The wrong side of history

[sabotabby]

Listening to a CBC segment on Edward Snowden and wondering at the attempt to force a sort of ambiguity on a situation that really has little in the way of moral ambiguity.

Historical memory is a funny thing. We venerate individuals who stood up to political evil, whether their actions were legal or otherwise, and they do tend to be otherwise, so long as the evil has passed. I've been assembling a collection of photos and quotes by and about Nelson Mandela, who, when he began his long journey as an activist and well into it until the anti-apartheid movement became acceptable by the mainstream, was derided as a terrorist by the likes of David Cameron and many other upstanding Westerners. Civil Rights activists, Soviet dissidents, the few Germans who resisted Hitler, the protestors of the Arab Spring, all acted outside of their country's legal structure. Even in our popular culture, we cheer for the underdog freedom fighter, the Katniss Everdeens and Mal Reynolds and Rebel Alliances that stick it to the big totalitarian governments, a habit we've no doubt picked up from having 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 on high school English class reading lists for approximately forever.

And yet when history is actually being made, when we're inside the narrative, suddenly it's somehow less clear. (It isn't, but there are a number of very powerful interests working very hard to muddy the waters.) The U.S. government behaved badly in a way that, if it had occurred on a TV show, would be classic Evil Totalitarian Government behaviour. In fact, it's kind of the classic Evil Totalitarian Government behaviour. And it obviously affects people far beyond the U.S. They were, and presumably still are, spying on all of us, not just their own citizens.

One does not politely ask an Evil Totalitarian Government to kindly stop doing that bad thing it's doing. Well, one can, but one is unlikely to meet with a very useful response. No, we've all seen the movie, we know what the proper response is. The truth must come out.

History will vindicate Snowden, which does him little good at the moment. In the meantime, there's handwringing about whether he broke the law and violated the national interest, as if the law is something sacred and immutable and given to us by God rather than written by human beings, as if the national interest doesn't include any people. It displays a profound ignorance of how nasty regimes are allowed to develop into nasty regimes in the first place. It strikes me, from my position in this quaint little backwater property of the Empire, as so deeply absurd and myopic that I can't honestly believe that people are making these sorts of arguments. I can't believe that my own government is not at least contemplating granting Snowden asylum, as it did to Igor Gouzenko for doing essentially the same thing as Snowden did with less altruistic motives. (Well, I can, but only because my government is currently trying to be more actively evil than the American government.) It's not that I disagree with these arguments, though I do, it's just that I completely can't understand the mentality that would cause someone to make them. One would have to stand completely outside of the constructs of ethics—which a good many people do, apparently—and the lessons of history in order to stake a claim that this man did anything other than the right thing.

Comments

[begundan.livejournal.com]

Funny, I was just recently thinking about the same thing. How history in the making is complex and ambiguous, and how the ambiguities and intricacies seem to collapse under the weight of the years onto one, or sometimes two, rather diminished narratives. IIRC, I was thinking about it in connection to partisans on occupied land.

But maybe it isn't true that people as a whole view history in the making as more ambiguous. Maybe we're just as polarized with respect to current events as we are when we conceptualize the past.

[begundan.livejournal.com]

Apropos soviet dissidents, my grandfather was one, and I'm far from convinced he deserves to be remembered as a brave righteous soul resisting an evil regime, even though my reasons for viewing him as morally ambiguous are, superficially at least, different from the ones the regime had.

[sabotabby]

One of my grandfathers was on the right side of history in regards to organized labour struggles in Canada, but he was still an irredeemable asshole in every other possible way. It happens. I mean, look at Julian Assange; one can be a hero in one way and rapist scum in another.

