What do you expect him to say? He is in Russia. If he says something against the war in Ukraine, he is being arrested because it is illegal in Russia to be against the war, you are not allowed even to call it a war. If he is arrested, in the best case he will be deported and then goes to jail in the US. In the worst case, he is put in jail in Russia next to Navalniy. If he doesn't say anything, then apparently the only thing he wants to say is things against this war. There is nothing else for him to say. Therefore his silence means that he is strongly against the war.
It is like some people actually want him to commit self righteous suicide for no benefit to anyone besides some tweet saying nothing more than "Russia sucks lol" to satiate the selfish desires of outspoken protestors.
I wonder how many of those people would be virtuous enough to bear the costs in his place to allow him to speak out.
> he is being arrested because it is illegal in Russia to be against the war
do you have any source to support this?
I went thru most "Criminal Code of Russia" searching for anything related to war, and could not find anything in terms of even temporary jail time for speaking out against war. Many people do, in Russia, including politicians of Putin opposition and they are nor being jailed. Looks like you can get jailed for participating in a protest against war or basically against anything in Russia... but nobody is going to bother going after you because you have posted a mean tweet. And if you search Twitter there are thousands of anti-war anti-Putin tweets from Russian accounts posted for years and these accounts keep being acting and keep posting (from jail I assume???).
See КоАП РФ 20.3.3 and УК РФ 207.3, passed in March. You won't be jailed for a single tweet denouncing the war - but you will likely get up to a $1k fine if you are reported (and since around half of Russians support the war it isn't that unlikely you WILL get reported). If you are more politically active, you can get visitors irl (police coming to your house, or just random pro-government activists doing vandalism around your house/flat). Additionally, spreading "fake news" can get you up to 15 years in jail (but most people "only" qualify for 3 years). By the way, I'm Russian, so feel free to ask me further questions about the overall situation.
Some call acting on principle with the understanding you may be imprisoned for doing so “having the courage of one’s convictions’.
Snowden evaded extradition to the United States by residing in Russia. At present, he appears to be silent regarding the current state of Russia/Ukraine relations.
He already showed his courage, and will likely end up in history books at some point - but he paid a very high price for that, and expecting more is very unreasonable of us. Let the man rest and enjoy the relative freedom and safety he has left, he did his part.
Furthermore: If he wanted to say something in support of russia, he would have absolutely been able to. His silence is very eloquent to me.
If Edward Snowden hasn’t illustrated enough conviction to meet your standards, I am aching to learn who has.
He sacrificed his entire livelihood for his fellow Americans, yet whose most honorable efforts have still had no measurable political impact despite being the most important media story in the past decade, opting against sacrificing the fleeting bits of life he has left to call his own in the name of yet another unrelated cause.
Realize you aren’t criticizing a questionable action of his. You’re just brazenly insisting that he do more to impress you. Where is the logic here?
Why though? We didn't do anything with what he gave us. He gave up a normal life to give us all of the evidence we needed to prove all of the things we always suspected and... crickets. Nothing changed. Neither party cares, they both call him an enemy of the state. Even Trump with his fake war against the Deep State, didn't pardon him when he had the chance.
I’m starting to wonder why Americans think he did what he did. Is it possible that most Americans just think he was trying to become famous or some kind of career-martyr? Are we that broken?
Speaking out publicly might not be the most effective course of action. Recall that his previous efforts exposed illegal, secret government programs. He collected evidence and then published it, bringing to light illegal programs that were previously not public. He didn’t just tweet uselessly, he provided extensive proof or illegal programs.
Everyone knows Russia is conducting a blatant power and territory grab (except maybe the willfully ignorant). Snowden tweeting about it would teach us nothing new.
Maybe if the US stopped persecuting him for publicizing our government’s illegal programs he’d be free to leave Russian and criticize their illegal actions.
Yes, but it should still be accounted for in their answer. I read someone saying “Snowden isn’t courageous enough” and I think that this person does not have enough information and intimate knowledge to make such a statement. Not everybody needs to be a superhero on every issue.
Courage of convictions is an ideal to impose on yourself. You don't get to impose it on anybody else. You don't know enough about anybody's situation except your own.
