Julian Assange

[NeurotrashWarrior]

Julian Assange: Wikileaks co-founder arrested in London www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47891737

A woman from the Ecuadorian Embassy just said on Ch4 News that he smeared the walls of the embassy with faeces. On this thread someone said he damaged the fabric of the building by riding around indoors on a skateboard. I'm amazed it took them this long.

I absolutely despise Assange and everything he stands for...which is essentially being a Russian puppet masquerading as a freedom fighter. Fuck that guy.

“Manning, dressed in US military uniform and presenting as the male gender of her birth (she later transitioned as a woman),”

How convenient. If only I could flex some male privelage when I thought it would be helpful to me...

www.theguardian.com/media/2019/apr/11/chelsea-manning-julian-assange-webchats-wikileaks?CMP=twt_gu&utm_medium=&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1555004658

Odd stance for Diane Abbott to take I think, irrespective of what happened to Chelsea in terms of transitioning.

It wasn't a position of Diane Abbott. It was the official Labour Party line.

I watched in adject horror to her speech in the HoC.

She cited it as press freedom. Its bullshit. We have a tradition of whistleblowing hard hitting journalism in this country - possibly greater than any other country. But this is also characterised as responsible (and generally) ethical journalist when it comes to areas of particular sensitivity such as security. Media outlets spend a lot of time and money on lawyers and considering what can be published in the public interest, and what they should withhold being it may pose some sort of problem - such as placing an individual in danger.

Wikileaks has none of these concerns and as such I regard their claim to be journalists as highly questionable. They had no responsibility over the impact of their lack of gatekeeping. Its just a data dump without this process and consideration.

Not only this Abbott went on about how Assange was being persecuted and had don't nothing wrong but expose the US's wrong doing in Iraq.

I found this incredible.

Indeed it gave Sajid Javid easy ammunition in saying that she was not standing up for the rule of law and how Assange was guilty of skipping bail.

Abbott not long afterwards was clearly on a damage limitation exercise as she tweeted

Diane Abbott @ Hackneyabbott
Home Secretary claims law applies to everyone. But no-one argued that Julian Assange's skipping bail here should be ignored. It's the extradition to the US that is at issue, where he faces lengthy imprisonment for whistle blowing of US military operations in Iraq.

Except this is completely disingenuous representation of her statement in the HoC. She prattle on about his poor health and held against his will.

There also seems to be a certain amount of dissent in Labour. Diana Johnson MP for Kingston and Hull said
I am concerned that a man suspected of rape, which is what in this case actually happened, was able to do what he did for several years to escape justice. I have seen media reports that lawyers for the victims in Sweden are taking steps to start the proceedings off again. I wonder whether the Home Secretary might be able to investigate that and let the House know. I am sure that many Members of Parliament are very anxious about the matter.

The case of Assange is far from simple and I certainly do have concerns about any one being extridited to the US on computer misuse charges for human rights reasons.

But the way Abbott has presented the case today is nothing short of appalling.

I believe there are rumours of stronger charges yet to come from the US against Assange, possibly in relation to Trump Russia (and talk of the death penalty possibly being on the cards). In which case under the ECHR we would not legally be able to extradict him.

If I'm honest, I have to say I hope Sweden take the problem out of our hands though. He's cost us enough in terms of the £13million spent on policing and frankly I'd rather someone else handled it, because the case will be too politicised on tribal lines to be in the interests of the public at all.

hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2019-04-11/debates/0650F0B8-1D1E-4FD5-8E6D-9A94FE112986/ArrestOfJulianAssange
Anyway here is today's HoC debate on the subject so judge for yourself.

I'm very pissed off about it.

Without understanding the importance of ethics in media, the press is a very dangerous power. We are all too aware of cases where media has not acted ethically and this has proved to be a bad thing. For the Shadow Home Secretary to be unable to comprehend this and speak in a way that reflects this nuance is terrifying in its implication.

Abbott gets so much unnecessary abuse, but on this occasion I can't help but feel she's had not only a bad day at the office but one which neglects key issues which protect individuals from abuse of power and neglect of responsibility for the consequences of actions.

/rant

Red
I just watched this from 2013 & thought it interesting. Would be interested in your thoughts

'Douglas Murray Vs Julian Assange and Wikileaks'

www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=814&v=UDnt_CYDiuE

It is by no means clear if the cat donated its shit for the dirty protest.

Meanwhile, spare a thought for Cupboard Boy tonight. He'll be in some hellhole like Brixton or Wandsworth until they find a permanent place for him.

....OK, that's enough. Now forget about him until May 2nd.

The judge seems to have been unimpressed.

Thanks Redtoothbrush. That was illuminating. I do try and make allowances for Diane Abbott as she does get a lot of bad press coverage and abuse on social media but today’s performance was clearly really poor.

