Anonymous Under Civil War?

Stoobalou writes "Civil war appears to have broken out in the ranks of headless 'hacktivist' collective Anonymous, with claims that a rogue admin has seized control of two key sites used to coordinate the loose-knit group's online direct action. The news follows speculation that a breakaway group of Anonymous members was responsible for the hacking attacks on Sony's PlayStation Network and Online Entertainment Network, which saw personal information, including credit card details, stolen from as many as 100 million users' accounts."

Comments

Anonymous is rock and roll

[jollyreaper]

I grew up in a conservative Christian household so I got the full scare story on the ebils of rock and roll before I dipped my toe in the other side. From the Christian POV, rock is monolithic. There's the titular head represented by Satan who is coordinating everything in a top-down hierarchical fashion from AC/DC, Ozzy, and Alice Cooper on down to the Beatles and Pat Boone. Even the most banal, lite rock-friendly artist is promoting Satan's message of substance abuse, loose morals, easy sex and enjoyment of life. Drug messages are backmasked into the music. Sex permeates the videos. Album jackets and psychedelic posters all have their hidden symbols and meanings; it's fun to take a trip, put acid in your veins. (supernaut!)

Then you look at it from the other side and shit, it's just a business. Rebellion is popular so you package it, commoditize it and sell it. Satan has nothing to do with it unless that's just a personal nickname for soulless assholes in suits. You really think it takes a prince of darkness to sell people on the idea of having fun and getting laid? Puhleeeeeeeeaze. Some rocker can declare he's doing something in the name of rock and roll, critics can argue about what rock is, how it should be, but they're all just tossing ideas into the collective memetic cess pool. There's no ecumenical councils trying to establish rock orthodoxy, no pope of rock to excommunicate you if you aren't doing it right.

It's the same thing with Anonymous. There's a vague, poorly expressed ideal with everyone supporting their own irreconcilable interpretation of it. You can't really have a civil war amongst people who were never unified to begin with. That's making the fundamental mistake of assuming Anonymous is top-down, hierarchical, and organized. Organized anarchy? That's as oxymoronic as Christian rock.