
Why Am I So Upset About Aaron Swartz's Suicide? - discountgenius
http://discountgeni.us/2013/01/13/why-am-i-so-upset-about-aaron-swartzs-suicide/
======
cup
The Aaron Swartz issue really reaffirms a hypothesis ive held for a long time
about empathy. This is the first time I've seen HN in uproar, up in arms about
the injustice against a man at the hands of the state for a crime which they
cannot agree with. Yet there have been far greater travesties of justice,
countless suicides by innocent people in Guantanamo bay or prison and not a
bleep on the HN radar.

Obviously Aaron Swartz impact on the internet, his relevance to this community
and obvious closeness to many people explains it. But take away who he is and
the circumstances are sadly far from rare. Aaron Swartz' ordeal is being
relieved right as we speak in numerous places around America and the world.

It's just unfortunate that for many it took this long to empathise or
understand their plight.

~~~
rdl
Guantanamo is different. There are a lot of people there (fewer now) who don't
belong there, but others I'd have to try hard not to murder, myself.

The problem with Guantanamo is the lack of legal process, and the way some
people were swept up who shouldn't have been (which mostly got resolved in
2005-2006), not that many of them aren't horrible criminals. I'd be fine with
prosecuting them all in federal civilian court with fair trials.

~~~
hobbyhacker
The problem with Guantanamo is that it exists at all as an extra-judiciary
area specifically designed to deny inmates certain rights.

~~~
alexqgb
The whole point of the tactics used against Aaron was to render his right to a
trial by jury too risky and expensive to exercise. In both cases, the legal
accountability of the Executive Branch is what's being undermined - by the
Executive Branch.

------
guynamedloren
I'm going through the exact same thing. I've been upset since Aaron's suicide
and I just cannot figure out why it's affecting me in such a way. I didn't
know him, and like the author, I have a difficult time feeling emotions for
distant (yet immense) tragedies, including war and natural disasters. But this
just fucking hurts.

Maybe it hurts because seemingly reasonable, well educated people are behind
this. This wasn't some looney that snapped and walked into a school with guns
blazing. The people responsible are representatives (in one way or another) of
the United States of America. Land of the free. Home of the brave. Supposedly
good people. But they can do this (thanks to the wallets of hard working
American people) and will probably get away with it? They have this kind of
power? They can ruin a person's life for a victimless crime, even when the
alleged 'victim' chooses not to pursue legal action? That's a devastatingly
scary thought. And it's not just Carmen Ortiz and Steven Heymann. Our justice
system is wrought with corruption, and that's scary, because it's probably the
best justice system in the world (or at least touted as such).

~~~
0xABADC0DA
> The people responsible are representatives (in one way or another) of the
> United States of America. Land of the free. Home of the brave.

I don't get this at all... Harvard fellow uses MIT's network surreptitiously
to violate the terms of service to download a nonprofit's entire database and
then give it away for free, putting them out of business. Gets busted and
charged with crimes. Where's the problem here?

Ok the prosecutor may have been overzealous, but we do have an adversarial
system and it was Swartz's bad decisions that brought the hammer down. They
didn't plant drugs on him. He wasn't doing it to feed his family. Sorry to all
the people here that knew him personally, and to whom this is a personal
tragedy, but this is not the kind of travesty of justice that you are making
it out to be.

~~~
toyg
35+ years in prison for "checking out too many books at once" is not a
travesty?

~~~
emkemp
According to the Wall Street Journal[1], the government would probably have
asked for 7 years, and a plea bargain offer was made to reduce to 6-8 months
in prison. The 35+ years was the potential maximum, would have required
conviction on all charges, and ultimately would have required an independent
trial judge to "throw the book at him."

[1]
[http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB1000142412788732458150...](http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324581504578238692048200404-lMyQjAxMTAzMDEwMzExNDMyWj.html?mod=wsj_valetbottom_email)

And "checking out too many books at once" = allegedly hacking into a third
party network to download 4 million articles from 1,000 academic journals
without paying the required fees.

~~~
chris_wot
7 years, for downloading articles that should probably be in the public
domain? Well, that's not prosecutorial overreach _at all_.

~~~
mpyne
6-8 months is what the prosecutors asked for, remember?

