Whatever you think of Assange, you should know why the US government wants to prosecute him. He published this among other things:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8xhH0FkCQg
Context: that’s a US gunship firing on Reuters journalists among other civilians including kids.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=A8xhH0FkCQg
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Isn’t it bonkers that they want to put him in jail for publishing a thing that is today hosted freely on YouTube?
What if I told you that’s not why at all.
It’s definitely “why” they want to put him in jail regardless of what anti-journalism charges they hit him with.
I know, it’s about the conspiracy charge, it was a poorly worded musing.
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Assange is a bit of a scumbag, but unrelatedly, his efforts for freedom of information should not land him in US torture prisons like many others.
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Not a single non US citizen should be extradited to the US. The US has the worst prison system and punishments outside of some really cruel regimes. They also refuse to work with international criminal courts.
Besides I’m pretty sure the guy only committed a crime in Sweden and not the US.
Does he deserve to be in prison for the rest of his life?
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How is he full of shit? Care to pick up leaks from wikileaks and point out which ones are bullshit and which ones aren’t?
And what does that have to do with the fact that he faces over 100 years in prison?
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His moral righteousness is irrelevant to the fact that he is being persecuted for journalism.
It’s not like the core thing he did to even be noticed is relevant.
The fuck does this mean? The core thing he did to be noticed is also the thing that’s getting him persecuted.
I feel like you’re not allowing two statements to be true.
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Assange is being doggedly pursued by the US for leaking state secrets. No I do not think he deserves to be punished for information he released like with Afghanistan. I think we are better for it and clearly this is the US making an example of him. Obviously we all knew he would be pursued, but again, I think that was the morally right thing to do, and I believe in protecting whistleblowers
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I also take umbrage with any attempts to make him out to be a good person or in any way virtuous, which is what the comment I responded to did. He isn’t. He had my support when he was standing for transparency, and he lost it when it became clear he saw leaks as a tool for his political preferences and friends.
We can hold these two ideas at the same time.
As for the sexual assault allegations against him, I have no clue what to think the waters are too muddy there. So I just don’t engage that generally.
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moral righteousness is irrelevant to the fact that he is being persecuted for journalism.
I think the question is, when does the line between journalist and espionage intersect?
Does his state sponsored participation in election interference count as journalism? Did his misinformation campaign during the Catalan independence movement count as journalism? How about the attempt to bribe the Trump administration for the ambassador seat to Australia?
There’s a reason every serious journalist that Assange utilized to launch wikileaks has not only abandoned the project, but has accused Assange of financial fraud, miss handling information, and endangering their sources.
I don’t think Julian Assange is a journalist, I think he just likes being famous, and at one point journalism was a way to do that. I don’t think he should be in jail for the rest of his life, but I also don’t think he deserves Carte Blanche for everything he’s done based on his prior “journalistic integrity”.
someone painting him as a morally righteous
The first thing @seSvxR3ull7LHaEZFIjM said was: “Assange is a bit of a scumbag” …
The closest thing to “righteousness” said was: “his efforts for freedom of information should not land him in US torture prisons like many others.”
Which, being true, it’s absolutely not challenged or contradicted by anything you said in response.
Note that “freedom of information” is totally compatible with “picking and choosing” the manner in which you exercise that freedom. In fact, I’d argue that the freedom of “picking and choosing” what’s published without external pressure is fundamentally what the freedom of press is about.
Assagne (like any other journalist) should have the freedom of “picking and choosing” what facts he wants to expose, as long as they are not fabrications. If they are shown to be intentionally fabricated then that’s when things would be different… but if he’s just informing, a mouthpiece, even if the information is filtered based on an editorial, then that’s just journalism. That’s a freedom that should be protected, instead of attacking him because he’s publishing (or not publishing) this or that.
What does this have do with the fact he’s been jailed for years and is waiting extradition to usa? It literally looks like you are trying to spread dirt on him for no reason other than choosing what story to cover, something most publisher do on daily basis and on a much worst scale.