[rinue.livejournal.com]

Politely, and without making an argument about Snowden, I have to observe there are plenty of people who have revealed state secrets who history has not vindicated as freedom fighters (off the top of my head, Benedict Arnold [who I actually like], Aldrich Ames, and the Cambridge Five). Nor do I think there is the same consensus that government spying - without moves to oppress the speech being observed - is de facto an act of evil (witness the British embrace of a London-wide CCTV camera network, which troubles some of the populace, but which the majority embrace as protection analogous to a friendly policeman on the corner).

Thus divided reactions are perhaps baffling you more than they need to. Although you are clear in your own mind about what you feel, the ambiguity is not manufactured, and plenty of intelligent, skeptical, historically-steeped people - including me - take a very different point of view.

[sabotabby]

I have to observe there are plenty of people who have revealed state secrets who history has not vindicated as freedom fighters

Well, yes. It's not the action itself, but the motive and effect. Stealing state secrets to give to a rival country? History will vindicate whoever came out on top in that conflict. Stealing state secrets to give to the people victimized? You don't need to wait that long.

(On that note, I'm still waiting for history to vindicate the Cambridge Five. Admittedly, I'm biased in that regard.)

Nor do I think there is the same consensus that government spying - without moves to oppress the speech being observed - is de facto an act of evil (witness the British embrace of a London-wide CCTV camera network, which troubles some of the populace, but which the majority embrace as protection analogous to a friendly policeman on the corner).

I just can't understand this. Maybe I'm just more North American than North Americans, but unwarranted invasion of privacy is, I believe, inherently evil, even if the government does nothing but listen. But then, I also find the idea of a friendly policeman on every corner totalitarian.

[mendaciloquent.livejournal.com]

But then, I also find the idea of a friendly policeman on every corner totalitarian.

That's because "friendly policeman" is an oxymoron.

[sabotabby]

I have met friendly individual policemen in a professional capacity, who in a friendly way have told me that if they encounter me at a demo they will not hesitate to beat my skull in no matter how lovely and peaceful a person I happen to be.

[rinue.livejournal.com]

It really comes down to whether you have more trust of your government (which depending on the government may or may not have layers of oversight, may or may not be elected by you, and has a judicial/appeals system which falls somewhere in a range of corrupt-to-just) or more trust of random people on the street. Depending on the government in question, and depending on the larger culture, either of these is a totally reasonable position.

In my lifetime, and especially recently, I have received a good deal of protection and aid from the federal government and federal law enforcement, a moderate amount of harassment and unwarranted intrusion from local government and police, and a pretty mixed bag of treatment from my fellow citizens, some of whom have been kind beyond what I deserve and others of whom have targeted me for random (and sometimes not random) acts of violence. So I tend not to have a polemic reaction for or against surveillance; it can be evil or helpful or protective or oppressive or liberating. My concern with government overreach tends to focus on things like habeus corpus, legal presumption of innocence, the right to know charges against me, the right to face my accuser, and no prior restraint of the press.

I do think many more things are classified than need to be. However, as a US citizen who pays a reasonable amount of attention (or some would say unreasonable amount of attention) to public policy, Snowden didn't reveal anything to me I didn't already know. The fact that the NSA was archiving that data? Approved by Congress more than a decade ago, and a matter of public record - along with the legal process for being able to access it, which is actually more stringent than our legal standards for approving a wiretap. The fact that we were spying on foreign governments? Is what spy agencies do and have done for centuries if not millenia. It's in their charters and in our history books. I admit I am fairly angry to find out that our internal audit process seems to be terrible, because the fact that a sysadmin like Snowden was able to get that data without much effort is inexcusable. Yet I am sadly not surprised, because that kind of thing is exactly what happens when you cut the budget of an agency while still demanding it do all the same stuff. Corners get rounded off that really shouldn't.

Meanwhile, what does Snowden do? He runs to China and then Russia, neither of which I'd classify as bastions of democracy or freedom. Not by a landslide. Does not pass the smell test.