I don’t really understand why Assange still has so many allies. One of the worst arguments of his fans was that benefits of WikiLeaks somehow cancelled out possible rape in Sweden. Plus the idea that it was not safe to go to Sweden to be interviewed by the police because Sweden would extradition him to the US was really not plausible.

I hope Swedish prosecutors get their act together and reopen the case. I'm not a massive fan of suppression of freedom of speech but I'm even less a fan of a man who is accused by women of sexual crimes, runs away and then claims they're just part of some massive multi-state cover-up.

Face the music, Julian. You creep.

Lady Gags and Vivienne Westwood were supporters too.

R0wantrees that YouTube clip is very very good and it's interesting to watch Assange's response to Douglas Murray.

I think it highlights the concept of how a system might be flawed but that doesn't mean the alternative is better.

The concept of gatekeepers is one that I had drummed into me. Its a role that carries responsibility as well as power.

To use an example: a newspaper has a story about how all the of paedophiles for an entire region have released back into the community and housed by the council in a single area right next to a particular school. They decide to run a story questioning the policy and ask why the council has a policy which allows there to be such a high concentration in such a small area, especially since many of these men were familiar with each other from prison and were exchanging tips. It exposes the concerns and asks questions of the authority.

Compare it with a data drop website who report the story, and then publish a list of names and addresses of all newly released prisoners, which includes everyone from those who had been held without bail and released following being found not guilty of shoplifting to convicted paedophiles. Do the public need to know this information? Some might argue they have a right to know exactly who is living in their area. The problem though comes when vigilantes decide to hunt everyone who is newly released and intimidate them, or worse. Not only are people who were convicted of the serious crime caught up but also those who were innocent of any crime.

It unleashes almost a form of mob rule wherein human rights and civility are lost in the frenzy of 'informing us'.

My point being that, how does more information being available, actually help society? Can the problem be exposed and pressure brought to change a policy that is wrong, without unleashing this type of chaos?

I don't deny that we should know about US abuses of power. We should. But how much do we need to know, to still expose it, without there being a reaction which is beyond the control of any institutional power?

The flip side of that is Spotlight. The gatekeepers decided that the Catholic Church was more important than children. I mean eventually they didn't but everyone decided that to start with.

It’s amazing how certain people manage to be wrong about absolutely everything.
Diane Abbott, Peter Tatchell, Vivienne Westwood. Absolute shit for brains, every single one.

m.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/06/18/julian-assange-ecuador_n_5507558.html

How unsurprisingly that it was a women's bathroom which was appropriated.

"And the quietest room is the women’s bathroom, the only room that’s easy to sleep in. So I thought I’d try and somehow get hold of it and renovate it. Eventually, somewhat reluctantly, the staff relented. They ripped out the toilet. They’ve been very generous."

Says everything you need to know about his attitude.

How did he ever get into the women's bathroom in the first place to find out it was the quietest room in the embassy? What was he doing in there?

Was he sleeping in the bath then or is he just pretending to be British?

How unsurprisingly that it was a women's bathroom which was appropriated.

Indeed.

It is saddening, even when a man is a proven activist for human rights or whatever, that somehow even women seem to think they will never be likely to be sexual predators. As history has proved all too many "great men" have been sexual abusers.

In the meantime here are some quotes which show he is just another anti woman self aggrandising prick whose only noteworthy work was actually done by Chelsea Manning, who accepted legal punishment unlike the coward Assange.

^In one astonishing scene, Assange talks to Helena Kennedy QC, who is advising him on how to deal with the allegations. Assange says, as if to excuse himself, that it is a “radical feminist conspiracy” and dismisses the complainants as lesbians. Kennedy tells him it is not helpful to talk like this. “No, not publicly,” he says, while being filmed. Her look of despair is priceless. Assange then explains why it is not in the best interests of the women to press charges. “An actual court case is going to be very hard for these women … they will be reviled for ever by a large segment of the world population. I don’t think it’s in their interest to proceed that way.’’

“His lawyers demanded we took this scene out, and another one where he talks about the investigation and the women involved. We didn’t, and then he sent a text saying the film is a threat to his freedom and he is forced to treat it accordingly.” What right did he have to make that demand? “He had no right. He had no editorial control over the film.”^

www.theguardian.com/film/2017/jun/29/laura-poitras-wikileaks-film-risk-julian-assange

Julian Assange referred to the two Swedish women who accused him of sexual assault as “treacherous” and claimed that the allegations were the result of “crazed radical feminist ideology”, it has emerged.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/julian-assange-swedish-women-s-sex-claims-are-crazed-feminism-b08z2m0xk

^One Assange lawyer had said in court, "If Sweden [said] sucking toes without washing.. is rape..then that would be an extradition offense? No."