“Trump totally didn’t offer him a pardon to say Russia had nothing to do with it.”
You may have missed the part where he’s still in jail and the trump government had a plot to have him assasinated
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Assange#Later_years_in_the_embassy
Can you really blame the man for picking sides after all the US has done to him personally over the years?
Yes. Wikileaks is supposed to be a tool of transparency. Not a tool for his political revenge.
How was wikileaks used for revenge? Are you saying that they shouldn’t have publish all these leaks concerning USA such as Vault 7
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vault_7
There’s plenty of stuff about russia on wikileaks too, you can just search for it.
I’m not saying I condone what he did, but I can understand it from his perspective. I’d probably do the same thing if there were a country responsible for ruining my life and health and I had the information to inflict some damage.
I am not saying I condone what he did
I’m not sure what we are debating/discussing. If you’re going to claim you are a bastion of transparency and information for the general public, then no, you can’t weaponize your site and omit politically damaging information about political groups you agree with/are aligned with.
That’s not just revenge against the US. That’s failing to provide the transparency you claim to stand for. He chose to obscure information based on his own whims. How is that not an issue?
Wikileaks had their own leak and it was a very interesting read.
If you care about transparency so much i don’ think you would be here trying to belittle someone who spent the past years in jail for the sake of transparency.
He didn’t spend years in jail, he spent years in self imposed exile because he was afraid of facing a court room.
@BolexForSoup just to be clear are you saying that journalists with a political or ideological slant should not be afforded the same protections as other journalists?
No, I believe it’s pretty clear they’re saying journalists who claim total transparency should have total transparency, not obscure some things because they want to. If you claim to want to protect children and then do a bunch of things to hurt children, you lose your standing as a protector of children. The same here. If you claim total transparency and then hide certain things you lose the claim of total transparency.
If you claim total transparency and then hide certain things you lose the claim of total transparency.
Sure. I agree. I just don’t see the relevance to whether or not you should be extradited to a foreign country that uses inhumane conditions.
Oh yeah, totally agree with that. I don’t know if anyone should be extradited to the US regardless of what they did.
Especially since he isn’t a citizen and shouldn’t be subject to US laws.
Unfortunately the whole “isn’t a citizen” thing might work against him. IIRC courts have ruled the Bill of Rights applies to citizens, including freedom of the press.
The whole situation is absurd though.
Oh yeah, US courts justifying their continuous rights abuses of foreign detainees is absurd and should be legitimized by no international judgements.
One more reason to not extradite Assange. Let him sit trial for everything else he’s allegedly done in countries with humane criminal justice systems, but do not subject him to either Manning’s, or worse, as you say, non-citizen’s torture in places like Guantanamo Bay.
Freedom of information? He was pretty selective about which bits he released back in 2016. That guy can rot in prison for all I care.
jfc we can’t just let the state imprison journalists without pushback because we don’t like the particular journalist
“journalist”
You have got to be kidding me…
This dude is a Russian asset and pawn. Russia is our enemy
Do the math.
I don’t care if you don’t consider him a journalist. He is facing charges for doing journalism
that doesn’t make every Russian suddenly not a human without rights or subject to extrajudicial punishment.
I’d say since the first full year of him living in an embassy ended, we can’t be justified to call him a scumbag.
Other than that - his sense of humor in the NetBSD fortune files and other traces in the Internet maybe sucks, but he’s a better role model than Snowden (whose life is somehow much easier, which is suspicious really).
Why would he be a better role model than Snowden?
Because unlike Snowden you can somewhat trace him before the big story which made him known, and that trace is connected with, as I said, NetBSD and cypherpunk culture, the good stuff.
While Snowden is some messiah which came out of nowhere and is still free and well. It’s just suspicious for me.
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How are you arriving at that idea?
thats what being a dissident gets you in the us.
may there be mercy on his soul if he even gets extradited.
not even in the US
The Australian government voted on a motion to bring him home. He is a journalist who did nothing wrong.