So no, I don't view Snowden's actions as revealing that the US is secretly totalitarian and sliding toward facism, nor do I believe in his pure motives. I look around and I still have a democratically elected (although frequently bumbling) government that is nowhere near monolithic enough to even pass a budget on time. The jackbooted thugs showing up on the behest of the thought police have not yet manifested.

Don't get me wrong - the government is up to screwy stuff, and I think Bradley Manning for instance is a hero. Snowden, not so much. Snowden is mostly embarrassing.

[sabotabby]

Depending on the government in question, and depending on the larger culture, either of these is a totally reasonable position.

My experience has been the opposite. As I mentioned below, the friendly community policeman I know blithely informed me that, should we meet at a demo, I'm getting my skull bashed in no matter how nice we both are. I appreciated his honesty, at least. Still, I'm a white, middle-class, cisgendered professional—a schoolteacher, no less—nowhere near as vulnerable as most, let alone some.

I do think many more things are classified than need to be. However, as a US citizen who pays a reasonable amount of attention (or some would say unreasonable amount of attention) to public policy, Snowden didn't reveal anything to me I didn't already know.

Me neither; for the longest time I wasn't reading or posting about this because I felt that territory had been well-covered by BoingBoing articles over the past few years. But of course, he's much more convincing and much more public. Regardless of whether you and I know it, most Americans didn't know about it.

So no, I don't view Snowden's actions as revealing that the US is secretly totalitarian and sliding toward facism, nor do I believe in his pure motives. I look around and I still have a democratically elected (although frequently bumbling) government that is nowhere near monolithic enough to even pass a budget on time. The jackbooted thugs showing up on the behest of the thought police have not yet manifested.

I don't think they need to be all that organized. One of the things that we're seeing here is the extent to which every citizen is a criminal (and I know that's happening in the U.S. too, because I hear about the most egregious cases). There've been a fair number of entrapment scenarios that stick because everyone has said something dumbass online at some point—the teenage kid who's goaded into a half-ass terrorist plot by RCMP agents becomes a dire threat to national security if you cherry pick a lot.

Meanwhile, what does Snowden do? He runs to China and then Russia, neither of which I'd classify as bastions of democracy or freedom. Not by a landslide. Does not pass the smell test.

See below re: Manning. We've seen what would have happen had he stuck around. I think it was a silly move in terms of countries to flee to and not waiting to be somewhere safe before leaking the information, but I don't remotely blame him for running.

[rinue.livejournal.com]

I am really not a fan of the police. Thugs almost across the board. They're a self-selecting group of tough guys looking to beat up the baddies, and will make baddies to beat up if none seem easily available. I have not in my life met a policeman I trusted, although I have met policemen keen to placate me. I have a much more positive opinion of the Feds; although there are certainly rotten apples among them (I mean, I live in Boston, where the Whitey Bulger trial is going on, and that's all about FBI malfeasance), I have known a lot of them who were in my estimation genuinely good people who tried to keep a check on their own confirmation bias. I'm uncomfortable enough with the NSA and CIA that I specifically decided not to apply for work with them, even though I think I would be a good fit in either place.

I'm cheered that as soon as the Snowden incident blew up, there were immediately congressional hearings about it, all of which were aired on television and archived for free online, which says to me that the legislative branch still cares about acting as a check on the executive branch - which has been overreaching in all kinds of ways, and is for instance using the military as our main foreign policy arm, which means not only over-classification but a totally separate court system (with many fewer civil liberties) and taking over decision-making that is expressly reserved in the Constitution for our elected members of Congress.

My point is essentially that I think this is an ambiguous situation in which it's possible for intelligent people to have different points of view. I know where I stand on it, but I don't think that where I stand has a particular moral force; it mainly tells you what I think about government and suggests that I take a relatively Realist approach to international relations, all of which give you some clues about my family background and which areas and eras of history I tend to read. If somebody disagrees (you, for instance), that strikes me as reasonable, particularly if they've clearly given it some thought (again you) and are bringing a broader perspective than a knee-jerk "information wants to be free!"

