Mundus Vult Decipi

christielouwho:

funktastik:

 ”Not affiliated with Anonymous.” Interesting statement.  At what point does your involvement with or support for Anonymous make you a member? At what point does it grant you the ‘right’ to publicly share your ideologies and calls for action using the Anonymous logo and a Guy Fawkes mask?  Anonymous is a collective, not a group. It isn’t guided by a manifesto, but by its people.  To steal a line from the video, “if you are looking for members of Anonymous, you need only look into a mirror.” This video is not taking credit for hacktivism efforts, nor is it making threats that AnonOps would have to back up.  It is simply a call for public demonstration of dissatisfaction. If that isn’t in the spirit of Anonymous, I don’t know what is.

christielouwho:

nedhepburn:

TODAY IN ‘Holy Fucking Balls’ News:

Anonymous takes on the entire fucking U.S. government.

This is almost assuredly NOT affiliated with Anonymous. Nothing has come from AnonNews since this has been posted. I don’t trust it at all. 

I have no problem with the organizational efforts of individuals trying to bring information to people on the internet, but if that’s the case then don’t use a labeling technique that is affiliated with a specific group of individuals. If this video had been created simply with the “spirit” of Anonymous it would have presented the information without claiming it was from Anonymous. This falls into very similar tactics of the popular media by using brand language and naming techniques of other brands/groups/items/etc to trick you into understanding. That is why I distrust it.

Two things.

1) I originally had just such a caveat in my response but decided I was being too hard on what I assume is a predominantly younger constituency. I asked myself, “was it a conscious decision or merely the most effective way to have one’s voice heard?  Does it matter if its abuse of the brand is intentional or not?”  Because if this was a politically cognizant 18 year old woman vlogging from Prairie Village, Kansas, I guarantee it would not have garnered the attention or support it currently has.  And if she intuitively used the Anonymous branding because it was the most efficient way to express herself through social media, has Anonymous been debased in any way? 

In any case I share some of your inhibitions, albeit to a lesser extent.

2) I need to learn proper reblog etiquette and put my responses at the *end* of a post. Apologies.