I mean, what if it’s not about courage? What if it’s canniness? What if he realizes that the long run best way for him to advance his goals is to quietly ride this time out and prepare for the opportunities on the other side?
Putting on my conspiracy robe, I would say something like he's a Russian spy, but his roots are well researched and he's the most doxxed person on the planet, so it's hard to claim he's a Russian spy. The guy seems genuine enough in my eyes, and changed the Internet forever. Like, 90% of sites are encrypted now, and he sparked a privacy revolution after the leaks. He's not a traitor, he's a hero IMHO. Others who claim he's a traitor probably think outfits like the NSA or other agencies are good or benevolent (Hint: they're not).
It's not just the Internet traffic being encrypted, it's the proliferation of alternative services that have popped up because of the leaks (Protonmail, Tutanota etc).
Many services exist now that are because of the revelations, and it's not just about HTTPS. You can very readily install many tools & utilities that thwart the NSA dragnet. Think Signal, Matrix, Cryptomator, self-hosted Nextcloud, AD-blockers like uBlock Origin etc.
> Many services exist now that are because of the revelations
That's the narrative but doesn't really hold up to scrutiny.
> Signal
Moxie's original encrypted messaging apps date back to 2010 and Open Whisper was officially started in Jan 2013.
> Matrix
Came out of an effort to build a unified communications suite for corporations.
> Cryptomator
Never heard of it. More widely used solutions like Attic/Borg have been around since 2010.
> self-hosted Nextcloud
Nextcloud was forked from OwnCloud which was started in 2010.
> AD-blockers like uBlock Origin
Ad Block Plus has been around since 2005. uBlock Origin solves the same problem but does it better. Claiming this had anything to do with Snowden is a very tenuous argument.
Matrix actually came out of frustration from implementing RCS, and wondering if we could do better. There was no influence from Snowden; the reason that Matrix is E2EE is just common sense to avoid smearing plaintext data everywhere.
Or he's the only one who lived up to that trust, since the surveillance he exposed is unconstitutional. He owes his loyalty to the American people, and what is a better expression of their will: the constitution, or the intelligence agencies?
Are you making the argument that doing the bidding of people who would corruptly misuse their power and lie about it to the American people... is a good thing?
In addition to what other commenters have said I would imagine Snowden is keeping a particularly low profile since he represents a significant bargaining chip for Russia with the USA. The more fraught that relationship is the more likely one or both sides will reach for all the bargaining chips they have.
It's really outrageous to me that one of the few things the Democrats and Republicans can agree on is the unjust vilification of Edward Snowden. Someone who gave up an amazing life to protect and defend the American people against illegal surveillance by their own government. It should be just about as clear a hero's story as you get and yet here we are.
He did pick Cuba! If I recall correctly he was flying from Hong Kong to Cuba and the US canceled his passport on the layover in Russia, stranding him there.
Always looked at him as an anti-governmental corruption and abuse advocate... it feels weird he hasn't said a word since Russian invasion in Ukraine started...
It was always a condition of him staying in Russia that he could only call out things that occurred anywhere but Russia.
He has a wife and child now and in calling out the Kremlin he’d either be jailed by the Russian government or expelled by Russia and likely taken to the US for trial.
People are getting jailed under highly specious circumstances in Russia. It wouldn’t surprise me if I learned he was already under some sort of precautionary light house arrest.
"I'm not suspended from the ceiling above a barrel of acid by a rope that burns a little faster every time I tweet, you concern-trolling ghouls. I've just lost any confidence I had that sharing my thinking on this particular topic continues to be useful, because I called it wrong."
By "called it wrong", he means this, from February 11:
"So... if nobody shows up for the invasion Biden scheduled for tomorrow morning at 3AM, I'm not saying your journalistic credibility was instrumentalized as part of one of those disinformation campaigns you like to write about, but you should at least consider the possibility."
This supports the theory that Putin is a) a rational actor who was b) fed bad information about Ukraine's political disposition, and so c) appeared to act irrationally. Snowden knew a, didn't know b, and then felt rebuked by c. I would tell him: it's okay, Ed, how could you have known?
He would literally be putting his life in danger. He isn’t putting out tweets in support. Therefore, his silence means that is his best option for the moment. You can’t expect someone to put his life on the line for you to feel justified. It’s not his country.
