Kiwi Farms

Chelsea Manning is a victim. For most of her life, Chelsea has been exploited by the people that surround her. Chelsea was abused and neglected by her family, had unduly harsh punishment distributed to her by the government and been used by communities which saw utility in her infamy. While it is possible to find a great degree of salience, humor and drama in the social media of Chelsea Manning, the social media sphere that surrounds Chelsea Manning is just as salient, humorous and dramatic, making Chelsea Manning a great addition to the Rat King.

The United States v. Bradley Manning and the SocJus Reaction

In terms of national security and the issue of the ethics surrounding the classification of government data stored digitally, there is no weirder story than that of Chelsea Manning. Most people recall that Chelsea Manning was known as Bradley Manning during their trial where she was found guilty of crimes related handing off classified government documents which would find themselves on Wikileaks. It is suspected that the handing off of these documents may have cost the lives of Americans and placed diplomats at harm, and Manning themselves taking on the decision to exploit their access to these documents was irresponsible (archive). In fairness, the documents released by Manning were not classified as Top Secret and about half were not classified at all (archive). Chelsea was subsequently sentenced to 35 years in a federal prison for this crime, but the impact on discourse persists.

This is where things started to become weirder and more political in nature. What was once a story which was focused on the balance between national security, classified information and the rights of the American public to understand what the government truly was doing was infused with a new element related to the gender and sexuality of Bradley. Brad decided to come out to the public at this point as a transgender female. While there was some suspicion that the decision to do this was motivated by a desire to gain sympathy from the public and encourage left-leaning people to become engaged in lightening her sentence, there are chats from this time period which show that Chelsea's gender and sexuality was something they were questioning for a while before being put on trial. Regardless, the issue of their gender still seemed to be a point engaging a new audience, and Chelsea became a new pawn for SocJus and left-leaning press to exploit.

Left wing online sources staked their claim in the field with regard to how it is that they saw the issue of Manning's sentencing and treatment as a prisoner. A 2010 article in Salon attempted to frame the treatment of Manning in prison as being borderline torture, essentially saying that the confinement at the Supermax prison in Colorado was having a detrimental impact on Manning's mental state and the restrictions were unfair because Manning was a model prisoner. Below is clip from the article (archive).

From the beginning of his detention, Manning has been held in intensive solitary confinement. For 23 out of 24 hours every day — for seven straight months and counting — he sits completely alone in his cell. Even inside his cell, his activities are heavily restricted; he’s barred even from exercising and is under constant surveillance to enforce those restrictions. For reasons that appear completely punitive, he’s being denied many of the most basic attributes of civilized imprisonment, including even a pillow or sheets for his bed (he is not and never has been on suicide watch). For the one hour per day when he is freed from this isolation, he is barred from accessing any news or current events programs. Lt. Villiard protested that the conditions are not “like jail movies where someone gets thrown into the hole,” but confirmed that he is in solitary confinement, entirely alone in his cell except for the one hour per day he is taken out.

In sum, Manning has been subjected for many months without pause to inhumane, personality-erasing, soul-destroying, insanity-inducing conditions of isolation similar to those perfected at America’s Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado: all without so much as having been convicted of anything. And as is true of many prisoners subjected to warped treatment of this sort, the brig’s medical personnel now administer regular doses of anti-depressants to Manning to prevent his brain from snapping from the effects of this isolation.

Just by itself, the type of prolonged solitary confinement to which Manning has been subjected for many months is widely viewed around the world as highly injurious, inhumane, punitive, and arguably even a form of torture. In his widely praised March, 2009 New Yorker article — entitled “Is Long-Term Solitary Confinement Torture?” — the surgeon and journalist Atul Gawande assembled expert opinion and personal anecdotes to demonstrate that, as he put it, “all human beings experience isolation as torture.” By itself, prolonged solitary confinement routinely destroys a person’s mind and drives them into insanity. A March, 2010 article in The Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law explains that “solitary confinement is recognized as difficult to withstand; indeed, psychological stressors such as isolation can be as clinically distressing as physical torture.”