According to Lessig that wasn't even the sticking point for Aaron: Aaron
didn't want to plead guilty to a felony, he wanted lesser charges.

~~~
chris_wot
Allow me to rephrase that then: 6-8 months, for downloading articles that
should probably be in the public domain? Well, that's not prosecutorial
overreach _at all_.

------
ck2
We're upset because Aaron was an activist while many of us capable of doing
what he did, just sit on our couches or comfy chairs.

We're upset because the full legal power of the government was used as a
weapon against him almost as if he was mass murderer instead of his "crime"
being just setting information that was technically free in the first place,
actually free.

We're upset because instead of waiting pensively for what his sentence would
be and protesting what would undoubtedly be unjust, all we can do is remember
who he was and triumph his cause in the hope that this won't happen again.

He didn't deserve to feel this was his only way out and he had so much more to
contribute based on his past accomplishments.

I guess the problem with us identifying with Bradley Manning in comparison is
he didn't do things like contribute to RSS and Markdown. But the information
he set free is just as important.

~~~
jeffdavis
"I guess the problem with us identifying with Bradley Manning in comparison is
he didn't do things like contribute to RSS and Markdown."

No, my problem identifying with Manning was that he exposed private
communications involving the State Department, which could have consequences
for our foreign relations and national security. Swartz was downloading
scientific journals, which is an entirely different ballgame.

Very few people believe that State Department communications should be public.
So, even if you convince everyone that some injustice was done to Manning
because of specific situations that called for whistle-blowing, it does not
reveal any general problem in the federal justice system.

With Swartz, I think just telling his story will cause many people to realize
how broken the federal justice system is.

~~~
ck2
There are nearly 5 million people with access to US "top secret" level
information.

So I would disagree about how public you think it is just because it's not on
the nightly news.

~~~
jeffdavis
Are there 5 million people with access to that specific top secret
information?

My understanding is that you only get access to some top secret information,
not the keys to the castle.

------
gws
"Aaron Swartz is what I wish I was."

I am too a cold, rational bastard and yet I've found myself fighting tears
over and over these last two days. And I barely knew who Aaron was until two
days ago.

But I think the OP nailed it, for me and I'm sure for many more. I can still
recall when I was an idealist as a child and a young teen. But I preferred to
become cynical rather than suffer from injustices in the world. Much easier to
be above, untouched, than fight for change and inevitably suffer, a lot.

But we still viscerally admire somebody like Aaron, somebody who took the hard
route, somebody we could have been but hadn't the courage to.

That's why we suffer so much today, the best part of us has died.

~~~
krrrh
I think you nailed it for me with having to confront out best selves and their
absence. It's why I keep thinking of this George Orwell verse where he cursed
his own cynicism upon meeting an idealistic young soldier in Barcelona (hat
tip to Hitchens):

 _For the fly-blown words that make me spew_

 _Still in his ears were holy,_

 _And he was born knowing what I had learned_

 _Out of books and slowly._

Later on he ends:

 _But the thing I saw in your face_

 _No power can disinherit:_

 _No bomb that ever burst_

 _Shatters the crystal spirit._

~~~
limist
And a hat tip to you for sharing this poetry, which so perfectly expresses the
feelings some of us have reading about Aaron's life, and seeing his smile in
photos.

------
junto
Whether or not the actions of the US government via the DOJ was the direct
cause of Aaron's suicide will be debated at length.

However, as both a cause and a "martyr" of sorts, Aaron's death has become a
rather large stick to hit both government and the copyright lobby with.

I hazard a guess that Aaron would have been happy for us all to use that stick
with a vengeance.

We should keep hitting these powerful lobbies with that stick until they break
or the stick breaks.

------
creamyhorror
Reposting my comment from a forgotten thread, because I think the sense of
loss many of us are feeling should be channeled into actions that may
conceivably do some good:

\---

1\. What concrete steps can people take to prevent cases like Aaron's from
happening again? What enduring commitments can be made, and to what causes or
organizations?

2\. Who should we be listening to and supporting who is of like mind with
Aaron, and has been neglected so far? Who is doing good work out of the public
eye, like Aaron was?

I join you in commiseration. I'm going to look for a local organization to
join in support of online freedom. Perhaps find a club to mentor promising
youth in tech. I hope the Americans here will take every feasible step in
correcting overzealous prosecutors (and nonetheless calling for justice where
it hasn't been meted out). Aaron's passing must not be in vain.