Espionage is something wrong. Hiding behind a Russian website to make your posts that threaten us national security?
That definitely a paddlin’. Widdew ol juwian did nuffink eh?
He is a journalist who did nothing wrong.
You mean besides the rape where he hid in Ecuador until the statute of limitations ran out?
Every political opponent of America is a rapist and their hard drive is filled with child porn when they get arrested
There’s a pattern here…
It must be the pedophilia that makes them expose America
Well, this is not the accusation that the US is interested in at the moment. You could say much worse things about trump, and he is running for presidency. So there is that.
You could say much worse things about trump
Then that implies Trump did nothing wrong? It’s all a government conspiracy to attack Trump?
No. The point is, Assange should not get persecuted for his actions as a journalist. You are saying he should because of rape allegations (why that matters in this case is your argument not mine). Yet, the president candidate of the same country was found guilty of rape and is not persecuted.
Luckily political dissidents don’t need to fear for their life/freedom in the west, ow wait.
Btw what is up with those rape charges, or did Sweden conveniently drop them the moment Assange was pulled from that embassy?
"On 12 August 2015, Swedish prosecutors announced that the statute of limitations had expired for three of the allegations against Assange while he was in the Ecuadorian embassy. The investigation into the rape allegation was also dropped by Swedish authorities on 19 May 2017 because of Assange’s asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy.[5][6] Assange said in these proceedings that he feared he would ultimately be extradited to the United States if he were sent to Sweden.
In May 2019, the Swedish Prosecution Authority reopened the investigation against Assange. The prosecutors expressed the intent to extradite Assange from the United Kingdom after he served his 50-week prison sentence for skipping bail.[7] In June 2019, the Uppsala District Court denied a request to detain Assange, thereby preventing his extradition to Sweden.
As of 19 November 2019 the prosecution dropped the case because “the evidence has weakened considerably due to the long period of time that has elapsed” although they were confident in the complainant.[8]"
It was a rhetorical question, but yes, April 12: dragged out of embassy, November 19: Sweden drops charges. And soon thereafter America suddenly says they would like to extradite him to the US even though they denied this for years while Assange was in the embassy.
Honestly, I skimmed this title and thought it said he was found in a ditch. I’m surprised he has lasted this long.
Too high profile for the ditch… Right now. He gonna get gulag like navlny until the regime is comfortable to dispose of him
I misread the title and thought it said “found in ditch”
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it wasn’t until he conspired with Russia to interfere in the 2016 election that the US decided to SEEK extradition.
Let’s see
NATOWikipedia over here…Idk man, seems pretty planned-out to me…
Right, I’m sure the US had nothing to do with the charges that Sweden was trying to file. I’m sure that Ecuador let him hide in the embassy since 2012 for no good reason
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Your conspiracy falls apart when you look at Chelsea Manning, she was sentenced to 35 years, got the government to pay for her transition, her sentence was commuted after 7 years, and she went on to cuckole Elon Musk.
First of all, whataboutism and ad hominem (specifically about ‘privilege’), second, 7 years is a lot, if you can compare it to Jeffery Epstein’s sentence deal of 1.5 years (18 months)…
Assange raped two women, used his propaganda outlet to push conspiracy theories and hid in the only embassy that would take him. Later he was kicked out of the Ecuadorian embassy for using it to collude with Russia to influence the US election.
Honestly, outside of politics, Assange should’ve prbly been held for trial for that, in Sweden, NOT in America. Also, when did he decide to push conspiracy theories (I never heard him support Qanon)? And well, I kinda think the Russia collusion here is more of a post-hoc justification for the U.S to get him so…
Critique me if you want…
I don’t like this journalist’s source, let’s fucking kill him
To all the clowns here protecting Assange as a “dissident”, I suggest you read up on his conmection to Israel Shamir.
Assange is a huge asshole who doesn’t give a shit about journalism or exposing wrongdoing.
He definitely (cherry) picks on the US of A. Does he have to take on everyone to be a True Scotsman?
