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The question is not whether we should give corrupt organizations a pass (we shouldn't), it's whether we should try to keep Wikileaks honest, given that its posi

The question is not whether we should give corrupt organizations a pass (we shouldn't), it's whether we should try to keep Wikileaks honest, given that its position gives it strong incentives to do shady things without any transparency. Wikileaks' core activity forces it to walk a very very thin moral and ethical line. I think we the public have obligation to make sure they don't cross it, especially if we benefit from the leaks. I'll note that in another context, it was for a long time not alright for prosecutors to use illegally obtained evidence, in order to discourage prosecutors and police from breaking the law, even at the cost of potentially letting criminals go free. Why doesn't that logic apply here?

rndgermandude 10y ago
I was replying to this specifically: Being politically motivated can very much be a form of abuse. When you have the ability to significantly hinder or tear down public organizations through leaking [...] If there is no (major) wrongdoing, you cannot just tear them down. The organization needs to be corrupt in the first place. it's whether we should inspect Wikileaks itself, given that its position gives it strong incentives to do shady things without any transparency. I don't see anything suggesting strong incentives to do shady things, can you elaborate please? I see the opposite, however, they got strong incentives NOT to do shady things, because if they are caught even once doing shady things, their reputation is in the gutter and nobody will ever listen to them again. That is not to say that they got no political bias and even political bias. When the emails you obtained contained Hillary asking why they cannout just "drone him" (aka Assange), you might take that a bit personally too. But political bias and personal bias is in no way evidence for "shady things" and wrongdoing. But yes, wikileaks too should be scrutinized, and I think it is, by pretty much everybody, the government, it's agencies, the media. Still, so far, after a decade of operation, there is no proof wikileaks did anything sinister, and the best attempts so far to discredit wikileaks was coming for their leader with rape charges instead of discrediting what the organization is doing. And yes again, we the public should not stop to be vigilant and continue to scrutinize wikileaks.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
  > If there is no (major) wrongdoing, you cannot just tear them down. The organization needs to be corrupt in the first place. I'm not so sure that's true. As the size of an organization grows, the probability that someone in it will write an e-mail that looks incredibly damning when leaked approaches 1. That's true regardless of whether there is any actual corrupt behavior, but the political damage is done regardless. IMO, the public is generally not great at teasing apart real misconduct from stupid private e-mails, because the public either lacks or chooses to ignore context. I know in this day and age it's not very popular to say that things should be kept from the public, but I'd like to point out the example of the legal system. Judge often decide that evidence should not be shown to juries because the evidence is inflammatory and will cause bias. Sometimes showing more evidence leads to less truth, not more. Obviously, Wikileaks is not a court, but it does choose who gets to see what, and they have some idea of how the public will react to what is revealed. But we have no real idea how they internally make that decision. > I don't see anything suggesting strong incentives to do shady things, can you elaborate please? Sure -- this is an organization that often gets illegally obtained information from perhaps anonymous sources. Because the sources are by definition secret or inaccessible, and yet the information can be very damaging, there's always the temptation for illicit dealings. Here are some possibilities: - Someone in Wikileaks uses the information to blackmail the target of a leak - The target of a leak gets wind of it and tries to buy off Wikileaks - Outside actors (e.g. the Russian government) effectively use Wikileaks as a 'neutral' channel to cloak their interference in the political affairs of another country. This may in fact be what is happening today, but we can't be sure because again -- Wikileaks is not transparent. - A Wikileaks staffer is arrested or otherwise threatened by a government to do their bidding Contrast this how major news organizations handle sources and leaks: journalists form a professional body with their own journalistic code of ethics and conduct. Leaks are evaluated for their newsworthiness and sources are scrutinized. Obviously, traditional media organizations aren't perfect either, but they are far more open and transparent than Wikileaks is, because there are institutional norms developed over decades that constrain their behavior. In a perfect world, Wikileaks would be open and transparent in their process of how they evaluate and pass on leaks, so we can be sure that they're not being unduly influenced or using it to advance a hidden agenda.
Bartweiss 10y ago
This is a very reasonable point, and I have some real questions about the recent failure to redact in the Wikileaks releases. That said... > The question is not whether we should give corrupt organizations a pass (we shouldn't) The majority of the criticism I've seen absolutely misses this step. It treats "Wikileaks is shady" or even "Assange might be a sex criminal" as a rebuttal to "this thing in this email you sent is incredibly unethical". Time and again, the discussion of Wikileaks ethics comes up only when they embarrass someone, as a defense for the person embarrassed. I'm not sure what to do about that. Ideally, I think we'd do it the opposite way - the published emails that weren't ethical embarrassments are a way bigger violation of privacy. I'd like to see Wikileaks held to account for publishing harmless and personal messages, while seeing the leak subjects held to account where the things they did were actually bad.

