Brava, Wikileaks!

I've been doing a lot of thinking about Wikileaks and the Julian Assange rape allegations, and I've come to the conclusion that Julian Assange (the founder of Wikileaks) is the biggest hero in journalism in decades. If you've never read the "About Wikileaks" section on the Wikileaks website, you should check it out right now before they shut it down again or find a way to block it (because they will). "They," in this case, are literally an unprecedented coalition of state and corporate powers around the world. Suddenly, countries that don't seem to agree on anything in the public sphere can agree on one thing: that the truth must be hidden at all costs.

And if this doesn't disturb you, it should.

What better way to discredit someone who's politically unpopular than to claim they're a rapist? It's incredibly unlikely that a person motivated to fight for government transparency and ethics could simultaneously rape anyone, much less multiple women. It's ideologically inconsistent to believe on the one hand in justice and human rights and then on the other hand to be some kind of raping psychopath. So is Julian Assange really a rapist or is it just possible that this is a cheap, politically motivated character assassination designed to silence an important journalist?

As for the people who tell you that publishing classified information weakens our national security... Sorry, but that's a retarded position. The idea that we're even remotely safe in a country that gives incentives to corporations to exploit worldwide labor forces so we can buy cheap trinkets at Walmart is just laughable. There is no security in a world like that. It's the price we pay for cheap oil and free trade policies. Censoring a website that attempts to shed light on this stuff is not in the interest of national security. What would really improve our national security would be understanding what's wrong with our foreign policy and making better policy decisions.

If we really believed in "freedom"--which we don't--then we'd support the free press and demand that they expose corporate and government lies without the fear of censorship. If we actually knew or cared about what was really going on in the world, and not just what the idiot propaganda machine feeds us, then maybe we'd quit voting for idiots and start talking about what's really in our best interest.

Incidentally, this situation is a perfect illustration of why we should be screaming very loudly about net neutrality. Without net neutrality, corporations (and the governments they control) can restrict our access to independent websites exactly like Wikileaks. Is this really what we've come to?

UPDATE: The Wikileaks site that I linked to earlier (wikileaks.ch) has already been censored. There is a massive internet hacking effort going on right now to keep the site mirrored. For a list of mirrors, click here: Wikileaks.