4 ms·

So I have a couple of thoughts on this. For context, I'm a big fan of Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. Julian Assange is... more interesting. Imagine you're

by cletus 2y ago

So I have a couple of thoughts on this. For context, I'm a big fan of Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. Julian Assange is... more interesting. Imagine you're a journalist and someone hands you a shoebox full of SD cards with classified materials including video evidence of war crimes. Most of us would agree it is the ethical thing to do to publish that and you're definitely a journalist. Now imagine you had a contact in the military with acccess to classified data. What if instead of simply receiving that information, you tell that person what you're interested in. Are you still a journalist? What if you procure tools for that person to bypass security procedures? What if you instruct them on methods they can smuggle out that information from a secure facility? Are you still a journalist? What if you run someone off the road so they have a car accident and they miss their shift and that person is in charge of facility security, making it easier for your contact to smuggle out classified materials? Are you still a journalist? This can go on and at some point you're no longer a journalist. My point is that Assange was allegedly more of an active participant in acquiring these materials so there's an argument to be made that he wasn't a journalist, legally speaking. But here's where I think Assange really hurt himself: by playing politics in selectively releasing the Podesta and DNC emails to try and sway the 2016 election. This demonstrated that Wikileaks is not, as it portrays itself, a vessel for unfiltered publication. This mattered in the court of public opinion because that's what would ultimately have to come to Assange's aid. Now make no mistake: the US government did what it set out to do, which was to create a chilling effect on journalism that exposed US government secrets. Assange has essentially spent 12 yaers in confinement between the Ecuadorian embassy and Belmarsh awaiting extradition.