rndgermandude 10y ago

I was replying to this specifically: Being politically motivated can very much be a form of abuse. When you have the ability to significantly hinder or tear down public organizations through leaking [...] If there is no (major) wrongdoing, you cannot just tear them down. The organization needs to be corrupt in the first place. it's whether we should inspect Wikileaks itself, given that its position gives it strong incentives to do shady things without any transparency. I don't see anything suggesting strong incentives to do shady things, can you elaborate please? I see the opposite, however, they got strong incentives NOT to do shady things, because if they are caught even once doing shady things, their reputation is in the gutter and nobody will ever listen to them again. That is not to say that they got no political bias and even political bias. When the emails you obtained contained Hillary asking why they cannout just "drone him" (aka Assange), you might take that a bit personally too. But political bias and personal bias is in no way evidence for "shady things" and wrongdoing. But yes, wikileaks too should be scrutinized, and I think it is, by pretty much everybody, the government, it's agencies, the media. Still, so far, after a decade of operation, there is no proof wikileaks did anything sinister, and the best attempts so far to discredit wikileaks was coming for their leader with rape charges instead of discrediting what the organization is doing. And yes again, we the public should not stop to be vigilant and continue to scrutinize wikileaks.

smallnamespace 10y ago
> If there is no (major) wrongdoing, you cannot just tear them down. The organization needs to be corrupt in the first place. I'm not so sure that's true. As the size of an organization grows, the probability that someone in it will write an e-mail that looks incredibly damning when leaked approaches 1. That's true regardless of whether there is any actual corrupt behavior, but the political damage is done regardless. IMO, the public is generally not great at teasing apart real misconduct from stupid private e-mails, because the public either lacks or chooses to ignore context. I know in this day and age it's not very popular to say that things should be kept from the public, but I'd like to point out the example of the legal system. Judge often decide that evidence should not be shown to juries because the evidence is inflammatory and will cause bias. Sometimes showing more evidence leads to less truth, not more. Obviously, Wikileaks is not a court, but it does choose who gets to see what, and they have some idea of how the public will react to what is revealed. But we have no real idea how they internally make that decision. > I don't see anything suggesting strong incentives to do shady things, can you elaborate please? Sure -- this is an organization that often gets illegally obtained information from perhaps anonymous sources. Because the sources are by definition secret or inaccessible, and yet the information can be very damaging, there's always the temptation for illicit dealings. Here are some possibilities: - Someone in Wikileaks uses the information to blackmail the target of a leak - The target of a leak gets wind of it and tries to buy off Wikileaks - Outside actors (e.g. the Russian government) effectively use Wikileaks as a 'neutral' channel to cloak their interference in the political affairs of another country. This may in fact be what is happening today, but we can't be sure because again -- Wikileaks is not transparent. - A Wikileaks staffer is arrested or otherwise threatened by a government to do their bidding Contrast this how major news organizations handle sources and leaks: journalists form a professional body with their own journalistic code of ethics and conduct. Leaks are evaluated for their newsworthiness and sources are scrutinized. Obviously, traditional media organizations aren't perfect either, but they are far more open and transparent than Wikileaks is, because there are institutional norms developed over decades that constrain their behavior. In a perfect world, Wikileaks would be open and transparent in their process of how they evaluate and pass on leaks, so we can be sure that they're not being unduly influenced or using it to advance a hidden agenda.

Bartweiss 10y ago

This is a very reasonable point, and I have some real questions about the recent failure to redact in the Wikileaks releases. That said... > The question is not whether we should give corrupt organizations a pass (we shouldn't) The majority of the criticism I've seen absolutely misses this step. It treats "Wikileaks is shady" or even "Assange might be a sex criminal" as a rebuttal to "this thing in this email you sent is incredibly unethical". Time and again, the discussion of Wikileaks ethics comes up only when they embarrass someone, as a defense for the person embarrassed. I'm not sure what to do about that. Ideally, I think we'd do it the opposite way - the published emails that weren't ethical embarrassments are a way bigger violation of privacy. I'd like to see Wikileaks held to account for publishing harmless and personal messages, while seeing the leak subjects held to account where the things they did were actually bad.