The judge begged to differ. In parsing the several allegations, he wrote of the charge that Assange had penetrated a woman who had agreed to sex only with a condom:

"The obvious and straightforward way of reading that allegation is that the complainant had made it clear that she would not consent to unprotected sex, and yet it occurred without her knowledge and therefore without her consent. Mr Assange was aware of this. Unprotected sex is wholly different from protected sex in that its potential repercussions are not confined to disease and include pregnancy."^

jezebel.com/judge-orders-assange-back-to-sweden-5769148

Apart from the sheer male entitlement dont forget many journalists who do support free speech, and had wanted to work with him, abondoned him because of his lack of professionalism and unwillingness to do the real work of resposible editing and back ground check.

All he did is take the information handed to him and publish in total without assessing the consequence. He is just another computer nerd with lack of empathy, and if newspaper tittle tattle is to be believed, lack of hygiene.

As others have said thank goodness the cat was taken away from him.

I don’t think he deserves life in a US super max prison - essentially 24 hour solitary comfinemnent - no sunlight etc - I still remember the videos and the audio of the civilians being shot that Chelsea Manning - leaked

LOL. That is not how it works. Assange is well-connected, well-off (thanks to idiot donors like Jemima Goldsmith) and white. He has allegedly committed a federal crime. He will therefore end up, if convicted, in a federal prison where conditions will probably be considerably better than an ambassadorial box room. And every publicity-hungry attorney in the US will be queuing up to defend him for the headlines and LOLs.

For reference: Paul Manafort (Trump advisor) - convicted of conspiracy to defraud the US, sentencing guidelines were 19-24 years. He got....47 months.

Jeffrey Epstein, friend of Trump & Clinton - a number of underage girls accused him of sexual abuse, including rape. He got.. 13 months in his own private wing of a jail and was allowed out 6 days a week on 'work release'.

FYI: Under the terms of the treaty between the US and the UK, extra retroactive charges cannot be added once a defendant is extradited.

I.e., If the US extradites him for computer conspiracy, the US cannot prosecute him for espionnage, or any other crime, that occurred before he was extradited.

Don't fall for the conspiracy theories. The request for extradition is for a charge with a maximum 5 year sentence.

Supermax prisons, FYI, are for the most violent --- the guys who could tunnel out of a maximum security prison to commit murder. They are not for a guy who fled to a friendly embassy to protect his brand's reputation from the damage his behavior has done.

I don’t have much time for Dianne Abbott and her views or Vivienne Westwood and her lazy and hypocritical thinking. - Assange is an unpleasant individual and should deal with all accusations in Sweden. However I don’t think he should be extradited to the US for essentially putting info he didn’t leak into the public domain. I also think and am willing to be told I’m wrong - that once in the US they will find new rather than old charges to try and put him in prison for a long time. The US penal system is pretty grim. Chelsea Manning is a person who appears to have some moral fibre ( I disagree with them on the ability to change sex of any human) at huge risk and cost they leaked footage of the US military shooting civilians etc- they were held in solitary prison facilities - and on a matter of principal they have ended up back in prison - for refusing to testify against others. Most people on these boards seem to believe in not being tribal, free speech and questioning authority and recieved wisdom. It’s those things that have led me to thinking someone as vile as Assangev deserves to be in court in Sweden but doesn’t deserve to be extradited to the USA

If the max he could face in prison in America is 5 years why spend 7 years holed up in not great conditions in England? Which he must have realised he'd either have to do for life or come out and face the music at some point?

I'd rather just have gone to America and done the 5 years. He'd be a free man by now!

Another one who deleted my previous account.

Anyway I'm trying to recall how much his original bail was, Jemima Khan was one of the people who stood surety and they all lost their money. So I assume there'll be no more bail options this time.

Andrew O'Hagan wrote a blistering article for the LRB on Assange. I highly recommend it.

I think that whatever your personal opinion of Assange is, being arrested for criticism of the government is a worrying development. Think about if this happened in Russia. If Russian police arrested a prominent whistleblower and critic of the Putin government, would any of you still stand by your claim that the whistleblower deserved to be arrested and stand trial?

That's the thing I can't get my head around. If you ask people in this country if our politicians can be trusted most people will say no. Yet they immediately accept that when a prominent critic of the government is arrested, the charges must have some substance. They seem to have faith in our system that if the person is innocent they will get a fair trial. Do you think that a Russian whistleblower would get a fair trial? What makes our politicians any more trustworthy, when they are regularly caught out lying to us? Is it just that people are blinkered when it comes to sexual related allegations, or do people not want to confront the reality that our government may be no better than the regimes we hear about across the world, where critics of the government get harassed with trumped up charges? You have to admit, it's a bit convenient for the government that a whistleblower causing them major headache just happens to have such serious allegations made against him.