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Comment by mc32 | Hacker News Reader

I wish people would just focus on the part that regards journalism, free press, free speech, sources and releasing leaked information.

All the rest will fall along political lines. Liked or disliked for the effects on political allies and foes. It’s obvious if you have followed this case.

Three years ago the right loathed him, today they love him and conversely today the left loathes him but 3 years ago they loved him. The state apparatus however still see this as an adversarial act.

So, instead let’s discuss the implications of censorship (state and self-imposed) and journalism this case has.

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The implications are grim.

Governments worldwide are tightening the screws, becoming more secretive and spying extensively on their citizens. Voting doesn't work, as most parties support this encroachment on civil liberties in the name of fighting various evils.

I don't have any solutions and little hope. In the past it used to be that totalitarian governments fell because the population was poor and deeply unhappy. What happens when the government has access to almost perfect information about its citizens, insights that even they might not have? And if they are able to offer decent living standards in exchange for fewer freedoms, they would have an iron grip on power.

It's been "Brave New World" for a while now.

"The philosophy of the ruling minority in Nineteen Eighty-Four is a sadism which has been carried to its logical conclusion by going beyond sex and denying it.

Whether in actual fact the policy of the boot-on-the-face can go on indefinitely seems doubtful. My own belief is that the ruling oligarchy will find less arduous and wasteful ways of governing and of satisfying its lust for power, and these ways will resemble those which I described in Brave New World."

http://www.openculture.com/2018/08/aldous-huxley-george-orwe...

It also seems to me that the possibility of a revolution, in any sense of the word, is getting more and more miniscule, no matter which angle you look at it, whether it's because many people simply don't care or are happy to voluntarily give up private information for diminishing doses of dopamine hits.

The thing about any major revolutionary change is that the initial seed is planted through breaking some kind of law. And if we get to the point where breaking simple laws is impossible because of the near-complete information the state actor has on it's people, things are likely to get worse.

I do see a bleak future ahead. And grim.

According to research I’ve read revolutions grow more likely only when food prices exceed the average income of the population. That is - populations only revolt when starving. That would explain why we see so little of them - starvation level poverty is perhaps becoming less common? This would be a good thing.

I’m not sure about this take.

One revolutions are overwhelmingly bloody and sow seeds of distrust and division among groups.

Two, most aren’t grass-roots but usually orchestrated by larger interests who then coöpt a desperate and vulnerable public.

[added] The effects of revolutions can have deleterious repercussions for several generations down the line.

Three, revolutions have always led to counter-revolutionary movements, that almost always attain some degree of power in the new system too. Bloody vicious cycles of purges and counter-purges follow. With a new system and the very same megalomaniac people in power, not much changes -- except for one or two key-issues the revolution wanted to tackle initially.

The revolution needed is for people to quit letting the politicians and press to set their world view. One must remember that political parties extensively use market research to craft their message and through sycophants in the press will float trial balloons of upcoming campaign statements to see what will work.

Using fear, uncertainty, doubt, and jealously, the convince you to not only put them in office but to stand up for you by "taking care" of those they have taught you to dislike to the point you are now voting people in to punish others.

How we fix that I don't know. However remember one thing. A religious leader demanding action on a moral backing is many many times less dangerous than a politician using a moral stance because theirs changes on a whim

“Politicians need religion even more than a hermit in retreat. If a hermit acts out of bad motivation, he harms no one but himself. But if someone who can directly influence the whole of society acts with bad motivation, then a great number of people will be adversely affected.”

The day I discovered this quote was a rather striking moment. I find it continues to be relevant. Especially when one considers the demagoguery and celeb - I don't just mean TV, note how certain politicians/bootlickers are treated right now - worship that we are effectively replacing establishment religion.

Also important to note that they both use religion. Who puts money in the tithe plate? Not the megachurch preacher. I am a former christian and I struggle to see many differences between a preacher and a politician. Especially celebrity evangelists.

Only well-funded revolutions historically succeeded. The only way might be crypto-based revolution, but I doubt that. Another way is a disorganized chaos when a society implodes, but that rarely brings better things.

A window will re-open (maybe permanently) when the majority of humans live in space habitats. Because of the long distances between habitats[1], the relatively small populations of each[2], and the fragility of the habitat[3], I expect local governments to be more responsive to their citizens.

[1] parent nation takes longea to respond with overwhelming force/more time for local rebellions to solidify control

[2] not enough population to sustain a large garrison but also easier to get a significant portion of the population engaged.

[3] catastrophic sabotage is easier so discontent must be addressed more proactively. Also external applications of force may be limited to massacre or siege since boarding a hostile ship becomes very dangerous.

W re: space habitats (extremely fragile living environments), that’s difficult.

When picking astronauts or cosmonauts they test and screen against negative psychological indicators.

In these environments discontent is a separate issue form psychological issues. Regular discontented people are generally not suicidal. Given that, unless what these people are responsible for is ultra valuable, I think this condition works against them. Unless they have complete independence, they are reliant on the dominant organization who could take advantage of this weak position.

==Three years ago the right loathed him, today they love him and conversely today the left loathes him but 3 years ago they loved him.==

Not necessarily true according to this poll [1]. The alt-right might love him, but rank-and-file Republicans don't seem to:

"A new YouGov poll of 2,455 Americans shows that a majority (53%) say Assange should be extradited to America. That majority increases among both Republicans (59% supporting extradition) and Democrats (62% supporting extradition), but decreases to a plurality (46%) among Independents."

[1] https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/20...

That is fascinating. I can't think of any other opinion where Republicans and Democrats have more in common than Independents, off the top of my head.

And the attack comes from the greatest democracy in the world. It is not from a dictatorial state. If the heroes are this way...

I disagree; much of the right still seems to be calling for him to be locked away for a long time despite his role in getting Trump elected. Much of the left (including the Guardian in this article) is calling for charges to be dropped.

The OP's point is that many people have flipped their positions on this topic - particularly when it suits them politically.

> Much of the left (including the Guardian in this article) is calling for charges to be dropped.

I really don't think this is true. The Guardian is more acutely aware of the threat this poses to general protections afforded journalists (even outside the U.S.)

Assange's reputation is putting an unfortunate taint to the story; if we separate the man from what's actually being done in the criminal charges, it's probably a lot clearer to people from both sides of the aisle that this is a threat to the fourth estate.

True, many leftist news organizations have been consistently defending him and calling this out as an attack on free speech. For example, the Intercept, Democracy Now, Jacobin, etc.

But that's the marginal class-based left; the liberal left, meaning the ones with any sort of power (e.g. Democratic Party, the Guardian, WaPo, NYT, etc...) generally have a history of condemning him while sometimes at the same moment profiting from publishing his leaks.

This is true. Words matter, if OP meant liberals they should've said liberals, not "the left".

>Three years ago the right loathed him

Please do not conflate the right and the neocons.

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