Sean Bruyea

So Sean Bruyea is an Canadian retired intelligence officer and (currently)an advocate for soldiers rights. When he was testifying against the new Veterans Charter about five years back, he ran into problems getting treatment for his PTSD.
Over on Sympatico, there's an article about his appearance on Question Period this week. Last Thursday, Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart acknowledged that his files were indeed accessed and shared among Department of Veteran's Affairs staffers.From the article:
Stoddart's year-long investigation stemmed from a complaint made by Bruyea that his personal and medical information was contained in briefing notes prepared for then-veterans affairs minister Greg Thompson in 2006. The notes covered Bruyea's participation in a press conference in which he was critical of the department.
"What we found in this case was alarming," Stoddart said Thursday in a news release.
"The veteran's sensitive medical and personal information was shared -- seemingly with no controls -- among departmental officials who had no legitimate need to see it. This personal information subsequently made its way into a ministerial briefing note about the veteran's advocacy activities. This was entirely inappropriate."
So Bruyea is understandably upset. Then he saw a memo in which " in which a department official suggested bureaucrats get tough on him for his criticism."
"When I received that memo I was stunned that I suddenly became subversive, I became a dissident, I became an enemy of the state for the very department that I was trying to help so that it can improve the treatment of veterans," Bruyea said. "I didn't get that. For me, it was mind-boggling."

So let me state for the record that what happened to Sean Bruyea was unconscionable. It was wrong. Both the current and previous governments deserve to be slapped around for their actions and Mr. Bruyea deserves apologies, compensation, whatever.
But, to be foul-mouthed and crude about it, exactly what part of this is fucking surprising? Has he been living with his head up his ass for his entire life? Has he never read a book? A newspaper? Watched a news program? Of fucking course he became subversive, a dissident, an enemy of the state. Did he not hear of Nixon keeping an enemies list? Or watch the actions of the Canadian government over the last fifty years?
I just want to slap this guy upside the head (not that I would, but the feeling is there). He was a part of the apparatus that maintains state power. The left has been yelling about this for decades. Hell, they even get it when the right complains about the same thing.
It's this fucking blindness to anyone who isn't us that drives me insane. CSIS recruits spies to infiltrate the union movement in Canada, who cares? That's them unionists. They're all probably commies anyway. That's YOU you fucking eejit! How fucking hard is it to understand that if one of us is a slave, NONE of us is free. Maybe it''s just because I would walk away from Omelas, but this shouldn't be that hard to get.
Every time a Communist, a gay man, an accused serial killer, is treated with fairness, justice, compassion, THAT'S YOU. This veneer of rights and democracy is thin enough. We have to do what we can to strengthen it, because when we do, it keeps us a little safer. It's not that fucking hard to understand.