Dozens of people, both students and citizens of Delaware, crowded University Hall and filled the seats of Gray Chapel, excited for what was about to occur. Excited for who they were going to see. Excited to hear from a person that was able to incite a great controversy in the US. They were all waiting to hear from the famous/infamous whistleblower, Edward Snowden.
The moment Snowden's face appeared on that screen, the room erupted in applause. Cheers echoed through Gray Chapel like a band echoed through a concert hall. Snowden clearly was not expecting this kind of welcome, as he appeared shocked. He was most likely expecting a polite applause and a few cheers as his actions are considered treasonous by many, yet he received something akin to adoration and was actually moved to tears which he quickly wiped away. The knowledge that not everyone in his home country did not despise him being a lot to take in.
When he composed himself, he began to speak of data, or more specifically the power that came with it. He spoke of how metadata, or the data that is comprised of the information made from emails, text messages, and social media information, was/is collected and used to profile people, allowing the government to "know" us on an almost personal level. He spoke of the first mass surveillance program, Stellar Wind, and how it was used to monitor American phone calls in order to find sleeper cells living here. When they did not find these terrorist cells, they did not terminate this program, on the contrary, they continued to monitor American citizens through different and more advanced means.
Snowden himself began to become suspicious of the government's activities when he heard the NSA blatantly lie about monitoring American's social media. He described how he started to search for evidence of the NSA's lies and he found more than he thought he would. He found documents that acted as physical evidence against the NSA's lies and files that explained how he did it. He even found a document that stated that the FBI had tried to get Martin Luther King Junior to kill himself through blackmail letters after the March on Washington.
Hearing everything that he had to say, I could see why he did what he did. While I can, and so could he to an extent, understand why the government did what it did, America had/has a right to know what was occurring. While Snowden has been deemed a traitor and his asylum in Russia will be terminated soon, I cannot help but think of what will become of the whistleblower that changed our country.
