For anyone who hasn't had a chance to catch up on the rise and rise of Wikileaks and the latest controversy about its founder, you could hardly look for a more full account than is provided in this newsletter which usually concerns itself with sci-fi ideas becoming reality:
http://www.arlingtoninstitute.org/tai/fearchive-featured
(although, in the middle of it all is a little article reporting that,
Use of mobile phones has been banned by a local council in northern India. The reason given is to ban unmarried women from carrying mobile phones and also to halt romances between youngsters from different castes. In Uttar Pradesh state, the Baliyan council has decided to ban mobile phone after a series of elopements. Over the last year, at least 23 couples eloped against their parents wishes. Jatin Raghuvanshi, a village elder, commented that the panchayat (assembly) was convinced that the reason of the recent surge in series of elopement was cell phones as the young loves planned their elopement over using them. )
For example, the introduction alone, with links, reads,
"PUNCTUATIONS
by John L. Petersen
Well, there's too much going on to not publish another issue of FUTUREdition before year end. We were planning on slacking off for the holidays, but then the sun exploded. Really. And WikiLeaks got hotter. There were a number of things that showed up that convinced us we needed to publish another issue before the holidays. So here's a very large issue for you.
As I suggested in the last issue, WikiLeaks has the potential to produce profound implications. Here are some thoughts on that subject.
WIKILEAKS: The Beginning of the End
WikiLeaks is doubly a big deal. We've hardly begun to see the potential fallout from the light that it is shining on what our governments have been keeping from us. Every day a new revelation shakes some more of the confidence that Americans (and citizens from many other countries) have in the systems and institutions that they have depended upon and trusted all of their lives. Some of the material that is rumored to soon be released has the potential to threaten the continued operation of major financial institutions, to say nothing about exposing the manipulations of governments.
But WikiLeaks is also the harbinger of a new era where information technology has the potential to fundamentally threaten democracy (as we practice it), and traditional ideas of free speech fly in the face of government's innate objective for stability and control.
On one hand, we're witnessing a titanic struggle between an encrusted, structurally unsustainable old order which is teetering on the edge of instability, and a rapidly coalescing new world. Powerful institutions are pulling out all stops to keep from losing the historical control that they have enjoyed. At the same time a new generation (that sees reality in quite different ways) is powering the emergent assault, enabled by exponentially exploding information technology that, in significant applications is so complex that no one really understands how it works.
Let me use the present WikiLeaks situation to give you a feeling of how this is playing out. Here are some high points that will hopefully give you the picture.
First of all, if you want to have a good understanding of an issue like this, nobody that I know does a better job of painting the big picture than Tony Judge. Tony holds forth regularly on big and complex ideas alike. His summary of the WikiLeaks situation, taken from the perspective of spying at the UN (are they really spying on each other at the UN?), is really quite masterful and insightful. I would encourage you to take some time and pursue this very nice piece of work.
One of the obvious points to be taken from this analysis is that truth is seldom the currency of governments. That's nothing new, of course, but releases like those of WikiLeaks expose the breadth of the misrepresentation. It's one thing to generally know that few things are exactly what a government agency spokesperson says it is. It's quite another to have the sordid details laid out in front of you.
The only way this is all sustained, by the way, is through the institutionalization of secrecy - which of course is why governments are lying even more than they usually do to try to stop Julian Assange. One of the links in Judge's analysis is this one from filmmaker Michael Moore. Regardless of what you think of Moore, I think his logic about why Sweden is chasing Assange for allegations of sexual misconduct (for which he hasn't been charged) is pretty compelling. The U.S. is very much afraid of what might be leaked by Assange and is using its leverage, whether legal or not, to try to stop it. It's interesting to see what even progressive governments like Sweden will do when they're put in a corner.
A bigger issue is the aforementioned erosion and failure of large institutions. In a democracy, the press is supposed to play a pivotal and fundamental role in the society - shining a light on the doings of the government and other institutions. It is the fundamental and necessary counterbalance to an authoritarian and secretive government. When the press doesn't do its job, the government takes advantage of it, and that is what's going on right now.
Arrianna Huffington, in her piece The Media Gets It Wrong on WikiLeaks: It's About Broken Trust, Not Broken Condoms makes this point eloquently. She ends by saying:
"It is about our future. For our democracy to survive, citizens have to be able to know what our government is really doing. We can't change course if we don't have accurate information about where we really are. Whether this comes from a website or a newspaper or both doesn't matter.
"But if our government is successful in its efforts to shut down this new avenue of accountability, it will have done our country far more damage than what it claims is being done by WikiLeaks."
I agree.
Happy holidays to you and all of those you love..."