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"Why do you think Wikileaks is only about the US? Right now the cables leaked out are from the US, but the point is to do this to every government. Everyone opp

by bonaldi 16y ago

"Why do you think Wikileaks is only about the US? Right now the cables leaked out are from the US, but the point is to do this to every government. Everyone opposed to statism and nationalism benefits." I think a dog only barks because that's all I've heard it do. I think you're choosing a "point" that chimes with your hopes, not the facts. Your "benefits" too need made more explicit. I'm opposed to nationalism and don't see any short or long-term benefits for me, here. Doing actions contrary to the welfare of a national state doesn't automatically amount to a benefit for anti-nationalists. On the contrary, there are serious questions to be asked about what this will do to things that actively help nations to work together, such as diplomatic backchannels. Severing those is no more laudable, and far more potentially lethal, than when TC posted Twitter's internal emails. As for 1959, your answer's a little fine in its splitting of the hair -- the KGB went after plenty in its time, including assisting in the bizarre murder of Markov, and the "suicide" of Shevchenko's wife. There were also the many sentenced to death that had to be hidden by the CIA. Lets not start on the Stasi, either. If your point was that tyrannies don't murder their citizens for treason, you'll have a tough sell. That's why actually taking them on is a lot harder than taking on a government that -- as the cables are showing -- is actually relatively close to plain-speaking in its dealing with other nations. A lot of the embarrassment has come from second-hand revelations about what other countries have been lying about.

sedachv 16y ago
"Doing actions contrary to the welfare of a national state doesn't automatically amount to a benefit for anti-nationalists." I don't know if you've seen this already, but this summarizes Assange's views well: http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/julian-assange-and-the-computer-conspiracy-%E2%80%9Cto-destroy-this-invisible-government%E2%80%9D/ http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/julian-assange-an... "I'm opposed to nationalism and don't see any short or long-term benefits for me, here." I see a lot of potential benefits for people currently being murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan. "On the contrary, there are serious questions to be asked about what this will do to things that actively help nations to work together, such as diplomatic backchannels." Nations working together towards what? The whole point is that nations work together for the benefit of those governing them. The only reason you and I aren't property of god-kings at this point in history is because in the past people have resisted tribal/nationalist/statist power. "As for 1959, your answer's a little fine in its splitting of the hair -- the KGB went after plenty in its time, including assisting in the bizarre murder of Markov, and the "suicide" of Shevchenko's wife. There were also the many sentenced to death that had to be hidden by the CIA. Lets not start on the Stasi, either." Do you think Africa is a country? How is it splitting hairs to be aware that "Eastern Europe" isn't a single place? "If your point was that tyrannies don't murder their citizens for treason, you'll have a tough sell." Every country punishes its citizens for treason. Assange isn't a citizen of the United States. Bradley Manning is.
- bonaldi 16y ago
  "I see a lot of potential benefits for people currently being murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan." 1. Expose internal documents. 2. ???? 3. Fewer people being murdered in Iraq. Going to need to spell out 2 here, because nothing wikileaks has done so far has done anything to stop those deaths, and isn't likely to. Assange's, yours and Winer's stances all assume that the states involved won't change their methods in response to informational insecurity, and will instead continue business as usual. This is a strange assumption. "Do you think Africa is a country? How is it splitting hairs to be aware that "Eastern Europe" isn't a single place?" It was you who took my allusion to Litvinenko and turned into it something exclusively exclusively about Russia. My point was, and remains, that tyrannies murder to protect themselves, and high-minded rhetoric about bringing them down comes to naught when you just pick on the soft targets.
  - sedachv 16y ago
    "Assange's, yours and Winer's stances all assume that the states involved won't change their methods in response to informational insecurity, and will instead continue business as usual. This is a strange assumption." Please read Assange's manifesto, I posted the link for a reason. The whole point of Wikileaks is to force states to "change their methods in response to informational insecurity" and make their functioning less efficient. Armed revolution isn't popular these days, and this is a bloodless, scalable, and morally unassailable (well, for normal people's morals, anyway) way to attack the functioning of a government. ------ Also, I just learned about this: http://www.boingboing.net/2010/12/03/wikileaks-cables-rev.html http://www.boingboing.net/2010/12/03/wikileaks-cables-rev.ht... Let's see what the outcome will be.
    - bonaldi 16y ago
      I read the manifesto; it's troubling for people who, like me, are in support of the general principle of greater transparency but don't support an ideological reading of the US as an authoritarian conspiracy. As for "morally unassailable", that's a ridiculous assertion. HN can't even decide whether or not TechCrunch was right to publish the Twitter emails; this is at a much more morally complicated level. The potential to put people in harm's way is being used by politicians as a stick to beat WikiLeaks, but nonetheless there's something to it. When Amnesty International says you're putting people in danger, there's more than just hype to it.

