Edward Snowden is a Hero - Argumentative Essay

A hero is a respected or idealized person for bravery, outstanding accomplishments, or noble potentials. These features can be identified in Edward Snowden because, through his effort, many have been inspired. Therefore he is considered heroic due to the release of confidential documents that fully disclose and illustrate some of America's darkest secrets. Nevertheless, the leaked information has continued reverberating in today's political environment and is ascertained to continue in the unanticipated future hence its significance to American citizens. Under this concept, the essay seeks to explore on heroic aspect portrayed by Edward Snowden.

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Edward Snowden is a specialist that has worked for Dell, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency. Through his discovery, the U.S government used a global mass surveillance system to spy on foreign citizens, foreign governments, and American citizens that were never associated with terrorists. This was discovered after an NSA contractor hired him Alexander (2013). He was not pleased with how the intelligent agencies acquired information from civilians without a legal warrant or court order through his contract. Nevertheless, it is typical for intelligence agencies to carry out reconnaissance actions to protect the public against terror assaults and supplementary grave crimes. This was contrasting his endeavor; therefore, he did not appreciate that an excessive amount of private data, including intimate images, web histories, text messages, emails, and phone location, were collected Burrough, (2014). He decided to copy and leak thousands of confidential documents regarding the NSA domestic and international surveillance programs under this notion. Through him, the government's capacity to exploit new info technologies and inhibit diverse nations' cyberinfrastructure from gathering the information that is unlikely to be used to protect the public was controlled.

Edward Snowden is a hero who sacrificed his freedom and career for the public's right to privacy. However, some consider him a traitor who has slipped classified material materials from his firm and has humiliated the United States government on an intercontinental degree. Despite the public critiques on Snowden's action, his leaks have played a vital role in flickering a global argument concerning privacy and illegal surveillance. As a result, both the government and global technology firms have been forced to be more transparent and less intrusive Czabanowska, (2013). His act of showing the American public that the government was violating their civil liberties even though he knew that his exposures would have overwhelming control over his life shows bravery and selflessness.

Being a whistleblower was his decision since the computer programmer never wanted to live in a surveillance state where everything he did and said was on the government's palm. This is evident from one of the interviews carried out by newspapers that published Snowden's files. Even though he did not practice his civil rights, he understood that he would defend the right to privacy through transparency and culpability within the intelligence diligence Eldridge, (2019). Therefore he decided to leak the confidential documents on realizing that the head of state had no intention of addressing the right to privacy. Regarding the NSA's surveillance systems at the time, he pointed out that employees like himself could intercept people's credit card details, phone calls, passwords, and emails, and that the agency collected more information from American citizens than Russian citizens.

From other citizens' perspective, Edward is a narcissistic criminal whose disclosures have coursed more damage than noble. This is because, having worked for the NSA, Snowden knew his obligations and was undoubtedly aware that unveiling classified information of any kind was a crime in the United States. Nevertheless, he took the job and whistled the blow on a system that failed to meet his correctness standard. Besides, the top-secret court order approved the surveillance project leaked by Snowden; therefore, it portrays that Edward's main aim was to damage his employer's reputation, rather than exposing something illegal.

The majority of American citizens contrast from the above claims. Snowden's revelation of classified documents that merited to be portioned out with the public, without damaging his country's national security, shows that he was altruistic and responsible. This is because he did not leak any possibly destructive information about the U.S military plans or the delicacies between the United States and foreign government officials that could be expended by external interventions to harm his country and citizens. Unlike other victims accused of disclosing classified documents, Snowden did not disclose the information to the public to create a global information empire but rather to empower citizens across the world Hardy, (2015). This is factual because he spent time inspecting meticulously every single document before deciding to leak them; thus, his main goal was to perform public service without causing any harm to the nation. Besides, he knew the information he had could be significant for foreign intelligence agencies and governments to gain a competitive over the united states or even terrorist to improve new schemes to bypass surveillance; therefore, he only disclose limited files with a viewpoint of encouraging the American public and government, and foreign citizens and governments to oppress the ugly truth.

Though Snowden's exposure of classified documents, the United States government felt compelled to pass laws restricting government surveillance. Besides, it has forced the intelligence agency to be more transparent regarding their practices Papandrea, (2014). Concerning the perception that surveillance is essential to prevent terror attacks, the computer specialist has confirmed that the government uses surveillance systems to spy civilians with no crime or no link to terrorism. Besides, he affirms that the government stores a large amount of data that cannot protect the public Sharpe, (2019). It is also attained that terrorists carry out their attacks through offline means; hence they stop intelligence agencies from intercepting their calls or monitoring their online actives.

In summary, Edward Snowden is considered heroic due to his action that has played a significant role in implicating American citizens' perceptions on governments, intelligence agencies, and technology firms. He triggered a global dispute concerning the role of privacy and surveillance within the context of digital technology through his success of showing citizens that their government eroded their privacy rights in the name of national security. Critics has been made by concerned citizens concerning undemocratic surveillance programs employed be the NSA to spy on civilians that has no records of crime. This has been made possible through Snowden leaks. The most awful exposure revealed by Snowden is that the NSA was mainly attentive in snooping on American citizens' conversation rather than Russians, who are frequently portrayed as a threat to national security. The awful truth is that the government used global surveillance systems to spy on its citizens and gather the wrong information concerning their personal lives and conversation from social media platforms such as Facebook, Skype, Yahoo, etc.

Works Cited

Alexander, Rachel. "Edward Snowden: Traitor or Hero?" Tea Party Tribute. Tea Party Tribute 28 (2013).

Burrough, Bryan, E. Ellison, and Suzanna Andrews. "The Snowden saga: A shadowland of secrets and light." Vanity Fair (2014).

Czabanowska Maria. "Critical Discourse Analysis of the British Newspapers on the 2013 NSA Disclosures."

Eldridge, Scott A. "Hero or anti-hero? Journalists and their stories." Journalism Practice 13.8 (2019): 890-894.

Hardy, Kieran. "National Security Reforms and Freedom of the Press." Griffith Journal of Law & Human Dignity 3.1 (2015).

Papandrea, Mary-Rose. "National security information disclosures and the role of intent." Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 56 (2014): 1381.

Sharpe, Sybil. National Security, Personal Privacy, and the Law: Surveying Electronic Surveillance and Data Acquisition. Routledge, 2019.