I think it's time we had a civilised discussion on the ethics, pros, cons and everything inbetween as it relates to WikiLeaks and it's founder; Julian Assange.
Some questions I think would be productive to debate:
Is what WikiLeaks does justified?
The United Nations' Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that Julian Assange has been "arbitrarily detained" and that his detention should be brought to an end. Do you agree with them?
Some theorists speculate that Julian Assange has been killed, on account of his lack of recent public appearances and fabricated videos of him. What do you think about this?
How influential do you believe WikiLeaks to have been in the recent 2016 Presidential Election?
Ask yourself what role Clinton played in the outcome of the US election, and investigate for yourself what the Clinton-related leaks say rather than trying to guess about where they came from.
1. The reason why he's hiding out in an embassy is because of alleged sexual misconduct. He doesn't deserve to go to prison over alleged sex without a condom, with a woman associated with state agents, who later retracted the charges etc etc ... But yes, Julian Assange really is a weirdo. he was very close to a 14 year old girl in the Wikileaks chatroom. Everyone just had pseudonyms they could pick at will, with no other identifying information shown, but Assange kind of stuck out. I would not be surprised if he has some resentment against the US govt, but that's really not a bad thing to have, especially if you actually read the leaks or study his case.
2. Wikileaks is a very reliable and independent news org. They are definitely not conservatives, statists, fascists, nationalists, or things like that -- they've leaked plenty of bad things about the US Govt and large corporations. I'd say they're somewhere between libertarians, anarchists and pacifists. That is to say, they don't think any institution is above the truth, and think that transparency/whistleblowing will result in less harm.
3. The Russians most likely did not leak the documents, and most likely did not leak them to make Donald Trump president. Clinton and co. were up to a lot of shady business, Clinton lied a lot, and Bernie Sanders and all his supporters got robbed by the state/corporate favorite.
The WikiLeaks "mission" is to release verified and notable information they receive. As they've done with the TPP, info on Scientology, info with Vatican-related scandals, and plenty of other things that are linked to on the first page or two of the website.
He's probably not dead, and he should be set free -- he's an editor and a journalist imo, not some kind of evil master who breaks into the government's supercomputers to cause chaos.
For the record, I don't object to what whistle-blowers do or what they stand for. In fact, I first voted "Yes" on the poll. I believe that their services help fill the information gap between the government and the governed. But after a few days of reflection, I'm not entirely sure if I can trust the WikiLeaks organization itself.
I have a lot of misgivings with how they do things, but perhaps most concerning is their history of inadvertently revealing very personal information for large portions of the online world to see. And I'm not talking about war logs or the the shady dealings of a member of the establishment-- they have, on more than one occasion, revealed the private information of innocent civilians, including full names, home addresses, phone numbers, and even medical records. That's not to mention all the messages with touchy details like peoples' sexual orientation, what STDs they have, and who they owe money to.
Now, I don't think I need to remind anyone on a site with OPI rules that this is usually considered unethical and dangerous, but apparently the people behind WikiLeaks no longer give a crap. Allegedly they once had a vetting process for this sort of thing, but nowadays when this sort of thing is brought up the staffers seem content to shrug their shoulders and pretend it didn't happen.
We could go back and forth on whether or not the consequences of their personal information policy are worth the absolute transparency, but the way I see it is that these people have the power to prevent harm and refuse to use it. Chances are good that they won't be held accountable for this, and that anyone who's been affected by WikiLeak's carelessness won't be compensated in any way. And this isn't something they've shown any signs of addressing -- the DNC leaks had juicy tidbits like credit card information and Social Security Numbers.
How about you tell us why we voted no? Really think about it. Tell us how it could be a bad thing.
deletedover 8 years
https://wikileaks.org/Assange-Statement-on-the-US-Election.html "We publish material given to us if it is of political, diplomatic, historical or ethical importance and which has not been published elsewhere. When we have material that fulfills this criteria, we publish. We had information that fit our editorial criteria which related to the Sanders and Clinton campaign (DNC Leaks) and the Clinton political campaign and Foundation (Podesta Emails). No-one disputes the public importance of these publications. It would be unconscionable for WikiLeaks to withhold such an archive from the public during an election.
At the same time, we cannot publish what we do not have. To date, we have not received information on Donald Trump’s campaign, or Jill Stein’s campaign, or Gary Johnson’s campaign or any of the other candidates that fufills our stated editorial criteria. As a result of publishing Clinton’s cables and indexing her emails we are seen as domain experts on Clinton archives. So it is natural that Clinton sources come to us."
cmon guys pls tell me what reason there is to be anti-wikileaks
deletedover 8 years
Oh ya Bebop link a video about the history of everything pertaining to wiki leaks so i can know whats going on please. And how and why would he be missing
deletedover 8 years
Warning for anyone who do not know shi*t will talk sh*t .... Please do not sh*t talk
