Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

zyan.scripts.mit.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 179 posts

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#21

Post by street »

developer2 wrote: post #14
mynameishere wrote: post #6

Whatever sympathies you want to arouse for Pvt Manning for political purposes, however wordily and clumsily expressed, try to keep in mind that throughout all of history, in all contexts, regardless of rank, Manning would have been summarily hanged as a spy and/or traitor rather than merely imprisoned. Manning got off nice and easy. That said, it was a total failure of the system to allow someone so mentally unstable…

The lack of a first name or a single pronoun in your comment has more meaning than anything you actually wrote.

Why?

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#22

Post by seletz »

street wrote: post #21
developer2 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of a first name or a single pronoun in your comment has more meaning than anything you actually wrote.

Why?

I guess the point developer2 tried to make is that the parent poster's language is very non-personal.

This is a common thing -- by not seeing the victim as a person/human it's way easier to rationalize whatever ideology etc. you might have.

Sorry, not a native speaker -- can't put it better :p

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#23

Post by gambiting »

chinathrow wrote: post #15

> She hopes that the world hasn’t forgotten about her. No, we haven't. And we also haven't forgotten about the war crimes she published.

Hmm I'm not sure. I'm not from US, and while I am very familiar with Edward Snowden, I have never heard of Chelsea Manning, I had to do a wiki search to read a bit about her. I guess the international coverage just wasn't the same in her case.

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#24

Post by street »

seletz wrote: post #22
street wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

I guess the point developer2 tried to make is that the parent poster's language is very non-personal. This is a common thing -- by not seeing the victim as a person/human it's way easier to rationalize whatever ideology etc. you might have. Sorry, not a native speaker -- can't put it better :p

Or it could be a way to make sure responses wouldn't derail towards the correct pronoun to use.

I read developer2's response as being very presumptuous and prepossessed, and was wondering why.

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#25

Post by Freak_NL »

gambiting wrote: post #23
chinathrow wrote: post #15

> She hopes that the world hasn’t forgotten about her. No, we haven't. And we also haven't forgotten about the war crimes she published.

Hmm I'm not sure. I'm not from US, and while I am very familiar with Edward Snowden, I have never heard of Chelsea Manning, I had to do a wiki search to read a bit about her. I guess the international coverage just wasn't the same in her case.

That honestly surprises me. Where are you from? In the Netherlands all major news sources reported on this the past few years.

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#26

Post by [deleted] »

mynameishere wrote: post #6

Whatever sympathies you want to arouse for Pvt Manning for political purposes, however wordily and clumsily expressed, try to keep in mind that throughout all of history, in all contexts, regardless of rank, Manning would have been summarily hanged as a spy and/or traitor rather than merely imprisoned. Manning got off nice and easy. That said, it was a total failure of the system to allow someone so mentally unstable…

[deleted]

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#27

Post by gambiting »

Freak_NL wrote: post #25
gambiting wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm I'm not sure. I'm not from US, and while I am very familiar with Edward Snowden, I have never heard of Chelsea Manning, I had to do a wiki search to read a bit about her. I guess the international coverage just wasn't the same in her case.

That honestly surprises me. Where are you from? In the Netherlands all major news sources reported on this the past few years.

Poland.

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#29

Post by douche »

vertex-four wrote: post #13
thr32989 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not taking dig on Manning, but activists. Gender is irrelevant, what matters is 10 versus 35 years. And you proved my point.

Gender's not quite irrelevant - I'm reasonably certain Chelsea is happy that she gets the medication she needs (as she has written), and that in general, people accept her transition at this point. Humane treatment is a thing that's important, and for trans people, humane treatment partially involves treating them as the gender they are. Personally, I have no skin in this game, but I have a suspicion that the people…

Fact of the matter is that Manning was born with a Y chromosome and a penis. Mental illness aside, he's still a man, albeit one who has chosen to mutilate himself. I don't really care what he decides to do with himself - although I smart a little bit that taxpayer money funded his gender vision quest.

Re: Visiting Chelsea Manning in prison

#30

Post by ptaipale »

seletz wrote: post #22
street wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

I guess the point developer2 tried to make is that the parent poster's language is very non-personal. This is a common thing -- by not seeing the victim as a person/human it's way easier to rationalize whatever ideology etc. you might have. Sorry, not a native speaker -- can't put it better :p

That is rather to the point when we talk about a military person who's acting in his military role: the style of communication tends to be very impersonal.

I learned to know a friend in the army (went through NCO and officer schools with him and was always in the same accommodation rooms because our last names began the same) and later have seen him with family (our kids are grown up by now). It took me a good while to feel natural about referring to him by his first name, because the army way was to use the last name.

Post reply on HN