\---

------
shaunxcode
I know absolutely why I feel so upset. He was part of my tribe. Though I never
met him, or even directly engaged with him, I was very aware of him and took
direct inspiration from his actions. I have dealt with the death of close
peers in the past who were part of my tribe. I was younger and more prone to
succumbing to anger and spite - now I know the best thing I can do is to honor
their memory by maintaining the impetus we once shared.

------
EuroCoder
While I sympathize with the tragedy of Aaron's death, I have to agree that he
is receiving a disproportionate amount of attention. Take away his association
with the HN community and the Internet, and his case is not nearly as tragic
as many others. Take the Guantanamo inmates who committed suicide. They were
innocent and were imprisoned without any control over the situation. Aaron
chose to break into the MIT network closet and JSTOR (though I agree that the
punishment is way too harsh, there should be no punishment at all). But
everything Aaron did was by his own choice. The people in Guantanamo didn't do
anything at all. Their situation is much more infuriating, much more tragic,
and deserves much more attention.

------
julianpye
Maybe it's similar for you to how many people were surprised by their level of
grief, when Princess Diana died. Girls growing up in the 80s grew up on the
fantasy of being like her, chosen and given wealth and fame and becoming a
queen. And then she didn't buckle up and the entire childhood fantasy died
right there with her in the tunnels of Paris. This trauma has changed
England's emotional landscape for good - no more stiff upper lip.

So you saying 'Aaron is what I wish I was' is the correct analysis - Aaron had
everything that we here strive for - he was recognized for his potential when
he was a teenager, he had been accepted by YC, was part of a successful exit,
was a highly respected and idealistic Internet activist and intellectual...
These are the goals people strive for when they tell themselves 'if I only
could achieve XYZ, then I will be happy - I will put all my energy into XYZ,
because it will eventually be worth it'. The reality is more complex. Even
with all these achievements, the highest potential that we can strive for can
be destroyed. In his case by the beast of depression when driven by senseless
persecution through the political apparatus.

------
ak39
I'll tell you why you're upset. You're upset because you are precocious. And
decided. And certain. And dare I say sometimes morally certain!

Aaron was an absurd hero who chose not to revolt. He just didn't imagine
himself happy, so he agonised about the futility of living with every breath
he took. He remained a stranger in his own life even with each new career
summit he topped. Ultimately he chose to check out thinking that was the only
way from the inevitable. Tragic. It needn't have been.

Like most of the high achievers of Aaron's age, your generation has achieved
so much so quickly that you've missed the barely audible slow burning whisper
of your own existential questions. The din of success, of the ceaseless
twittering of Twitter, of the vacuous flapping on Facebook and the daily
showboating wankery of blogging has made you forget that it's the SILENCE that
matters. It's the silence of your thoughts to yourself that will answer your
questions. Slowly and with meditated patience.

I'm upset too. I'm upset that his parents have to deal with this tragic loss,
that his surviving loved ones are looking for answers to this tragedy. I'm
upset that traditional methods of calming, of seeking, of surviving are lost
to this generation - a generation addicted to instantaneous Google-fed answers
and one that is now gyrating to hokey lyrics like "partying & bullshit",
"we're gonna die young"* ... :-(

This generation that obviously knows a great deal about internet startups and
computer science, and Batman and world peace knows very little about how to
answer their own questions about a meaningless existence. Their parents did
it. Same shitty world, shame shitty life - they made it! How??

Finally, I now know what a pointless Sisyphean desk job has to offer to a
young person: how to suffer patiently without self-destructing. How to fold,
without going all in on the flop.

Much love,

AK

\-----

* I like the songs, btw :-)

~~~
anu_gupta
Seriously, if you think this generation has a monopoly on glamourising the
"live fast, die young" ethos, you haven't been around for very long.

But excellent attempt at using someone's suicide to vent a lot of your anger
at today's kids.

~~~
ak39
<Quote> Seriously, if you think this generation has a monopoly on glamourising
the "live fast, die young" ethos, you haven't been around for very long.
</Quote>

I didn't say that really, did I?

I've lived long enough to hear more than one case of rapid success claiming a
suicide victim in the field of arts. We all know them. Many of these cases are
often dismissed as some sort of underlying pathology and the rest as
inevitable result of the individual's pathetic circumstance. All of course
inadequate in truly explaining the "storm inside".

