The government's targeting of me is a perfect example of the Streisand effect

The US government’s targeting of me, a 48 year-old disabled father of three whose wife was a nurse at the Cleveland Clinic, for the “crime” of engaging in dissent and daring to exercise my Constitutional right to protected free speech, is a textbook case of the Streisand Effect. This is when attempts to suppress something only further expose and amplify its visibility. Named after Barbra Streisand’s 2003 lawsuit to hide aerial photos of her mansion—which only made them go viral—the suppression backfires, drawing more eyes to what one had wanted to bury. I was just a guy in Ohio writing about Marxism and challenging the Ukraine War narrative, not Osama bin Laden. I can barely walk to the bathroom with crippling arthritis most days. I find myself smeared with hundreds of posts, algorithmically boosted and upvoted by astroturf bots, numerous death threats, my wife fired from her job, my phones and computers hacked and classified Ukraine docs put on them and other folders which were locked so I don’t know what was on them, InfraGard goons firing automatic weapons outside my home, drones, and they even coerced my mother-in-law into helping them try and take our children by weaponizing CPS. We had to flee America and become political refugees in Guatemala. That’s a little bit of them overreacting, don’t you think?

This started in early 2022, and now it is 2025, and I still have 5-11 drones flying above my home to the tune of $15K per night for months and someone shooting outside my home in the distance at 5 am. If the government just forgot me and left me alone, I wouldn’t spend all my time writing and bitching about it. If they let me have my old life back I wouldn’t have anything to complain about. I would gladly give up my bitching if I had nothing to bitch about. It would mean less negative attention for them, and my life wouldn’t be so fucked. But instead they poke at me, create a reaction which gives them negative exposure, and then we go round and round. It never ends. They won’t even remove me from the Domestic Terrorist Watch List or stop the drones. What’s the purpose? Do they think I am out here making bombs? They think I am Che Guevara? Get fucking real. If the government had ignored me, I would just be the “anti-imperialist, communist guy” on Quora. Instead they decided to target me and destroy my life. I think part of it was their fear that I would expose their propaganda platform with glowies, but I had no intention to make a big deal of it. They wanted to preemptively screw me once they knew I had figured them out. I specifically condemned violence on Quora, multiple times, so the whole “he’s a violent domestic extremist” is total nonsense. On the spaces I edited, I said that those who called for violence would be banned. Yet because there is no due process, I was placed on the Domestic Terrorist Watch List on 7/22/22, anyway.

Compare this to Assange, and the pattern’s uncanny. Back in 2010, WikiLeaks dropped U.S. military leaks—Collateral Murder, Iraq logs—stuff that embarrassed the Pentagon but Assange wasn’t planting bombs. He was a publisher, a somewhat nerdy Aussie with a laptop, not a terrorist. The U.S. could’ve shrugged, let it blow over—whistleblowers fade when ignored. Instead, they went nuclear: Espionage Act charges, 175 years’ worth, extradition demands, and a CIA plot (per 2021 Yahoo News) to kidnap or kill him in London. He holed up in Ecuador’s embassy, then Belmarsh prison, rotting from 2019 to 2024 while the world watched. The harder they squeezed, the bigger he got—protests in London, UN cries of torture, X ablaze with #FreeAssange. By the time he plea-bargained in June 2024, he was a symbol, not just a man. The U.S. wanted him gone; they made him immortal. If they’d left him be, WikiLeaks might’ve fizzled—less martyr, less myth.

The parallels with my life are striking. Assange was a hacker-turned-leaker, me a Quora influencer with some strongly anti-imperialist views. We both cross the U.S. by challenging sacred cows: war crimes for Assange, Ukraine dogma for me, just as the war was getting started. Neither of us is violent—Assange didn’t shoot the Apache footage; I’m not arming militias. Yet the response is disproportionate: Assange faced a life sentence, I face drones, surveillance, and a possible frame-up. In both, the U.S. aims to crush dissent but ends up amplifying it. Assange’s leaks went from niche to global because of the manhunt; I continue to document and expose what is being done to me, and these very well may break big. The government’s own actions—legal hammers, tech intrusions—fuel the fire they’re trying to douse. It’s like they don’t learn: suppression breeds exposure.

