There are just too many opportunities - and an increasing number of them - to hide systemic, institutional wrongdoing behind legal veils, legal theories, and arbitrary exemptions. I hope that we can start to chip away at this, but it sure looks like society is still sliding in the opposite direction.

Chelsea Manning

Categorized in : Numbers Opportunity Opposites

I wanted the American public to know that not everyone in Iraq and Afghanistan were targets that needed to be neutralized, but rather people who were struggling to live in the pressure cooker environment of what we call asymmetric warfare.

Chelsea Manning

military struggle war

I want people to see the truth... regardless of who they are...

Chelsea Manning

decision truth people

I think we can achieve meaningful change, but only if we demand that the institutions themselves change their behavior.

Chelsea Manning

demand meaningful thinking

I prefer a painful truth over any blissful fantasy.

Chelsea Manning

painful-truth fantasy painful

I regret if my actions hurt anyone or harmed the United States. It was never my intent to hurt anyone. When I chose to disclose classified information, I did so out of a love for my country and a sense of duty to others.

Chelsea Manning

regret hurt country

I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible.

Chelsea Manning

childhood transition support

Even if I didn't have the support that I have, I would still be fighting the same fights, and I would still be the same person that I am today.

Chelsea Manning

support fighting today

Sometimes You Have to Pay a Heavy Price to Live in a Free Society

Chelsea Manning

heavy pay sometimes

Anxiety, depression, and suicide don't discriminate based on how much money you have - though it might make it easier for you to get help.

Chelsea Manning

anxiety suicide might

As Iraq erupts in civil war and America again contemplates intervention, that unfinished business should give new urgency to the question of how the United States military controlled the media coverage of its long involvement there and in Afghanistan.

Chelsea Manning

unfinished-business military war

The press and free speech landscape has totally changed. There is far less news reporting today. Instead, we have this endless stream of - largely meaningless and speculative - analysis by sideline commentators and self-proclaimed "experts."

Chelsea Manning

landscape news self

It can be so difficult to get people to think about systemic institutional problems. It is easier just to see the actions of one or two people and say, "That's wrong!"

Chelsea Manning

two people thinking

It's not my goal to be a leader or spokesperson, or anything like that.

Chelsea Manning

leader goal

I think that some of today's focus on freedom of information and trans rights have a tendency to focus on the actions of individuals and how they should be regulated by governments. However, I think it's important to remember that it is the institutions themselves - schools, tax collection services, banks, human resources decisions, health departments, police departments, prosecutors, courts, and prisons - where the most devastating and systemic problems occur today. The scale of these problems is simply unimaginable.

Chelsea Manning

rights school thinking

I think the increased ubiquity of the internet and networked computing in general allowed me to have some tether no matter where I was geographically. I could log in to a computer from anywhere in the world and access the same information and the same people. It allowed me to transcend the physical differences.

Chelsea Manning

ubiquity differences thinking

I want people to see the truth.

Chelsea Manning

want people

The sole relief I am asking for is to be released from military prison after serving six years of confinement as a person who did not intend to harm the interests of the United States or harm any service members.

Chelsea Manning

six military years

If an organization produces a document, it should be made public as soon as possible.

Chelsea Manning

organization should made

Disturbingly, the First Amendment, along with the Fourth Amendment - protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures, and requiring warrants - have been the major casualties of the shift in government policy in the last two decades. Unfortunately, I think that the biggest consequences of this tragedy won't be clear until it is far, far too late.

Chelsea Manning

government two thinking

I think it's actually kind of sweet how there is a reciprocal effect that our stories can have on each other.

Chelsea Manning

stories sweet thinking