Leakers and Jacqueries
Last edited Sat Aug 10, 2013, 12:47 PM - Edit history (2)
The Jacquerie was French peasant uprising in 1358. There were frequent peasant uprisings during the late middle ages and Jaquerie is sometimes used as a general term for a popular revolt.
Such uprisings were perennial and usually dealt with the same way.
1) Capture the ringleaders of the revolt and make a merciless public example of them, and
2) Spontaneously, unilaterally and graciously (sarcasm intended) grant some of whatever those treasonous and amply punished ringleaders had been demanding.
The first was necessary lest the peasantry think they have power.
The second was necessary because the folks in charge knew that the revolt was not really just the work of the few bad eggs, but was a manifestation of popular support and the acquiescence or even assistance of the growing bourgeoisie. Thus the demands of the revolt had a lot of constant but disorganized power behind them that had to be defused (or diffused... ha) because there would always be somebody else willing to exploit (I don't mean that pejoratively) that bubbling discontent.
By running around to the head of the parade the aristocrats could give the peasants much of what they were demanding (but not the best stuff, of course) in the guise of benign noblesse oblige, rather than have it wrested from them in the near future in a subsequent revolt.
Making Snowden an individual public enemy and offering reforms of surveillance methods and protocols is how the game of governance is played.
I find it quite unrealistic to expect the government to thank a criminal (which Snowden surely is) for forcing it to at least pretend to reign in its own power. To do so would be to spontaneously admit to deep corruption, when you think it through.
It is all just the way things work.
As for Snowden... I don't feel obliged to have an opinion of the man, any more than I feel required to have a personalized opinion of someone instigating an uprising in 14th century France. Such persons are historical catalysts in terms of action and reaction and their character and purity of motive are pretty irrelevant to the action-and-reaction dynamic.
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