A satirical "e-mail release from Anonymous" ruffles a lot of feathers - as it was intended to do. But the subtlety of the satire has caused many to take it as legitimate. Has the author done more harm than good?
Earlier today (as I write this; "yesterday" by the time I'm done, I'm sure - 27-August-2011), DailyKOS diarist "My Left Behind" posted an article (called "diaries" on the site) claiming to be an e-mail leaked by Anonymous from a Karl Rove-operated right-wing activist group.
The e-mail intends to criticize liberals and progressives who have been quite scathing in their criticism of the Obama administration over the last couple of years. This is not an entirely invalid criticism. While I have not been entirely happy with this administration myself and have at times been quite critical of it, I also recognize that there is a segment of the population who are far less interested at heart in "progressive" or "liberal" values like putting people over profit than in the classic "bread and circuses" thinking that has plagued democratic systems since Plato's Republic.
The unfortunate reality is that those who voted for Obama thinking he was going to wave a magic wand and end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, turn around 8 years of suicidal fiscal policy, and unilaterally institute universal single-payer health care were voting for a fantasy constructed in their own minds, and it's small wonder that they are disappointed in the results.
The unfortunate reality is also that this administration has failed to lead on important principles - notably warrantless wiretapping, federal prosecution of medical marijuana users in states where such use is legal, the closing of the Guantanamo detention facility and detaining of scores of human beings without due process, and the failure to shame those who oppose universal health care into submission.
Those are legitimate criticisms of this administration, and I find it troubling to read suggestions that we should fall in to the mentality that we should stay quiet and docile about it lest we fracture some imaginary "unity" and "give power" to conservatives.
That kind of lock-step thinking is exactly why I'm not a conservative. It serves no positive purpose in a democracy to turn a blind eye to failure; that is not loyalty or patriotism but blind fealty, and it is dangerous.
At the same time, there are those who simply want what they want, and they want it now, and if they don't get it they'll throw a fit and start talking about a primary opponent for the president or sitting out the election or even voting Republican, all of which are not solutions but infantile fits thrown by people who care less about what's good for the nation than what's good for themselves. I'm sure my readers don't need me to explain the difference between babies and bathwater.
So that deals with the meat of the matter - two extremist positions, both of which have valid aspects but are also fatally flawed. Now let's discuss the meta of the matter: does this message do more harm than good, and why?
In my opinion, the message does in fact create more harm than good, for a couple of reasons.
- It's far too subtle, and is being copied and pasted outside DailyKOS - without meta tags or embedded hyperlinks - as a legitimate piece of journalism. People are taking this thing at its word, that it is a genuine Anonymous release of a genuine Rove e-mail.
This has caused it to be circulated heavily among progressive Facebook and Google+ walls, and it's only a matter of time before someone tries to use it as "proof" that the Rove Machine is every bit as insidious as we've always said it was. Then the conservatives in whose face this is being rubbed track the message back to here, realize it's a sham, and now they've got an excuse to dismiss all legitimate criticism of the mentality and techniques described here as hot air.
In essence, the article makes the conservatives' case for them that the fear/anxiety over right-wing dirty tricks is simply unfounded paranoia, and liberals are dumb enough to believe any bad thing you say about Karl Rove.
- While (as I've indicated above) I agree in part that some of the criticism levied at the Obama administration has been less "Progressive purist" than "self-interest," I am appalled by even the suggestion that criticism is inherently bad or helpful to the "other side."
I am a progressive not because I am anti-conservative but because I seek truth, balance, and the most effective path to the fulfillment of individual and collective potential in the broader context of the continued survival and evolution of the species.
There are some valid points of philosophy on the right - a resistance to government intrusion into the lives of individuals, for instance - and even the Tea Party, bless their little hearts, has managed to do one thing right: helping to push back against the odious aspects of the PATRIOT Act, even when some of our "champions" on the left refused to do so.
Gathering into a "gang" mentality and attempting to stifle dissent as a general rule is odious and authoritarian - exactly not "liberal" or "progressive." The author of the Rove piece fails to acknowledge this, instead casting any and all criticism or dissent of the current administration as a betrayal of the cause...and that smells deeply of the rot of authoritarian groupthink. As a progressive, I cannot abide by such a mentality; if that is what we're fighting to preserve, we've already lost...for we have already become that which we most oppose.
I have asked the author of the original piece to edit it so that it includes a clear disclaimer. Even if the author waits until the end of the piece to reveal the game, that's fine, but from a standpoint of both ethics and functional communication there should be a clear disclaimer to help avoid precisely the kinds of misunderstanding that are already happening as a result of this piece. The DailyKOS brand carries with it a sense of legitimacy that is very much compromised by the failure of the article's author to make the satirical nature of the piece more clear within the body of the work.
John Henry is a social, political, and media analyst at LowGenius.Net