I thought I felt your shape but I was wrong

everybody’s on social media all the time!
Chelsea Manning has been photographed by Annie Leibovitz for the September issue of US Vogue, posing in a swimming costume on a beach to accompany an interview discussing her new-found freedom.

Miss Manning, 29, posted the Leibovitz image on Instagram with the caption: “This is what freedom looks like”.

Released from prison in May, her sentence for leaking military documents to WikiLeaks commuted by Barack Obama, Miss Manning tells the magazine about adjusting to her new reality, and contemplates running for political office.

“I’m certainly not going to say no, and I’m certainly not going to say yes,” she said.

“My goal is to use these next six months to figure out where I want to go.

“I have these values that I can connect with: responsibility, compassion.

“Those are really foundational for me. Do and say and be who you are because, no matter what happens, you are loved unconditionally.”
Profile | Chelsea Manning

She also told how, in 2005, she happened to be in London, in King’s Cross, at the time of the July 7 bombings. That traumatic near-miss drove her to leave the UK after four years in Wales and return to the US, to live with her father, she said.

Miss Manning revealed she is working on her memoir, and relishing living in New York for the summer.

After seven years behind bars, and three years of military service before that, she said that she is shocked by how everyone now spends so much time on their phones.

“We’re sitting in the same room as each other but looking at our phones constantly,” she said.

“Before I was in prison, I was one of the only people on social media. I was a novelty.

“Now everybody’s on social media all the time!

“I think that’s where a lot of this miscommunication, polarisation, friction, and chaos is coming from.”

Current Mood: sad
Current Music: Siouxsie And The Banshees - Dear Prudence