The whole Wikileaks saga has left me torn and confused. My automatic reaction is to welcome the leaks, to welcome the fact that we know much more now about how the wool has been pulled over our eyes as citizens about matters ranging from the hopelessness of the war in Afghanistan to the dodgy behaviour of Prince Andrew.
So why then have so few of the main left leaning blogs in the UK said anything thoughtful or positive about Wikileaks? The establishment, as represented by the political blogosphere?
- Left Foot Forward has one piece, critical of Wikileaks, posted by Marcus Roberts – I assume the same Marcus Roberts who was field director for Ed Miliband
- LabourList has one piece by Bryan Barder, taking the standard UK establishment line that the Wikileaks info is nothing new (something I don’t agree with)
- Political Scrapbook has an odd article about the Romanian President sourced from Wikileaks, but nothing on the ethics of the leaks
- Labour Uncut has a piece by Tom Watson that mentions Wikileaks that comes close to welcoming what the site has done, but then goes on to talk about Phil Woolas instead.
- Next Left has not mentioned Wikileaks in the last month
This therefore – more than ever before – demonstrates the value of Liberal Conspiracy. For it’s the only major left leaning blog site where the Wikileaks issues have been widely and thoughtfully debated, most notably here and here.
For more thoughtful reflection on all of this then have a read of Clay Shirky and Jeff Jarvis.
If I could do a little self-promotion, some people have said nice things about my own post on the subject: [http://raincoatoptimism.wordpress.com/2010/12/08/assange-debate-has-nothing-to-do-with-feminist-men-selling-out-its-a-different-compulsion/]
and on the Federal Union website here http://www.federalunion.org.uk/lessons-from-wikileaks/
Thanks for the link! But Federal Union doesn’t exactly class as left-ish 🙂