However I find a lot of the overheated rhetoric wearying. I wind up hearing more of it from the Left than I do from the Right, just because of who I chose to spend my time listening to. There may very well be people on the Right who think that Snowden is some evil schemer who should get the death penalty and who has put lives in danger, and I'm sure I'd be very annoyed with them, but I haven't actually heard anything from them. On the other hand, I have been bombarded with an awful lot of Snowden-as-saint from friends on the Left, and I'm starting to feel like Godwin's Law ought to be expanded to include hyperbolic comparisons to MLK (and possibly Nelson Mandela). Way too much playing of the MLK card going on. Being arrested or under surveillance does not turn you into MLK. If it were that easy, I would definitely get myself arrested ASAP.

It is interesting to me that this got everyone's attention and none of the other stuff did. I'm not even sure how that happened. It kind of reminds me of In The Loop. But I suppose I also have a hard time understanding what makes one pop song hit it big and another one not.

[sabotabby]

I'm cheered that as soon as the Snowden incident blew up, there were immediately congressional hearings about it, all of which were aired on television and archived for free online, which says to me that the legislative branch still cares about acting as a check on the executive branch - which has been overreaching in all kinds of ways, and is for instance using the military as our main foreign policy arm, which means not only over-classification but a totally separate court system (with many fewer civil liberties) and taking over decision-making that is expressly reserved in the Constitution for our elected members of Congress.

Part of my point is that publicly accessible congressional hearings wouldn't have happened if he'd simply written a formal and polite note about abuses of power and sent it up the proper channels.

If the system works, great; he's helped correct abuses. But I think the system's response by and large—putting pressure on other governments not to allow Snowden asylum, and, most egregiously, diverting Morales' plane—justifies the initial action of breaking the law.

Regardless, even if Americans are willing to be monitored, I, as a citizen of a foreign country that does not get a chance to vote for your government, am not, and foreign electronic communication is apparently being monitored too. So there's that.

There may very well be people on the Right who think that Snowden is some evil schemer who should get the death penalty and who has put lives in danger, and I'm sure I'd be very annoyed with them, but I haven't actually heard anything from them.

That's not actually what I'm concerned about. It's more the nice liberals that I was listening to, insisting that he should "have his day in court" after what happened to Manning.

Being arrested or under surveillance does not turn you into MLK.

Well, my comparison is not that Snowden is as much of a hero or as important as MLK or Mandela, but rather an examination of how civil disobedience is perceived at the time it's going on. The examples seem hyperbolic only through the lens of history, because these men are so widely accepted as saints.

Nor, of course, is the U.S. at the moment much like Stalin's Russia, despite a surveillance network that would make Dzerzhinsky cream his dress uniform. But comparisons—and even Godwin violations—are warranted, I believe, because societies like that don't simply emerge overnight or without a certain level of resignation or acceptance on the part of the population.

[the_axel]

My understanding & recollection is that CCTV was unpopular when it went in, but not unpopular enough to cause a public backlash.
It was put in in a very unstructured and ad hoc way, with support from both Labour & the Tories which made it difficult for opposition groups to make a fuss about
Over time it's become a thing that's there and isn't going away so people put up with it.

[symbioid.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit sad that Russia didn't take him without a promise, and I'm upset that they forced the fucking Bolivian plane out of airspace. What the fuck is the US threatening on all these countries? I suppose it's all these sort of "we're all countries here" looking out for each other. Especially when you have larger fascist-y states (china, russia) vs the "third world"/anti-colonial movements in S. America...

So Russia will talk tough against the US but in the end, they know which way the bread is buttered, and in order to get the US to cooperate with them now and then, will do its bidding.

[sabotabby]

So Russia will talk tough against the US but in the end, they know which way the bread is buttered, and in order to get the US to cooperate with them now and then, will do its bidding.

Pretty much. It will do some posturing but I imagine if anyone steps up to the plate, it'll be somewhere like Bolivia or Venezuela.