...

In 2006, a bipartisan National Commission on America’s Prisons was created and it called for the elimination of prolonged solitary confinement. Its Report documented that conditions whereby “prisoners end up locked in their cells 23 hours a day, every day. . . is so severe that people end up completely isolated, living in what can only be described as torturous conditions.” The Report documented numerous psychiatric studies of individuals held in prolonged isolation which demonstrate “a constellation of symptoms that includes overwhelming anxiety, confusion and hallucination, and sudden violent and self-destructive outbursts.” The above-referenced article from the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law states: ”Psychological effects can include anxiety, depression, anger, cognitive disturbances, perceptual distortions, obsessive thoughts, paranoia, and psychosis.”

When one exacerbates the harms of prolonged isolation with the other deprivations to which Manning is being subjected, long-term psychiatric and even physical impairment is likely. Gawande documents that “EEG studies going back to the nineteen-sixties have shown diffuse slowing of brain waves in prisoners after a week or more of solitary confinement.” Medical tests conducted in 1992 on Yugoslavian prisoners subjected to an average of six months of isolation — roughly the amount to which Manning has now been subjected — “revealed brain abnormalities months afterward; the most severe were found in prisoners who had endured either head trauma sufficient to render them unconscious or, yes, solitary confinement. Without sustained social interaction, the human brain may become as impaired as one that has incurred a traumatic injury.” Gawande’s article is filled with horrifying stories of individuals subjected to isolation similar to or even less enduring than Manning’s who have succumbed to extreme long-term psychological breakdown.

Click to expand...

This sentiment was echoed by Vice in an article reviewing the treatment of Manning from the point where they had been detained (No Archive; Vice does not support freedom of speech, hence blocks archives).

When asked to explain in court this week why nine months of maximum custody was necessary, his jailers gave varying answers akin to what would be expected for such strict handling: He could have harmed himself; he could have been harmed by others; he wasn’t mentally sound. Upon cross-examination, though, other information was unearthed revealing that the egregious conditions could easily be viewed as imputative, not imperative.

In multiple instances, the Quantico guards admitted that they subjected Manning to harsh treatment because the very antics he used to amuse himself in his cage were giving them cause for concern.

“His erratic behavior” was reason for putting him in protected watch, said Col. Dan Choike, the brig commander at the base

“His acting out, playing pee-a-boo, licking the bars on the cell itself. Different dancing. Erratic dancing.”

“Erratic dancing?” asked Coombs.

In another example, Marine Corps Gunnery Sgt. William Fuller cited Manning’s “little interest in discussion" as a reason to him as POI. Col. Choike, the brig chief, had similar rationale.

He was “withdrawn, depressed,” Col. Choike said of Pfc. Manning.

Click to expand...

The New York Times detailed events which happened with Manning while in prison, where Manning was placed in solitary confinement because of a suicide attempt, and that Manning had a hallucination where they believed that people tried to kill their guards and tried to enter the cell (archive).

Human Rights Watch called the prosecution and sentencing of Manning where he was found guilty of 20-of the 32 crimes he was tried for "aggressive" and said that the sentencing far exceeds sentencing for similar crimes in other free countries (archive).

On August 21, 2013, a US court martial at Fort Meade, Maryland, imposed a 35-year-sentence on Pfc. Bradley Manning.

“The aggressive prosecution and harsh sentencing of Manning not only contrasts sharply with the total impunity of former senior US officials for torture and related abuses, but also far exceeds the sentences most democratic countries impose for public leaks of sensitive information,” said Dinah PoKempner, general counsel at Human Rights Watch.

...

The only other case in which a soldier has been prosecuted for indirectly aiding the enemy was in 1863, against a Civil War private who was sentenced to three months’ hard labor for giving a military roster to a newspaper, which printed it. The court declined to dismiss the charge on July 18, for lack of evidence once the government had presented its case, but apparently found the government failed to establish the charge beyond a reasonable doubt. This result, while positive, still leaves a threat of prosecution alive for those who leak information to the media without any actual intent to aid the enemy.

