An Address To All Anonymous Members

Internet activists must assume a global dimension today. All governments are furiously targeting us, passing laws that treat hacking as terrorism and jailing us with trumped-up charges. Large corporations work with governments to pin activists against a wall - we saw banks and Paypal close off all access to Wikileaks when they released the Iraq War Logs, which included the infamous video of the US Military killing journalists with an airstrike. Historically, activists have taken the easy way out: Lulzsec's Sabu notoriously not only snitched on his fellow members but hacked foreign websites at the request of FBI agents. Understandably, he had a kid to take care of and had no real connection to the Lulzsec members he condemned to arrest. However, the violent reactions taken against internet activists today signify our true potency.

Another kind of activist, the libertarian 'dark market' operator such as Ross Ulbricht, is up to the task as long as he is making money. When he was arrested, one saw no grand statements of political injustice, but only an attempt to get his bitcoins back. Again, this is understandable: he was charged with conspiracy to murder, and although it was subsequently dropped he was scared enough to play the lawman's game. He will most likely be sentenced to a decade or two and get out a thankful felon - at least he didn't get a life sentence!

The State is more repressive than ever, but pretends to be tolerant. One can be anything he or she wants: a marxist, a libertarian, a feminist, a black supremacist, a survivalist, so long as his or her beliefs are not acted upon. One hundred years ago, practicing meant believing: anyone could be thrown in jail for adhering to a belief system not condoned by the State. In the 21st century, this has radically changed: one can believe whatever he or she wants, and in fact the State encourages this ideological plurality. It is only once a citizen acts on his beliefs, assumes a concrete status outside of the liberal pluralist society, in doing so threatening the underlying fabric of its permissive social sphere, that the State takes swift action. This is extremely dangerous for all radicals today: given the ubiquity of social media, everyone feels free to shout their ideological tendencies. This has proven fatal for too many activists: anti-war protestors were condoned, but direct evidence of the true damage of the United State's war in Iraq and Afghanistan brought the State crashing down on those who released the information. Further, the range of suspects drastically narrows when security agencies, led by the FBI and the NSA, can, with pinpoint accuracy, not only correlate ideological similarities in motives but also track GPS locations prior to, during, and after an operation takes place. Jeremy Hammond's court documents show that the FBI suspected him because of his anarchist beliefs; they then not only monitored his internet traffic, but also monitored where he went, and in doing so monitored his whole life.

Internet activists, given that we know all too well the reality of the repressive apparatus of the State, must act with this in mind. We must see ourselves as actors directly attacking omnipresent governments; we must avoid regressing into taking the easy way out, in both senses: we must fight against oppression on all fronts: not just human rights abusers, but the capitalist economic systems that perpetuate structural violence; not just criminal citizens, but the corporations that sustain and make up the surveillance state and the military-industrial complex; not just the most morally reprehensible group in a war, but the defense contractors that provide arms to all sides in all conflicts. We must also recognize that, if the State doesn't see us as only part-time activists, we must not either: we must not treat our radicalism as an aside but instead an integral part of our identity.

Many internet activists already have and continue to act in this way. However, too many still act with a cynical distance towards their actions: they do not truly believe that they exist within our current political situation. This is the most damning attitude an activist can have.

We are Anonymous.

We are Legion.

We do not forgive.

We do not forget.