I REMEMBER when
whistle-blowers, dressed in black, kept order during the game;
these days, they make rather more disturbing figures on the pitch
of life.
As I write, the American
citizen Edward Snowden is seeking political asylum. In a story
broken by The Guardian, he has produced evidence to show
that the United States National Security Agency routinely accesses
the data streams of companies such as Microsoft, Yahoo, Google,
Facebook, and Apple to extract photos, emails, and connection logs
that reveal individuals' movements and contacts.
Liberal hackles are
predictably raised in outrage; so are other hackles - hackles with
a different discomfort.
No one doubts the courage
of the whistle-blower. It is unlikely that there will be any
financial gain for Mr Snowden; only the unsettling knowledge that
the US government will come after him. From now on, safety is
relative, and normality of life is over.
He is brave,
unquestionably. And, of course, he has carried the flag of
individual freedom against the tyranny of the state. Yet, as
Professor C. Frederick Alford observes, something niggles at the
back of our minds. Humans are tribal beings, and, while society
considers whistle-blowers brave in theory, there tends also to be a
sense of discomfort with those who break from the tribe.
While we like to see some
tribes exposed, we do not wish it for our own. Life is difficult
enough on the shifting sands of organisational life without some
whistle-blower revealing everything, when really - and this is how
the argument goes - it would have been much better dealt with away
from the public gaze.
It is not
straightforward. I doubt there is a priest in the country who does
not know secrets that they hope will never get out. It is not that
they are against the truth; simply aware that it needs to be
managed, which sounds terrible, but we are doing it all the time.
"Here's the truth; but would this be helpful for people to know?"
There are many grey areas in the lives of people and organisations
where demands for discretion and revelation sit in awkward
association.
Our commitment to truth
comes and goes. Some want the oil company exposed; some want
governments exposed; some want sexual abuse in the Church exposed;
but few want their family exposed. Some of the harshest treatment
dished out to whistle-blowers comes from within, when people ask
their family difficult questions about their past. "Why rake up all
those issues now? What's to be gained?"
And perhaps this primal energy drives some political
whistle-blowers as they risk everything for the truth. Figures from
their past denied them honest words; they won't let it happen
again.