But guess who the high-achieving rock star child prodigies of today are, if
not the erstwhile artists? The new kids have given up their piano keyboards
for computer keyboards ... and there are plenty more of them in every second
suburban basement than there are talented musicians, actors and artists today.
And they are winning! And good for them! But some of the winners are even
dreaming, no - decided, about ideals like social justice, equality, freedom.
No amount of black and white binary talent will help answer the grey of these
concepts that have plagued humanity since the beginning of human conscience.

Wisdom is a slow cooking dish ... that's never going to be ready. I guess
you'll just have to grow up, kid.

(I'm sorry to sound patronising but there's no point in blaming the morons at
MIT, the tits at JSTOR, the vindictive FEDS or the rotten capitalistic system.
All really irrelevant.)

------
meric
"I am upset that we have a justice system that would persecute me the way it
did Aaron."

But it wouldn't, because we allow our fears to convince us to keep our
thoughts to ourselves. And I am upset the very persons who are courageous
enough to fight for our interest are eliminated, leaving us.

------
edw519
_Aaron Swartz is what I wish I was._

Please don't compare yourself to anyone else. It's pointless, disempowering,
and generally a waste of time. Your "best you" is what I wish you wished you
were.

 _I am a bright technologist..._

You are not alone. There are many of us here, like you and like Aaron.

 _...but I've never built anything of note._

The things you build do not have to be famous to be "anything of note". Do
people use the software you have written? Do they benefit from it? If yes,
then it is most certainly "of note".

 _I have strong opinions about how to improve this world, but I've never acted
to bring them to pass._

That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. That means you're normal.
99% of us are in exactly the same boat. We go about our daily business, taking
care of ourselves and those close to us, making the world a better place in a
thousand little ways.

Think of it this way. We're all just one great big football team. The Aaron
Swartzs and Steve Jobs of the world are the quarterbacks and ball carriers
whose names are in the press all the time. But they would accomplish little if
it wasn't for those of us around them who block and tackle all day long. Don't
be upset that, up to this point, you've been a blocker or tackler. Be proud.
And realize that your turn to carry the ball has yet to come.

 _I have thoughts every day that I would share with the world, but I allow my
fears to convince me to keep them to myself._

Congratulations. You have just taken the first step toward addressing that
issue with that statement here on Hacker News. Now please take Step 2. Start a
blog. If it's anything like this post, then I want to read it. And others, I'm
sure, will want to also.

 _If I were able to stop being afraid of what the world would think of me, I
could see myself making every decision that Aaron made that ultimately led to
his untimely death._

You don't know what really led to Aaron's untimely death. No one does. The
decisions you make are just one input to a complex process we still don't
understand. So go easy on yourself and don't jump to unnecessary conclusions.

 _I am upset that we have a justice system that would persecute me the way it
did Aaron._

Many of us are upset about this and a lot of other things too. But we won't
allow any of them to stop us from living our lives fully. You can be upset
about things in background and still have a wonderful happy life in
foreground. Give it a try.

 _I am upset that I have spent 27 years of my life having made no discernible
difference to the world around me._

I bet if I asked those close to you if the felt they same way, I'd get a
resounding "No!" Maybe you should, too.

 _Most of all I am upset that Aaron's work here is done when there is so much
more he could have accomplished._

Agreed. I guess that means that each of us now has a few more things to add to
our own To Do Lists.

Thanks, John, for the great post. Best wishes for feeling better and getting
on with it. Ultimately, that's what we hackers always do.

~~~
bengillies
While the untimely death Aaron is tragic, the constant fawning over
celebrities on Hacker News is frequently depressing. Both in the sense that
we, as a community, are not able to rise above it and, rather more selfishly,
that I am not one of them.

While, to a large extent, I already knew everything that you'd written, I'd
like to thank you for reiterating it.

~~~
danso
I don't know if I'd call the posthumous interest in Aaron as fawning. He did a
lot of great work and had admirable ideals. He no longer has the capacity to
be an agent of change. And while you can say his spirit "will live on", part
of that passing on the torch comes from a thorough examination and celebration
of his life. It doesn't just happen sometime down the road.