[smhwpf.livejournal.com]

We could add MLK who repeatedly broke the law, went to jail, and advocated others to do so, and who now has a holiday named after him.

Governments are very clever, and people, most especially political commentators, media pundits, etc., are very stupid, or rather they train themselves to think in an incredibly blinkered fashion, as a necessary condition for maintaining simultaneously their sanity and their employment (see Chomsky, passim). Only someone very well trained could, in response to the revelation of secret government Evil, say "But should he have broken the law to reveal the secret government Evil", as if there were any other way of doing so.

Although the place I work is rather more progressive than most US Think Tanks, I still see some of the same attitude amongst same people; we work in the Policy world, we deal with Government, so there's this thing where what goes on in Government and especially Diplomacy is Very, Very Important, so when Wikileaks happens, there's a sort of feeling that it has violated something sacred. (Certainly wasn't everyone's viewpoint, but I got something of that sense).

[sabotabby]

We could add MLK who repeatedly broke the law, went to jail, and advocated others to do so, and who now has a holiday named after him.

Right. And of course, his speeches now get bowdlerized and used by racists to defend all manner of horrors. But that was different, because it was in the Bad Old Days, and the people decrying civil disobedience in the contemporary era never imagine themselves opposing it back then.

Only someone very well trained could, in response to the revelation of secret government Evil, say "But should he have broken the law to reveal the secret government Evil", as if there were any other way of doing so.

Exactly.

Although the place I work is rather more progressive than most US Think Tanks, I still see some of the same attitude amongst same people; we work in the Policy world, we deal with Government, so there's this thing where what goes on in Government and especially Diplomacy is Very, Very Important, so when Wikileaks happens, there's a sort of feeling that it has violated something sacred. (Certainly wasn't everyone's viewpoint, but I got something of that sense).

This doesn't totally surprise me. I mean, I get instinctively defensive when there's controversy that involves the education system. But then I'm like, no, we ought to be transparent and respond to criticism, and if we can't, there's something wrong.

FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT

[symbioid.livejournal.com]

http://youtu.be/GWRqPbwwYS0

[sabotabby]

Sigh. No, Chomsky, no. I <3 him but this some prime People's Front of Judea bullshit.

[symbioid.livejournal.com]

Damnit, it's the Judean People's Front!

Splitter.

Your own hashtag

[ed-rex.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that. Brilliant analysis, as usual. As a reward, I've created #Sabotabby on Twitter, 'cause I'm sure I'll be pointing towards your journal again and again and again. Lemme know if you don't like.

[sabotabby]

I freaking love! I mean, as much as I hate Twitter, I like the idea of trending on it.

[mendaciloquent.livejournal.com]

I sometimes wonder what resistance will look like when state oppression not only takes place in the open, but when it's publicly assumed to take place in the open by a wider and wider number of people, and whether or not Snowden is sort of an example of that evolution -- not in terms of his motives or even the legality of what he did (does it matter?) -- but more in terms of tactics. It's hard to imagine that the move of preemptively going public, going abroad, and looking for support while releasing documents, was not motivated by seeing the betrayal and brutal treatment of Manning. In which case the ruthlessness of the US in hunting people, while not necessarily backfiring, may be creating a different kind of leaker.

[sabotabby]

Though one would think that knowing the brutality, he'd find somewhere safe and then leak.

It's interesting that the solution to increased surveillance is turning the spotlight the other way around as well. I think we'll end up with a culture in which more things are made public in general, both the personal and the state. Technologically speaking, it seems inevitable.

[lienne.livejournal.com]

naturally, I feel that there is an Alice Cooper song that fits this situation

[sabotabby]

That is a pretty perfect song, actually.

[lienne.livejournal.com]

ikr? :D

[sabotabby]

Think I'm going to have to use it for my next post.

[lienne.livejournal.com]

:DDDDDDD