Why does this happen? It’s not just incompetence; it’s systemic. The U.S. security state—CIA, FBI, NSA—runs on a paranoia engine. Dissent isn’t just noise; it’s a potential domino. My pro-Russia, anti-NATO posts might be seen as a cog in Moscow’s “information battlespace,” even though I have nothing to do with them. But that’s no excuse. People have the right to hold their own political opinions. That’s what the Constitution is all about. That’s why the courts have the Brandenburg Test. It’s not illegal to be a communist, either. Assange’s leaks threatened the war machine’s PR, so he had to go. The 2017 DOJ report on the Terrorist Screening Center showed how sloppy criteria land people like me on watchlists—vague “extremism” tags stick, and removal’s a slog. Once you’re in the crosshairs, the machine grinds on, costs be damned. Drones at $15K/night? Pocket change to the CIA’s $20 billion budget. Smear campaigns? Standard op—Snowden’s a narcissist, Assange a creep, I’m “crazy.” The goal’s control, not logic.

But here’s the rub: this machine’s blind to its own shadow. My losses—my wife’s job, my home, everything—echo Assange’s prison hell. Their hacking of my phones and computers in an attempt to frame me are serious felonies—crimes. My wife and kids see the drones and heard the automatic weapons being fired outside in Ohio—we’re not all hallucinating, nor were the forensic scans I did on my hard drives and phones. Imagine if Musk retweeted: “This is bullshit”—it’s a PR nuke, having tagged my video of the drone above my home, sent by the US government. The U.S. preaches freedom while framing a writer? That’s hypocrisy that is Assange-level bad. The optics tanked with him—Europe sneered, China gloated—and my situation could do it again for their terrible image. My $15K per night drone harassment means taxpayers are funding a vendetta against a broke expat. The government is shining a light on its own corruption, waste, fraud, and abuse.

The Streisand Effect thrives on this irony. “Leave me alone, and I won’t need to call you out” No drones, no story. I’m just a Substack writer who was deplatformed by Quora and lost the majority of my readership. Assange, too—ignore him in 2010, and he’s a footnote, not a folk hero. But the U.S. can’t help itself. It swings, and every punch lands on its own face. It’s like a primitive caveman, saying “ooga booga,” and who sees the solution to all problems as clubbing harder. DOGE and Musk need to audit this shit, because things are out of hand. My plight should be part of Trump’s waste-cutting crusade.

Assange’s saga proves that when the government retreats, it regains some credibility. Continuing to hold Asange in Belmarsh was a PR disaster that revealed the full hypocrisy of the US government. By 2024, the U.S. cut a deal—five years served, home free—because the optics were poison. Protests, UN reports, X storms (#FreeAssange hit millions) made it hurt more to keep going. I’m not there yet, but this isn’t going away unless they stop. My wife fired, kids scared, drones humming—all for a blogger? The $5.5M drone costs per year is the kicker; DOGE could rightly show us how deep the waste goes. Look to the military base in Honduras. Audit them.

What’s wild is how avoidable it was. I’m not some terrorist mastermind—I’m just a guy with a legitimate grievance, which they gave me. Assange wasn’t a terrorist—just a journalist and publisher they crowned. The U.S. could’ve let both fade; instead, it tossed shit at us and most of it splattered back on its own ghoulish face.

This isn’t just about us— it’s a warning. The U.S. targets dissidents and journalists—Snowden, Winner, journalists via Pegasus—and keeps tripping over the same trap. My life is a perfect example: I’m a nobody they made somebody. Assange was the blueprint; they didn’t learn. The Streisand Effect isn’t a fluke—it’s their Achilles’ heel. They swing at shadows and hit themselves, proving the harder you squeeze, the louder it gets. I’m still fighting because they won’t stop. If they did, I could focus not on my persecution but about writing in general. That’s the joke—they’re the punchline. The sad situation is that none of this is funny, but they are clowns.

Update: After publishing this, within a few minutes someone was shooting outside, at least twelve shots in short succession.