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by booyaa00
4579 days ago
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No. It's totally different. This is not about censorship. Newspapers can say what the hell they want. Unless they obtained that information via illegal means - which The Guardian did. They are absolutely the same as the phone hacking papers. |
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No, they are not.
Here's why:
Voicemail hacking - journalists directly hired and instructed investigators to hack voicemail of celebrities and murder victims in order to print salacious stories and earn money, they also paid off police and other public servants to obtain information. They did this to sell newspapers (and for that reason alone) - no other defence could be given for their actions.
Snowden's disclosures - journalists received a story and documents to back it up from Snowden, they did not solicit and pay for the information, and published only those stories which they felt were in the public interest. They informed the public of a major scandal, and potentially illegal actions on the part of the authorities (actions which the spies tried to have legalised retrospectively).
That's the job of the fourth estate - holding the government accountable, keeping them honest, and informing the public. That's why we have a public interest defence (at least in the UK), or a 1st amendment (in the US).
Now you might argue that Snowden broke the law, I'd absolutely agree he did, but some laws are bad laws, and sometimes to fight an unjust system you must break the law - examples from history are legion of people fighting unjust laws who in retrospect are seen as heroes - I suspect Snowden will be amongst them, but arguing over the legality of his actions is a distraction from the to me more important questions of a free press and how we can restrain a government which aspires to know everything about every one of us.