed Lord Stamp wrote to the Registrar General of the time
> that many problems would be solved: "if you would only face up to branding
> each one of us on the left arm at the time of vaccination". A joke, I
> think...
>
> If anyone is interested in a copy of the paper, I'm hapy to send them
> one.
>
> cheers,
>
> Jon
>
> Dr Jon Agar
> CHSTM
> Manchester University
Thanks. Very interesting...unfortunately, my abiding image
of this proposal was of the tattoos on the arms of
concentration camp inmates (see, I think, Emily Prager's
Eve's Tattoo).
Derrick
--------------------------
[log in to unmask]
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|