dietr1ch 2y ago
If only government secrets were just their grandma's recipes. Why do governments are given special treatment when some of their secrets are crimes that are disclosed too late to get anyone involved in a trial, and happened too long ago to do anything about it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_regime_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_r...
- JackSlateur 2y ago
  In the animal farm, all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
po 2y ago
I agree with you and I'm a bit surprised that more people don't see the difference between what Manning and Snowden did and what Assange was up to (including apparently Snowden himself). At the time, I was initially a person who thought that what Wikileaks was doing was a net good for the rule of law, but changed my mind when I learned about the selective nature of what they publish. The fact that they were playing politics, pushing conspiracy theories, and actively coordinating with the Trump campaign completely discredits any moral high-ground they had. You can say that what happened to him is unfair and that may even be true but Assange is no hero.
- marssaxman 2y ago
  If we consider other forms of journalism, it seems quite normal that a newspaper or TV station offers a specific political perspective, the news it publishes being selectively curated by its editor. Perhaps the issue is not that Assange had an editorial slant, but that his publication stood alone; we had no whistleblower's equivalent of CNN or the New York Times to consult for contrast as Wikileaks began playing the part of Fox News.
  - fastball 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - seanw444 2y ago
    Yeah all the famous, immortalized people we look back on in history have had a bias. The dude has a bone to pick with the Democratic party. So what. He exposed corruption deep in government regardless. Saying "yeah he exposed crimes, but he mostly only did it to spite the liberals, so does was it really a good thing?" is bizarre.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
CSMastermind 2y ago
I would add to what you wrote that I personally have reservations about revealing the identities of confidential sources, activists, etc. He willfully published not only the sources in active warzones who were feeding information to the US, risking their deaths, but also the secret identities and conversations of activists in Belarus who were summarily imprisoned or killed. And it's not that they're committed to always releasing everything, they painstakingly withheld information about Russia's financial backing of Syria during one of their releases.
- RCitronsBroker 2y ago
  i have a very, very hard time feeling sympathetic to the elements put in danger here.
  - cjpearson 2y ago
    What do you have against anti-Taliban Afghans or anti-Lukashenko Belarusians?
    - RCitronsBroker 2y ago
      I'm afghan, so i can only talk about the caliber of US-cooperating, calling them anti taliban is a distinct misnomer, afghans I’ve met, and they are quite literally some of the very worst and amoral people I’ve ever met. They aren’t motivated by moral objections towards Islamic extremism, they have found a big daddy to lend them authority and maybe solves a few unrelated vendettas for them. Most concerning opium and warlordism. Let’s also not forget where the taliban got their supplies from. …and the fact that the sudden US retreat, and especially backtracking on guarantees of citizenship, killed more pro-US afghans than assange ever could have. People don’t hold onto a departing planes landing gear for nothing, that’s something you do with your back against the wall. Kandahar skydiving club it jokingly was called by US troops, how about yall don’t feign sympathy.
impossiblefork 2y ago
I'm the precise other way around. Snowden and Manning had a duty to the US. They were US citizens, they even worked for the military or spying apparatus. For them to release information, no matter how justified, is obviously a crime, but Assange isn't American, not US permanent resident, and he has no duty to be loyal to the US. This is why I feel that the prosecution is so insane. Assange getting extradited to the US is like Russia getting somebody extradited to Russia. Now of course, you can't expect better from the UK, which participated in the same war he is most famous for publishing stuff from, and him going to the UK was incredibly stupid. But acquiring material actively is something you should obviously do. If you're a citizen of a third country and have a chance to obtain material of public interest, of course you should, and it shouldn't concern you whether the country whose material you obtain regards that as a crime.
- throwawayffffas 2y ago
  I think you are both right. Snowden and Manning broke the oaths they took. Assange is guilty of espionage. > but Assange isn't American, not US permanent resident, and he has no duty to be loyal to the US. That's besides the point, for example if a CIA agent is in China gathering intelligence on classified things, he is clearly guilty of espionage. You don't have to be a citizen or a permanent resident or have a duty to be loyal to a country to be spy. edit: typo
  - impossiblefork 2y ago
    Yes, but that doesn't mean that the CIA agent is a criminal. Consequently, if arrested in, let's say, Thailand and handed over to China he will presumably not confess to espionage, just as Assange should not. He will instead presumably regard the procedure as irrelevant and say nothing. By entering into a guilty plea he is participating in a legal procedure which is bullshit, and by legitimising it he causes harm to others who would seek to obtain information about war crimes from foreign countries.
    - throwawayffffas 2y ago
      The CIA agent is not a criminal in the US. For the Chinese government he is a criminal.
JackSlateur 2y ago
Here in France, as an individual, you can provide proof in a justice case, regardless of how you got them (that is, they are valid even if acquired through illegals means). I believe illegal acquisition of proof shall be punished only if the underlying case is denied.
unraveller 2y ago
>Are you still a journalist? If he were an american citizen then the answer is yes as nothing much would stop him from being a journalist. You can speak and journal from prison there. What your asking implies is was he more an agitator or conspirator. Well he is about to admit to as much out of necessity, more to the point, will the next round of international journalists feel so much grey area hunting is necessary to bring us the truth about governments acting in the red area? I suspect many a journalist would go back in time and spill coffee on Hitler if it helped unearth those state secrets.
hajile 2y ago
In the US, the Right to Freedom of the Press has NOTHING to do with "journalists" and everything to do with the freedom for ANYONE to write, publish, and distribute whatever they'd like. If I as a US citizen didn't sign a contract agreeing not to publish something and if that something isn't libelous, I should be free to publish it.
- sanderjd 2y ago
  The law on this is not at all that people can publish "whatever they'd like". It's a complex mishmash of written laws and legal precedents that have accrued over a long period of time. The end result is somewhere in the middle. There are legal ways to publish more information than the government or others would like, but there are also things that are arguably "press" that are not legal to do.

by cletus 2y ago

dietr1ch 2y ago

If only government secrets were just their grandma's recipes. Why do governments are given special treatment when some of their secrets are crimes that are disclosed too late to get anyone involved in a trial, and happened too long ago to do anything about it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_regime_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_r...

JackSlateur 2y ago
In the animal farm, all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

po 2y ago

I agree with you and I'm a bit surprised that more people don't see the difference between what Manning and Snowden did and what Assange was up to (including apparently Snowden himself). At the time, I was initially a person who thought that what Wikileaks was doing was a net good for the rule of law, but changed my mind when I learned about the selective nature of what they publish. The fact that they were playing politics, pushing conspiracy theories, and actively coordinating with the Trump campaign completely discredits any moral high-ground they had. You can say that what happened to him is unfair and that may even be true but Assange is no hero.

marssaxman 2y ago
If we consider other forms of journalism, it seems quite normal that a newspaper or TV station offers a specific political perspective, the news it publishes being selectively curated by its editor. Perhaps the issue is not that Assange had an editorial slant, but that his publication stood alone; we had no whistleblower's equivalent of CNN or the New York Times to consult for contrast as Wikileaks began playing the part of Fox News.
- fastball 2y ago
  [flagged]
- seanw444 2y ago
  Yeah all the famous, immortalized people we look back on in history have had a bias. The dude has a bone to pick with the Democratic party. So what. He exposed corruption deep in government regardless. Saying "yeah he exposed crimes, but he mostly only did it to spite the liberals, so does was it really a good thing?" is bizarre.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

CSMastermind 2y ago

I would add to what you wrote that I personally have reservations about revealing the identities of confidential sources, activists, etc. He willfully published not only the sources in active warzones who were feeding information to the US, risking their deaths, but also the secret identities and conversations of activists in Belarus who were summarily imprisoned or killed. And it's not that they're committed to always releasing everything, they painstakingly withheld information about Russia's financial backing of Syria during one of their releases.

