Journalists Abandoned Julian Assange and Slit Their Own Throats | Hacker News Reader

Journalists Abandoned Julian Assange and Slit Their Own Throats

chrishedges.substack.com

32 pointsjules-jules12 comments

I learned that very few people actually care about the truth/leaked materials themselves. The only thing most people care about are revelations that are bad for the person they don't like. As soon as something is published that shines "person they like" in a bad light, it's over.

People immediately stopped caring about whether what he leaked was true, they only cared if he leaked the right things.

I'm not sure America has actual journalists anymore, just writers who rewrite press releases and call themselves journalists.

I think there are people and institutions still trying to maintain ideals and standards. At least this section of Reuters seems to indicate that, or maybe that's just very good marketing and signaling: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/

Either way, I think adversarial systems are always helpful in keeping humans somewhat honest.

> just writers who rewrite press releases and call themselves journalists.

I tried "just reading the wire" for a few weeks before I gave up and went back to normal articles; journalists (imo) are supposed to provide the context for those 2-3 sentence long releases

if a wire comes down the line about an African king losing succession, i think a journalist is supposed to provide the meaning behind this (was it a coup? were they a popular monarch? what do people on the ground think?)

the first two can be filled in with some research, but that third requires (expensive) boots on the ground...

> I'm not sure America has actual journalists anymore

Many are still putting in the work: https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year

A lot of journalists indeed did. Some might try to hide behind some press codex, but they ignored that as well. It really showed how much scoundrels work in that industry. At this points I can believe the others are exceptions.

I think you make a great point.

It highlights that the press isn't dead because they failed to demand press freedom for Assange. The press is dead because they are a coporate entity. And they didn't demand press freedom for Assange because corporate interests didn't benefit from it.

I found out the hard way that as soon as your luck is down everyone abandons you. It is human nature to avoid those who are on a losing streak.

Speak to anyone in jail, they will tell you that almost all of their friends, all of their family will have abandoned them, regardless of their guilt or innocence. It's tragic.

So we had Assange who stayed and fought. We have Snowden who ran to safety.

I guess the lesson for future whistleblowers is to stay anonymous and dump the data covertly.

Yes! Like the leaker of Panama Papers.

Why on earth did Snowden reveal himself? Did he think he'd be like Daniel Ellsberg? Surely he'd seen what happened to Assange and Manning?

Yeah, you can see a pattern in wanting the recognition.

He is an Asutralian citizen so one has to wonder why Australians haven't burned down the US embassy yet. Why is there not more uproar about it from Australians?

The silence from Australia has been deafening.

>He was smeared as [...] a Russian spy

Calling him a Russian spy is misleading because he has been openly employed by Russian state media (RT) since 2012. He has never denied being affiliated with Russia so how can he be a spy?

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