Showing posts with label Guantanamo Bay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Guantanamo Bay. Show all posts

Friday, April 29, 2011

To define

The recent NPR report about Wikileaks' Gitmo dump referred to the site as an "anti-secrecy website". The CNN report labeled Wikileaks "an organization that facilitates the anonymous leaking of secret information"; I think this is their official stance. The Wikipedia article defines Wikileaks as "an international non-profit organisation that publishes submissions of private, secret, and classified media from anonymous news sources, news leaks, and whistleblowers".

Why "anti-secrecy" instead of "pro-transparency"? Why highlight anonymity, and not whistleblowing, or exposing, or any other facet of the issue? Because when a label or definition is chosen, the chooser seeks to communicate something about the signified.