------
Fice
Everyone blames the system but we should really blame ourselves first. We did
not protest Aaron's prosecution enough, we did not make him feel our support.
We ourselves allowed this to happen.

~~~
toyg
I partially agree. I remember reading about his arrest thinking "uh-oh, this
time he messed up" and kinda forgot about it, but I never realised he was
facing the threat of 35+ years to life.

------
ohwp
Today I had a strange thought: did Aaron kill himself because he thought it
was the only solution to end the madness of the system?

~~~
csense
I think not.

If he'd been planning to use his own death to bring about radical change,
you'd think he'd at least have arranged for a suicide note to appear on his
website after he was gone, or something.

I haven't seen anything like that, and if it existed and was accessible to the
public, I'm sure it would've appeared on HN's front page by now.

Then again, if he _was_ planning this, we could account for our observations
by saying maybe he mailed instructions, passwords, documents and public
statements to someone he trusted to make the greatest impact with it, and that
person's sitting on the information, watching the momentum build, waiting for
the most effective time to release it. The noise about this has been
deafeningly loud for us in the tech community for quite some time, but only in
the last day or so have I noticed this story being picked up by mainstream
news outlets.

------
etherael
The state has for as long as I can remember disgusted me, amongst many other
things, exactly due to behaviour like this. Murdering thuggish religious
zealots are a lot less sympathetic than anti authoritarian information
crusaders, but the hysteria pitch here is eye opening to me at least from the
perspective of people being so incensed by the fact that their government
could be involved in such a thing.

Look around; the state is not your friend and it never has been, look at the
statistics for democide in the previous century if you need any more proof.
It's mindboggling to me that with all that goes on, when the blowback of
business as usual in a modern western nation state hits closer to home people
are actually shocked and amazed.

Look at the representatives of the law here on HN bleating about the nature of
the offense in question as within the strictures of the law and thus beyond
reproach and simply a symptom of a system that needs further tuning; This is
how the state operates, this is what it runs on. Changing this fact doesn't
require a simple tuning of a few dials here and there, it requires a
fundamental re-examining of the central role of the westphalian nation state
and the gears and levers upon which it operates in the modern world.

To be fair and admit my biases, yes, I believe castrating the beast is
necessary, and this is just one more on a practically endless list of bullet
points that demonstrate this.

As important as what happened here is and as much as it is nice to see people
actually appearing to finally notice what is being done in their names and
with their tacit consent, I simply can't see that actually happening. In a few
weeks people will become resigned to the fact that they have no actual power
and cannot make any actual change.

The depressing fact of the violent and compulsory nature of state authority
coupled with it's extreme innate resistence to any kind of actual, real change
are simply too entrenched for just this event to actually make any more
difference than the millions of others just like it that ended up hitting some
other tribe instead of ours.

Pity.

~~~
rprasad
The state is not a person, and ergo cannot be your friend. However, the state
is a collection of persons, both elected, appointed, and hired, and many of
those persons can be your friend. Indeed, I count a number of such persons
among my friends.

In a democracy, the state is what you make of it--it is your family, friends,
and neigbhors. It is not some monolithic evil construct.

~~~
etherael
That the state is an organisational structure and thus that it is "composed of
people" is no more an innate hedge against corruption than any other
organisational structure. That plenty of the people which make the machine are
otherwise good is precisely the problem; evil people will do evil things, but
evil people are rare.

A much larger problem is when otherwise good people can be convinced that evil
is good, and are wholesale conscripted into the commissioning thereof. Look at
the statist lawyer pack currently continuously stating that this is just
business as usual in this case. They're absolutely right, but that they can
accept that state of affairs purely because it is done under color of law
should be telling.

Any organisational structure given unlimited power and no direct oversight by
market forces will historically trend toward this kind of behaviour, that is
why I believe as I do that it is an innate characteristic of a state. The
ability to write your own rules and modify them at will and without effective
limit to power, coupled with the ability to levy compulsory fees on your
"customers" is put simply a recipe for disaster. Democracy is a laughable
hedge on that of power, the subversion of which on a daily basis ought to be
evidence enough that this is true.

I am aware of the traditional refrain that the solution is better educated
voters and less money in politics and a whole raft of other prescriptions, but
I am similarly aware that they never come to pass and all attempts are made to
keep the violent, psychopathic machine chugging along as it was before with
nary a sideways glance for other possibilities.

