Chelsea Manning as Transformative Truth-Teller

Abstract The chapter argues for reading Chelsea Manning as a transformative truth-teller. Through close examination of the chat logs between Manning and Adrian Lamo, the chapter argues that we should value rather than dismiss the connections Manning makes between her “private” struggles with Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and her struggles with mandated secrecy of information about government abuses of power in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The chapter reads Manning’s truth-telling, and her connection between public and private, not as simply an attempt to state or reveal facts, but also as an enactment of herself, as a gender nonconforming person and a person resistant to the army’s articulation of the national interest, as a proper speaker and defender of the public good. Yet her leaking aims not to restore institutions to normal functioning, but rather to transform the world so that she and her truths can be seen as significant.