Hypocrisy and Anonymous

You have to love people who are openly hypocritical.

Anonymous removed the published content from MIT's website and posted several things, most of which I agree with, including:

"We call for this tragedy to be a basis for a renewed and unwavering commitment to a free and unfettered internet, spared from censorship with equality of access and franchise for all."

The tragedy here is the suicide of a man who made "secret" government data public.  Truthfully, that specific situation is something else I agree with.

Does it occur to Anonymous that by censoring what MIT had published they are doing exactly what they want to stop?

 Do they think that by being censors they can somehow stamp out censorship?  If that isn't hypocritical I don't know what is.

Here is another good one:

"We call for this tragedy to be a basis for greater recognition of the oppression and injustices heaped daily by certain persons and institutions of au"thority upon anyone who dares to stand up and be counted for their beliefs, and for greater solidarity and mutual aid in response"

I believe that what this actually is saying is that people should be able to stand up for their beliefs without being afraid of ridicule or retribution.

Isn't MIT and many others standing up for their beliefs by publishing what they believe and along comes Anonymous to censor in retribution.

Here is another one:
"We call for this tragedy to be a basis for reform of copyright and intellectual property law, returning it to the proper principles of common good to the many, rather than private gain to the few"

Can't say anything bad about this.  Copyright laws should be twenty years, the same as patent laws.

"We call for this tragedy to be a basis for reform of computer crime laws, and the overzealous prosecutors who use them."

Computer crime does need to be reformed, and people who attack, censor, invade privacy and destroy peoples lives should go to jail.

In the end Anonymous is just as hypocritical and ignorant as everyone else.  What bothers me is not when someone is hypocritical, all of us are.

I believe it was wrong of Anonymous to invade the privacy of the assholes who raped the girl in Ohio and publish the video bragging about the rape.  I am also damn glad they did it.

Hypocritical?  You bet.  I know I'm being hypocritical.  I aspire to things I do not always achieve and I am constantly working on becoming a better person.  People are not perfect, get over it.

To do become better we have to know when we screw up.  We have to be consistent in our words and actions.  Anonymous isn't.  I don't think most people know or even want to know how ignorant and hypocritical they themselves are and Anonymous isn't any better.

Is some of what they are doing going to make the world a better place?  Probably, I think the the Ohio rape video is an example.

I can justify torture the same way.  It's okay to censor someone if they participated in a "greater wrong" and we can use the same logic for torture, its okay to torture someone if they participated in a "greater wrong".

That takes an awful lot of judgment and an awful lot of ego to enforce that judgment on others.

Talking is useful, negotiating is useful.  There comes a time when talking has to stop and people have to act.

Is doing that which must be stopped a useful action?  History will tell us.  I don't believe so.

Personally I think Anonymous could have gotten their message across without censoring the original content of the publication and I think that would have communicated their message much more effectively.