[capote]

This isn't too much negativity (2 or 3 top-level comments that aren't even purely negative, but just questioning his heroism) and they were downvoted into the ground.

Rest assured, HN is clearly pro-Snowden and doesn't question it.

I'm not impressed by Snowden because I've seen worse than NSA surveillance (communist Romania, my grandfather was beaten to death in jail for having an anti-government journal) and I don't think the US can fall down such a slippery slope that we need to worry about it at the cost of security and massive irony. The formula that makes oppressive countries oppressive through surveillance just doesn't exist here. Not even close. Even by modern standards, we're not even in the same league as Russia and China in terms of oppression via surveillance. We should probably stop it at some point but it's not at the top of my priority list right now, and I'm not worried we're going to fall off some metaphorical cliff anytime soon.

Anyway, to see Snowden in such a positive light requires thinking that stopping NSA surveillance is a top priority that should be done at any cost.