The reaction from the subjects when this is pointed out to them is
disappointing, but telling. I apologise if I sound overly shrill on the topic,
it's not my intent, I am simply tired of seeing this pattern repeated over and
over again only to have people utterly unwilling to examine the real root of
the problem.

~~~
temphn

      Any organisational structure given unlimited power and no 
      direct oversight by market forces will historically trend 
      toward this kind of behaviour,
    

Exactly. Absolutely right. The bureaucracy is like middle management gone
berserk. The founders were onto something, they built something with
incredible revenue potential, and were both the executives AND the workers.
Then some middle management layers had to arise for coordination. Over time
the separation between the executives and the workers grew to become a yawning
gulf, and the middle managers captured the asylum.

Lacking any inherent ability to create value (like actual producers) nor any
ability to be bold and take risks (like good executives), the legal
bureaucracy/middle management just consumes more and more resources.

It can go on for quite sometime when you have a company producing as much
revenue as USG. But in this case it won't go on forever, as China is now
rising beyond USG.

    
    
      Look at the statist lawyer pack currently continuously 
      stating that this is just business as usual in this case.
    

Yeah, this seemed weird to me too. The best way to understand it is that they
were taught in law school that extralegal methods (whether Lincoln suspending
habeas corpus or 60s sit-ins) are allowed if and _only if_ they are in service
of fighting racism, sexism, homophobia, or something similarly Nazi/KKK-ish.
And for those who are not straight white males, which is the majority of
today's new lawyers, they also believe (and are repeatedly told) that they owe
their current positions/status to the federal government's past extralegal
activities.

So they combine hatred for pre-1960s America with reverence for the 60s
revolution and absolute fealty to the modern US federal government. Insofar as
they ever critique it, it is almost always to strengthen it (more taxes, more
laws, more regulations, more government). They used to push to weaken criminal
penalties for actual criminals (Miranda) and to defund defense, but here too
there's been kind of a recent change; the new breed of
Sotomayor/Holder/Bloomberg/Obama types (along with the lawyers here) are
actually pretty hardcore on both of those points. They are all about mandatory
maximums and drone strikes.

The result is something similar to the first class of students raised after
the 1917 revolution. Extralegal methods for the Great October Revolution were
completely justified. But after that point complete obedience to the state was
required; the only exception were extralegal methods that tended to _increase_
the power of the state and be directed against various libertarians,
reactionaries, dissidents, or running dogs. When they felt they were still
fighting against Russian culture, they pushed to reduce penalties against
criminals; but once they felt they were fully in command the harshness of
everything ramped way up beyond where it was pre-Revolution.

------
bradleysmith
Thank you for this post.

I've also been wondering about the depth of my emotion on this event. I have
looked up to Aaron Swartz mildly in the past, but the turn of events and
subsequent reactions have occupied my attention greatly since.

I too wish to be more like Aaron Swartz in many ways, and I too am strangely
moved by his story and his passing. Reading my thoughts in someone else's blog
is appreciated.

------
vph
Aaron Swart is an example of people whose technical ability (IQ) exceeds their
other ability (EQ). His technical ability allowed him to accomplish great
technical achievements; it also let him get into troubles at work or with the
law, which together with his fragile mental health eventually got him.

~~~
npsimons
With all due respect, is EQ really that important? We keep getting told that
it is, but EQ never won a war; EQ never sent anyone to the moon; EQ didn't
cure polio. Maybe cases like Aaron Swartz are a wakeup call to us a society,
not that we need to be more "emotionally" intelligent, but that a society with
severe hangups chews up and spits out its best and brightest, to its own
detriment.

Say what you will about his activities not being in the accepted norm, or his
mistakes, but the way we treat mental illness in this country is something we
should be ashamed of, and I'm not just talking about the medical
establishment.

~~~
vph
EQ is that important. Simply because you don't live in a vacuum. You live and
communicate with other people. You can be as technically capable as you can,
but if you keep pissing people off, you won't go anywhere. Now in addition to
this, if you are mentally fragile, sooner or later you will be shocked by what
society has for you.

It is not the right time to analyze Aaron Swartz, but if you look at what is
publicly written about his tenure at Stanford, Reddit, etc., you will see what
I am talking about. Is it that important? You bet.

