Voicing Your Beliefs

My post today is on an article about the recent death of Aaron Swartz. "The Inspiring Heroism of Aaron Swartz", by Glenn Greenwald, tells of his exploits in activism, as he was a strong advocate for internet freedom. The famous computer programmer committed suicide on Friday at age 26. At a young age, Swartz played key roles in the creation the RSS software and popular website Reddit. When Reddit was purchased, he received a large sum of money which helped him become a legend before he was 18. However, he had little interest in using this to his own advantage. Instead, he worked only and always for his conception of the public good. These ideals included internet freedom, civil liberties, and making information and knowledge as available as possible. He was strongly against SOPA, a bill that would have let the government exercise censorship over the internet. In 2008, Swartz worked against Pacer, a site that provides access to court documents for a per-page fee. He was offended that people had to pay to access public documents. Helped by a friend, Swartz started a program to download millions of these documents and release them to the public. For this, he was investigated by the FBI, but never charged. In 2011, was arrested for supposedly targeting JSTOR, a company that distributes articles written by academics and sells them to subscribers at high prices. The program’s profits did not pay the scholars who wrote the articles, intsead benefiting the publishers. Swartz was offended by this and he allegedly trespassed into an MIT computer-wiring closet to download millions of these articles.
Swartz never distributed any of these, and neither did he intend to profit from them. He had the right to download the articles as a JSTOR user; at worst he might’ve made the articles available to the public. When he was arrested, he gave back all the articles and JSTOR told the feds that it didn’t want to see him prosecuted. He was still tried in court, and he was charged with multiple felonies– several decades in jail and $1 million in fines. He refused to plead guilty because of the stigma and denial of rights that entailed. According to several lawyers, even if the allegations in the indictment were true, the only crime committed by Swartz was basic trespassing (max. sentence 30 days and $100 fine). It is the belief of many that the DOJ (Department of Justice) already didn’t like him for his activism and civil disobedience. After the ordeal, he apparently couldn't take it anymore, so he hung himself in his New York apartment.

Swartz, pictured here in 2009.

Greenwald made this article feel very personal. He clearly wanted the reader to see that he thought what had happened to Swartz was very wrong. While I read the article, I felt angry and almost disgusted at the D.O.J. In his writing, Greenwald used 'I' a lot, which enhanced the sensation that he was actually speaking to me, not just writing an article for the public. He stated his opinion very boldly and clearly, and his direct manner of speaking made it easier for him to use strong remarks such as "...obscene over-zealousness..." and "...excessively vindictive..." This definitely convinced me that he truly believed in his statements. His technique inspired me in writing– I'd like to be as effective when giving my opinion! I think the author really wanted the reader to know how unfair the justice system can be at times, and how important it is to stand up for your beliefs.

 This article really awakened me to the reality of corruption and of suicide. You hear about corruption in textbooks, but in this case I feel like it truly occurred. The D.O.J. sentenced Swartz to over ten times the length of jail sentence he deserved, as well as multiplying his deserved fines by at least 10,000. I'm supportive of internet freedom (at least in the cases described in the article), and while I think Swartz may have gone too far by trespassing illegally into MIT property, I think the U.S. government went too far too– so far as to indirectly cause Swartz's suicide. Reading the article also made me think about prejudice, because the D.O.J. had obviously been influenced by something on the case. Apparently, they set a federal prosecutor notorious for her extreme prosecutions to lead the case, even though JSTOR had asked for there not to be a prosecution, and MIT had remained indifferent. This fact made me especially angry; the Justice system seemed to want Swartz charged with a crime. I feel like this event can teach us a lot about prejudice and standing up for our beliefs. We must always be accepting until we are sure that we shouldn't do something. Standing up for what you believe is right is important! If no one took a firm stand and stated their individual opinion on something, we'd all be following something that might not be our choice– just doing what others say is right so as to not draw attention to yourself. I really believe that being original and unique is crucial to living happily.


~Adrian


(sorry for the "read more" button, the post was too long to fit on the title screen)

BIBLIOGRAPGHY

Greenwald, Glenn. "The Inspiring Heroism of Aaron Swartz | Common Dreams." Common Dreams. The Guardian/UK, 13 Jan. 2013. Web. 15 Jan. 2013.