Manning’s trial points to the urgent need for reform in the laws the US has used to prosecute those who leak information to the public, as well as the need for stronger protections for national security whistleblowers.

Click to expand...

The Verge took the position that the trial was unfair, and that the prosecution attempted to paint Manning in a false light; however, the defense showed that Manning was well-intentioned in what Manning had done (archive). The article tried to indicate government corruption by pointing out that a third of the trial took place behind closed doors.

Prosecutor Major Ashden Fein described Manning as an “anarchist” who took an ego-boost from revealing classified documents — “making a splash.” Fein described Manning as a “traitor,” who leaked so much material that “there is no way he even knew what he was giving WikiLeaks.”



In contrast, defense attorney David Coombs reminded the court that Manning was just 22 when he committed the offenses. He was “young, naïve, but good-intentioned.” He’d thought the public needed to see what he’d seen; that if people knew the war he knew, they’d be unable to support it — or even any war. Manning, Coombs emphasized, was an idealist acting in the public interest.

Whatever she thinks of Manning’s motivations, Lind limited discussion of them during the court-martial. (She also has not made public the legal reasoning behind her verdict.) In the sentencing phase, though, Manning’s motives and life experience became central to his defense. The prosecution, meanwhile, attempted to define the harm caused by his leaks.

Click to expand...

Buzzfeed published an article on Manning telling the story of their childhood, including alleged abuse by their father, the divorce of their parents and having to move multiple times, including to Europe (archive). The article uses screen caps from private chats that Manning had with a friend and reporter to describe Manning's history and the events leading up to leaking the documents. The article paints Manning as being someone who had to face many personal problems in their life, but they overcame them and joined the military to help other people, suggesting that the leaking of documents was done out of a sense of patriotism.

In addition to media coverage, SocJus circles used Chelsea's transition as a weapon to beat people they disagreed with in unrelated arguments. Below are some examples of Rat King members tying Chelsea to things such as gamergate, same-sex marriage, Trump's election, etc.






Others tried to tie themselves directly to Manning.







Because Julian Assange knows who Laurelai is


FakeRobotGamer even used Chelsea to police the tone of discourse


Clearly, there was a consistent pattern among left-leaning media to paint the US government as being harsh in the nature and extent of the punishment Manning received, and much of the media coverage linked the gender and sexuality issue of the Chelsea Manning story to the way the government treated Chelsea. While Chelsea's sentence was more extreme than any other sentence in the past, circumstances contributed to the sentencing. Add to that, the media's painting of Manning as a sympathetic character and SocJus social media turning Chelsea into a tool lead to a clear conclusion that Chelsea was being exploited by communities and media for their agenda.

Post-Clemency Chelsea Manning and the SocJus Social Network

Since being released from prison, the SocJus network surrounding Chelsea Manning has been falling over themselves to associate with Manning.





The thirst is real.



Even trying to indoctrinate Chelsea into fur



That all isn't to say that Manning isn't apt to say something stupid. Keep in mind this is the same person who took responsibility for leaking a cache of documents where half the documents were barely even a leak; their release was not much more than a breach of procedure.

Arguing with that idiot Ian Cheong






In closing, while Chelsea is a member of the Rat King through associations with many members, Chelsea is less a cow and more of a cow magnet at this point. It remains to be seen what impact the rest of the Rat King will hace on Chelsea going forward, but thus far, the real lol has been in how it is that the Rat King members themselves have tried to stick themselves to Chelsea, thus making Chelsea a victim once again by their star fuckery.

There is more content out there. Check the Zinnia-Chelsea association related to the US v. Manning trial and the Lamo chat logs for more.

For more reading
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning
https://twitter.com/xychelsea?lang=en
https://medium.com/@xychelsea
https://www.wired.com/2011/07/manning-lamo-logs/