by bonaldi 16y ago

sedachv 16y ago

"Doing actions contrary to the welfare of a national state doesn't automatically amount to a benefit for anti-nationalists." I don't know if you've seen this already, but this summarizes Assange's views well: http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/julian-assange-and-the-computer-conspiracy-%E2%80%9Cto-destroy-this-invisible-government%E2%80%9D/ http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/julian-assange-an... "I'm opposed to nationalism and don't see any short or long-term benefits for me, here." I see a lot of potential benefits for people currently being murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan. "On the contrary, there are serious questions to be asked about what this will do to things that actively help nations to work together, such as diplomatic backchannels." Nations working together towards what? The whole point is that nations work together for the benefit of those governing them. The only reason you and I aren't property of god-kings at this point in history is because in the past people have resisted tribal/nationalist/statist power. "As for 1959, your answer's a little fine in its splitting of the hair -- the KGB went after plenty in its time, including assisting in the bizarre murder of Markov, and the "suicide" of Shevchenko's wife. There were also the many sentenced to death that had to be hidden by the CIA. Lets not start on the Stasi, either." Do you think Africa is a country? How is it splitting hairs to be aware that "Eastern Europe" isn't a single place? "If your point was that tyrannies don't murder their citizens for treason, you'll have a tough sell." Every country punishes its citizens for treason. Assange isn't a citizen of the United States. Bradley Manning is.

bonaldi 16y ago
"I see a lot of potential benefits for people currently being murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan." 1. Expose internal documents. 2. ???? 3. Fewer people being murdered in Iraq. Going to need to spell out 2 here, because nothing wikileaks has done so far has done anything to stop those deaths, and isn't likely to. Assange's, yours and Winer's stances all assume that the states involved won't change their methods in response to informational insecurity, and will instead continue business as usual. This is a strange assumption. "Do you think Africa is a country? How is it splitting hairs to be aware that "Eastern Europe" isn't a single place?" It was you who took my allusion to Litvinenko and turned into it something exclusively exclusively about Russia. My point was, and remains, that tyrannies murder to protect themselves, and high-minded rhetoric about bringing them down comes to naught when you just pick on the soft targets.
- sedachv 16y ago
  "Assange's, yours and Winer's stances all assume that the states involved won't change their methods in response to informational insecurity, and will instead continue business as usual. This is a strange assumption." Please read Assange's manifesto, I posted the link for a reason. The whole point of Wikileaks is to force states to "change their methods in response to informational insecurity" and make their functioning less efficient. Armed revolution isn't popular these days, and this is a bloodless, scalable, and morally unassailable (well, for normal people's morals, anyway) way to attack the functioning of a government. ------ Also, I just learned about this: http://www.boingboing.net/2010/12/03/wikileaks-cables-rev.html http://www.boingboing.net/2010/12/03/wikileaks-cables-rev.ht... Let's see what the outcome will be.
  - bonaldi 16y ago
    I read the manifesto; it's troubling for people who, like me, are in support of the general principle of greater transparency but don't support an ideological reading of the US as an authoritarian conspiracy. As for "morally unassailable", that's a ridiculous assertion. HN can't even decide whether or not TechCrunch was right to publish the Twitter emails; this is at a much more morally complicated level. The potential to put people in harm's way is being used by politicians as a stick to beat WikiLeaks, but nonetheless there's something to it. When Amnesty International says you're putting people in danger, there's more than just hype to it.