RCitronsBroker 2y ago
i have a very, very hard time feeling sympathetic to the elements put in danger here.
- cjpearson 2y ago
  What do you have against anti-Taliban Afghans or anti-Lukashenko Belarusians?
  - RCitronsBroker 2y ago
    I'm afghan, so i can only talk about the caliber of US-cooperating, calling them anti taliban is a distinct misnomer, afghans I’ve met, and they are quite literally some of the very worst and amoral people I’ve ever met. They aren’t motivated by moral objections towards Islamic extremism, they have found a big daddy to lend them authority and maybe solves a few unrelated vendettas for them. Most concerning opium and warlordism. Let’s also not forget where the taliban got their supplies from. …and the fact that the sudden US retreat, and especially backtracking on guarantees of citizenship, killed more pro-US afghans than assange ever could have. People don’t hold onto a departing planes landing gear for nothing, that’s something you do with your back against the wall. Kandahar skydiving club it jokingly was called by US troops, how about yall don’t feign sympathy.

impossiblefork 2y ago

I'm the precise other way around. Snowden and Manning had a duty to the US. They were US citizens, they even worked for the military or spying apparatus. For them to release information, no matter how justified, is obviously a crime, but Assange isn't American, not US permanent resident, and he has no duty to be loyal to the US. This is why I feel that the prosecution is so insane. Assange getting extradited to the US is like Russia getting somebody extradited to Russia. Now of course, you can't expect better from the UK, which participated in the same war he is most famous for publishing stuff from, and him going to the UK was incredibly stupid. But acquiring material actively is something you should obviously do. If you're a citizen of a third country and have a chance to obtain material of public interest, of course you should, and it shouldn't concern you whether the country whose material you obtain regards that as a crime.

throwawayffffas 2y ago
I think you are both right. Snowden and Manning broke the oaths they took. Assange is guilty of espionage. > but Assange isn't American, not US permanent resident, and he has no duty to be loyal to the US. That's besides the point, for example if a CIA agent is in China gathering intelligence on classified things, he is clearly guilty of espionage. You don't have to be a citizen or a permanent resident or have a duty to be loyal to a country to be spy. edit: typo
- impossiblefork 2y ago
  Yes, but that doesn't mean that the CIA agent is a criminal. Consequently, if arrested in, let's say, Thailand and handed over to China he will presumably not confess to espionage, just as Assange should not. He will instead presumably regard the procedure as irrelevant and say nothing. By entering into a guilty plea he is participating in a legal procedure which is bullshit, and by legitimising it he causes harm to others who would seek to obtain information about war crimes from foreign countries.
  - throwawayffffas 2y ago
    The CIA agent is not a criminal in the US. For the Chinese government he is a criminal.

JackSlateur 2y ago

Here in France, as an individual, you can provide proof in a justice case, regardless of how you got them (that is, they are valid even if acquired through illegals means). I believe illegal acquisition of proof shall be punished only if the underlying case is denied.

unraveller 2y ago

>Are you still a journalist? If he were an american citizen then the answer is yes as nothing much would stop him from being a journalist. You can speak and journal from prison there. What your asking implies is was he more an agitator or conspirator. Well he is about to admit to as much out of necessity, more to the point, will the next round of international journalists feel so much grey area hunting is necessary to bring us the truth about governments acting in the red area? I suspect many a journalist would go back in time and spill coffee on Hitler if it helped unearth those state secrets.

hajile 2y ago

In the US, the Right to Freedom of the Press has NOTHING to do with "journalists" and everything to do with the freedom for ANYONE to write, publish, and distribute whatever they'd like. If I as a US citizen didn't sign a contract agreeing not to publish something and if that something isn't libelous, I should be free to publish it.

sanderjd 2y ago
The law on this is not at all that people can publish "whatever they'd like". It's a complex mishmash of written laws and legal precedents that have accrued over a long period of time. The end result is somewhere in the middle. There are legal ways to publish more information than the government or others would like, but there are also things that are arguably "press" that are not legal to do.