Anonymous (group)

From Wikiquote
Jump to: navigation, search
We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.

Anonymous is a loosely associated hacktivist group which which promotes anonymous social engagement in direct action. It originated in 2003 on the imageboard 4chan, representing the concept of many online and offline community users simultaneously existing as an anarchic, digitized global brain. It strongly opposes Internet censorship and surveillance, and has hacked various government websites. In 2012, TIME named Anonymous as one of the most influential groups in the world.

For quotes on the subject of anonymity, see Anonymity.
For quotes for which the author is not publicly known, see Anonymous.

Contents

Quotes [edit]

The tendency to relate past events to what is possible in the present becomes more difficult as the scope of the geopolitical environment changes.
This is the future, whether one approves or not, and the failure on the part of governments and media alike to understand, and contend with the rapid change now afoot, ought to remind everyone concerned why it is that this movement is necessary in the first place.
Quotes of representatives or widely reported purported representatives of Anonymous
  • We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.
    • Anonymous representative of Anonymous, as quoted in Yale Law and Technology (9 November 2009)
  • The tendency to relate past events to what is possible in the present becomes more difficult as the scope of the geopolitical environment changes. It is a useful thing, then, to ask every once in a while if the environment has recently undergone any particular severe changes, thereby expanding our options for the future.
    Terminology, let alone our means of exchanging information, has changed to such a degree that many essential discussions in today's "communications age" would be entirely incomprehensible to many two decades ago.
    As the social, political and technological environment has developed, some have already begun to explore new options, seizing new chances for digital activism — and more will soon join in. It is time for the rest of the world to understand why.
  • I have been involved with Anonymous in some capacity or another for about six years.
    Looking back at my writing over that time, I have found that my predictions, while always enthusiastic, nonetheless turned out to have been conservative; when Australia became the first state to come under attack by this remarkable force, I proposed that we would someday see such allegedly inevitable institutions begin to crumble in the face of their growing irrelevance.
    Someday turned out to be this year.
    I predict that Anonymous and entities like it will become far more significant over the next few years than is expected by most of our similarly irrelevant pundits — and this will, no doubt, turn out to be just as much of an understatement as anything else that has been written on the subject. … This is the future, whether one approves or not, and the failure on the part of governments and media alike to understand, and contend with the rapid change now afoot, ought to remind everyone concerned why it is that this movement is necessary in the first place.

Anonymous Operation Last Resort (2013) [edit]

We have bidden our time, operating in the shadows, adapting our tactics and honing our abilities.
This time there will be change, or there will be chaos...
Anonymous representative of Anonymous, in a hacktivist message announcing at Anonymous Operation Last Resort at the United States Sentencing Commission (25 January 2013) and a Youtube video posted by Aarons ArkAngel
  • Citizens of the world,
    Anonymous has observed for some time now the trajectory of justice in the United States with growing concern.     We have marked the departure of this system from the noble ideals in which it was born and enshrined. We have seen the erosion of due process, the dilution of constitutional rights, the usurpation of the rightful authority of courts by the "discretion" of prosecutors. We have seen how the law is wielded less and less to uphold justice, and more and more to exercise control, authority and power in the interests of oppression or personal gain.
    We have been watching, and waiting.
    Two weeks ago today, a line was crossed. Two weeks ago today, Aaron Swartz was killed. Killed because he faced an impossible choice. Killed because he was forced into playing a game he could not win — a twisted and distorted perversion of justice — a game where the only winning move was not to play.
    Anonymous immediately convened an emergency council to discuss our response to this tragedy. After much heavy-hearted discussion, the decision was upheld to engage the United States Department of Justice and its associated executive branches in a game of a similar nature, a game in which the only winning move is not to play.
  • We have felt within our hearts a burning rage in reaction to these events, but we have not allowed ourselves to be drawn into a foolish and premature response. We have bidden our time, operating in the shadows, adapting our tactics and honing our abilities.
  • There must be reform of outdated and poorly-envisioned legislation, written to be so broadly applied as to make a felony crime out of violation of terms of service, creating in effect vast swathes of crimes, and allowing for selective punishment. There must be reform of mandatory minimum sentencing. There must be a return to proportionality of punishment with respect to actual harm caused, and consideration of motive and mens rea. The inalienable right to a presumption of innocence and the recourse to trial and possibility of exoneration must be returned to its sacred status, and not gambled away by pre-trial bargaining in the face of overwhelming sentences, unaffordable justice and disfavourable odds. Laws must be upheld unselectively, and not used as a weapon of government to make examples of those it deems threatening to its power.
    For good reason the statue of lady justice is blindfolded. No more should her innocence be besmirked, her scales tipped, nor her swordhand guided. Furthermore there must be a solemn commitment to freedom of the internet, this last great common space of humanity, and to the common ownership of information to further the common good.
    We do not expect to be negotiated with; we do not desire to be negotiated with. We understand that due to the actions we take we exclude ourselves from the system within which solutions are found. There are others who serve that purpose, people far more respectable than us, people whose voices emerge from the light, and not the shadows. These voices are already making clear the reforms that have been necessary for some time, and are outright required now.
    It is these people that the justice system, the government, and law enforcement must engage with. Their voices are already ringing strong with a chorus of determined resolution.     We demand only that this chorus is not ignored. We demand the government does not make the mistake of hoping that time will dampen its ringing, that they can ride out this wave of determination, that business as usual can continue after a sufficient period of lip-service and back-patting.
    Not this time. This time there will be change, or there will be chaos... 


Quotes about Anonymous [edit]

External links [edit]

Wikipedia
Wikipedia has an article about:
Commons
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
Retrieved from "http://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Anonymous_(group)&oldid=1546553"