Tag Archives: Neil Patrick Harris

Edward Snowden Has Just One Regret – By Will Oremus FEB. 23 2015 5:24 PM

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NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden says he doesn't care if people call him a traitor. Photo by Frederick Florin/AFP/Getty Images
NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden says he doesn’t care if people call him a traitor.
Photo by Frederick Florin/AFP/Getty Images

A day after Citizenfour won the Oscar for best documentary feature, its subject, Edward Snowden, appeared on Reddit for an “Ask Me Anything” question-and-answer session.

One of the first things users asked the fugitive whistle-blower was what he thought of Oscars host Neil Patrick Harris’s pun about him Sunday night. (“Edward Snowden couldn’t be here, for some treason,” NPH had quipped.) Many of Snowden’s allies, including Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, slammed the one-liner as insulting and irresponsible. But Snowden himself took it in stride:

To be honest, I laughed at NPH. I don’t think it was meant as a political statement, but even if it was, that’s not so bad. My perspective is if you’re not willing to be called a few names to help out your country, you don’t care enough.

For what it’s worth, Greenwald—who joined Snowden and Citizenfour director Laura Poitras on the Reddit AMA—insisted on Reddit that he had laughed it off too, despite earlier calling it “stupid and irresponsible” to a BuzzFeedreporter.

Another top question for Snowden on Monday was potentially a little more substantive. Reddit user TheJackal8 asked him: “Mr. Snowden, if you had a chance to do things over again, would you do anything differently? If so, what?”