I’m listening to tapes (tapes, not CDs) of a course from the Teaching Company entitled “The Self Under Siege.” I just finished a lecture on Michel Foucault, a French philosopher who died in 1984. According to the professor teaching the course, Foucault believed that information was always connected to power. The information we receive is the information the authorities want us to receive.
I certainly don’t know enough about Foucault on the basis of one 45 minute lecture to pontificate, but the way Bradley Manning and Eric Snowden have been treated makes me think that Foucault was on to something. Bradley Manning, a patriot who believed that our government was on the wrong track, may spend the rest of his life in jail for publicizing information about what our government has been doing in our name. Snowden, who exposed the incredible power of our government to snoop on our private communications, is being attacked by the full power of the federal authorities.
Would I have done what those men did if I were in their position? I don’t think I would have had the courage.
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