Adrian Lamo: The Boy Inside the Man
He was among the first celebrity hackers, a genius to some and a traitor to others— a spy who tried to come in from the cold but found little warmth.
The Small Picture
I was the Assistant Principal at Adrian Lamo’s high school. He came to us as a sophomore after some difficulty with computer use policy at his first school, a conflict that activated his reluctance to accept authority and blindly follow rules. I read the notes about the transfer, saw his college-level proficiency in two languages, read his statements declaring that he would never harm anyone but insisting that he had a right to challenge any rule.
I thought, OK, he’s right — in the big picture. But high schools are not always big picture places. Students have theoretical rights but they are not always supported when adults feel students are questioning the general hierarchy of authority. Agreeing to hear a student’s grievance could make me suspect in the eyes of other educators: Why open that door? We have rules, students follow them, when they don’t — you enforce them. Why complicate it?
Ironically, the answer is simple: Because human beings are complicated; multiply that by a complicated world and we get exponential complexity. And…
