Did He Really Do Anything Wrong?

Published in Sin Chew Daily
(Malaysia) on 25 June 2013
by Ouyang Wenfeng (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Mollie Gossage. Edited by Laurence Bouvard.
How much freedom does the United States actually have? Several million people are monitored by the U.S. government; the National Security Agency—in the name of anti-terror—gathers several billion phone records every day. It doesn’t end there. The government outsources these surveillance tasks to large corporations. Snowden made these facts public, and in doing so he kicked the hornets’ nest; all of American society rains curses on his treason. But, in the end, did he really do anything wrong?

Did Snowden really do anything wrong? He didn’t harm anybody. He said he didn’t disclose all the documents, but publicized selectively so as to ensure that no one suffered unnecessary harm as a result of his exposure. U.S. society and politicians say he harmed national interests—this is a grand but useless accusation. Hasn’t this always been the autocratic government’s most beloved rhetoric? Anyone can investigate and expose government scandals, then assume the power to say it is a state secret; when the scandal becomes the highest-level state secret, whoever dares to expose it is then the nation and the people’s offender!

Who can uphold righteousness before such an accusation? Who wouldn’t be afraid? It’s no wonder Snowden fled to Asia.

U.S. society and politicians blame Snowden for harming American interests, but if we can be a little more rational, it’s easy to discover that what he harmed was not American interests, but America’s dignity! The U.S. emphasizes freedom and respect for human rights, but Snowden exposed this hypocritical mask, robbing America of its pretentious foundation of self-righteousness, bringing it down from the high moral ground from which it criticized others. To put it bluntly, his offense is making America lose face!

He did well in fleeing to Hong Kong! Hong Kong could not extradite him. If China really did extradite him, America would lose even more face, because this is tantamount to China and America cooperating to punish a scandal-exposer. After that, what basis would America have to criticize China, or any country, for showing contempt for human rights, democracy or freedom?

National security is important, but the right to personal privacy is similarly important. The government cannot just do whatever it pleases under the slogan of national security, otherwise what does personal freedom even amount to? It’s not surprising that after this exposure of government surveillance, Obama’s popularity plummeted. The things that government—actually, high officials—do are all secret, as long as they don’t want to tell you, but common people don’t have any secrets to speak of. Once this kind of government begins to abuse its authority, it’s just as frightening as you can imagine.

If it were a Chinese scandal Snowden had revealed, he would have immediately become an American hero. But because it’s a U.S. government scandal, he instead becomes a traitor, even though authorities cannot specifically say how he harmed any Americans. The United States does not belong to the U.S. government, therefore this surveillance is genuinely damaging to the American people. But within the reversed values of rhetoric, those who speak out for justice for the American people instead turn into those who harm the American people. This kind of paradox often occurs in the Third World, but today it unfolds on the American stage—no wonder the whole world is in an uproar.

Don’t casually say a person has done wrong. We must examine the standards for right and wrong, as well as who has defined these standards. If these two matters are not made clear initially, to say others have wronged is completely meaningless, other than allowing dignity and self-righteousness to be maintained; if it’s because there is power in numbers, believing the minority is indisputably at fault is still absolutely naive and laughable. Even if it is purely an appeal to tradition, then the ignorance of it is all the more conspicuous, for we know just how many times people of the 21st century have already opposed tradition!


歐陽文風‧他到底做錯了甚麼?
美國到底有多自由?數百萬人受到美國政府的監控,國安局以反恐為名,每天搜集數十億個電話記錄。這還不止,這種監控工作政府外包給大型企業去做。斯諾登公佈事實,結果惹了滿身蟻,美國朝野大罵他叛國。可是,他到底做錯了甚麼?
斯諾登到底做錯了甚麼?他沒有傷害任何人,他說過他沒有公佈所有文件,他是選擇性地公佈以確保沒有人因他的揭發而受到不必要的傷害。美國朝野政治人物說他傷害國家利益,這是大而無當的罪名。這不是專制濫權政府一向最愛用的說詞嗎?任何人要調查、揭發政府醜聞,當權的就說這是國家機密,醜聞一旦成了國家最高級的機密,誰敢查誰敢揭發,誰就是國家與民族罪人!
這種大義凜然的罪名誰當得起,誰不怕?難怪斯諾登逃到亞洲。
美國朝野政治人物罵斯諾登傷害美國利益,如果我們理性一點,不難發現他傷害的其實不是美國利益,而是美國的面子!美國強調自由與尊重人權,但斯諾登揭開美國虛偽面具,使美國失去自以為義的虛假根據,從批判他人的道德高度掉下來。說穿了,他的罪名是令美國丟臉!
他出走香港,走得好!香港不可能引渡他,中國如果真的引渡他,美國更沒有面子,因為這等於中美合作對付一個揭發醜聞的人,美國以後可以再憑甚麼罵中國,或任何國家蔑視人權不民主不自由?
國家安全重要,但個人的隱私權也一樣重要,政府不能在國家安全的口號之下為所欲為,否則個人的自由算甚麼?無怪乎政府監控事件曝光後,奧巴馬聲望大跌。政府,其實說穿了就是高官,他們做的事,只要不想告訴你的,都是機密,但老百姓卻沒有機密可言,這種政府一旦濫權起來,說有多可怕就有多可怕。
如果斯諾登揭穿的是中國的醜聞,他馬上成為美國英雄,但由於他揭發的是美國政府的醜聞,結果成為叛國賊,雖然當權者完全不能具體地說出他如何傷害美國人。美國不是屬於美國政府的,因此監控事件真正受損的是美國人,但在價值顛倒的修辭學里,為美國人仗義執言的人,反而成了傷害美國的人。這種吊詭,時常在第三世界國發生,如今在美國上演,難怪舉世嘩然。
不要隨便說人家做錯事,我們必須檢驗對錯的標準是甚麼,而且是由誰定義。這兩件事不首先搞清楚,說別人錯,是完全沒有意義的,除了自以為義而自爽;如果是因為人多勢眾,而以為少數鐵定錯誤,無疑幼稚好笑。至於如果純粹訴諸傳統,則更益顯其無知,21世紀的人反傳統不知已反了多少次了!
This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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