There are moments when life in our society feels like a walk along the edge, and we’re in one now. If you read the Internet, it verges on impossible that you missed the news about the government indexing your email, your text messages, your phone calls, your Skype visits with friends, your credit card bills and your location on the planet.
This isn’t the worst thing to happen to a population — there have been a lot of holocausts since the day your grandma was born. Yet prying into our private lives, spying on the intimate affairs of people and threatening to use the information against them, is an act of psychological warfare that’s been used by the most notorious tyrants in history. We are experiencing an attack on the subtle trust that holds our relationships and our society together.
It’s not necessarily what anyone finds out about you that is the problem with being spied on; rather, it’s the sensation that there is no sanctuary anywhere. I don’t think it’s enough to say ‘what did you expect?’ I believe we need a more thoughtful response. The Internet is a frontier and while we may not know where we are in the history of consciousness, you can trust that it’s somewhere important.
The scenario is illustrated beautifully in an aspect that’s exact Monday night: the Gemini Sun opposite the (Chiron-like) centaur planet Pholus. Discovered orbiting our Sun in 1992, Pholus is the thing that comes out that cannot go back in. Borrowing from my friend Robert, who co-wrote the first book about this point, Pholus is the small cause with the big effect.
The Sun opposite this point looks like it would be volatile, but I think it’s more about the sensation of what could burst free rather than what will actually do so. That said, I don’t suggest you go looking for land mines by jumping around randomly, or trying to figure who is a nice guy by provoking anyone. Today is a day to walk gently on the Earth, remembering you’re also walking through the cosmos.