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Fuck you
liberal values on full display
He ran out the clock for the rape charge against him in Sweden? What a scumbag.
Afaik the charges were just a tool fabricated to be used against him.
He exposed US war crimes and therefore they made him an enemy of the state and want to make an example out of him, to show others that when going against the US you have no rights - they can torture you, imprison you forever, etc.Afaik the charges were just a tool fabricated to be used against him.
Yes, that’s a very popular conspiracy theory among his online supporters. It’s founded in literally no material evidence of any kind, but that’s never stopped a conspiracy theory from gaining traction.
Hey, quick question: to where is he is extradited?
*I’ve misread comrade, more paying attention to the tool part than fabricated part. Assange should get some hustice for his sa (iikely true) allegations, but prolly embassy imprisonment counts for his prison time for that
I think the more important question is why y’all think the charges are fabricated.
I will admit, I don’t know what to think, but that’s because the waters have become so muddy around those allegations. But I have yet to see anyone provide evidence that this was fabricated other than “it’s something that the government would do.”
It’s important to remember that conspiratorial thinking is not limited by virtue of political ideology. Yes, the right has co-opted it in recent decades, but unfounded political paranoia and the mythologizing of deepstate cointelpro, as fundamental concepts, are on some level ideologically agnostic.
Why he’s being extradited to the United States! Y’know, because of the ESPIONAGE charges brought against him in 2019, which were motivated by his receiving classified data from Chelsea Manning. You can say that the rape charges against him occurring around the same time are suspicious, and I would tacitly agree with you, but there’s no evidence to suggest that they are related. And if the United States wants your ass in a blacksite, it doesn’t need to fabricate sexual assault allegations to disappear you.
I do think his conduct can be classified as assault. I also think britain instituting 24/7 surveillance on ecuador embassy has got nothing to do with those charges, because no country in the world does this over sa charges. They (sweden case and usa one) are related in as much as he can’t answer for charges in sweden, cause even he were charged and imprisoned there, there is still no guarantee he won’t be extradited to usa.
The charges are a tool (maybe fabricated wrong word by the poster above), but they are still a tool to fuck him over.
USA can’t disappear to black site famous people, they need their mask of free press
The charges are a tool (maybe fabricated wrong word by the poster above), but they are still a tool to fuck him over.
This is hardcore goalpost moving. The original wording to which I responded was literally saying the charges were fabricated. Saying “fabricated” is the “wrong word” is like someone saying “fake” is the wrong word to describe the moon landings. It suggests a kernel of truth to something that is completely unfounded, implying that it’s simply overreaching by a matter of degree. So you’re not saying Julian Assange didn’t commit sexual assault. You’re just saying it doesn’t really matter if he did.
And literally no one is disagreeing that there’s some realpolitk at play here, but saying an instance of sexual assault did not occur on the basis that its occurrence is politically inconvenient (and when would a sexual assault charge not be for someone like Assange?) is literal rape apologism.
I thought there was a lot of basis for this. Testimonials from the girls in question, where the escalation to “rape” from “broken condom” was after learning about there being another girl. The definition of what can end up being translated as “rape”, is also not the same as one typically assumes when hearing that word in English. “Tampering with a condom, such that it leads to unprotected sex”, can be considered “rape”. Yet, the act can still be consentual. The other I believe accused him of taking advantage while asleep. Which would be fair to say, not lost in translation. But, she also didn’t mind him staying at her place for more days.
It’s been a while, so the details might be off here. Something along those lines at least. Also, naming the accused, was awfully strange, as it is just not done in Sweden for cases like this.
Probably enough information here:
In 2010, a Swedish woman initially referred to in the press as Miss A said that Assange had tampered with a condom during sex with her on a visit to Stockholm, essentially forcing her to have unprotected sex. She has since spoken publicly under her name, Anna Ardin. Another woman, referred to as Miss W, said that during the same visit, Assange had penetrated her without a condom while she was sleeping.
What part of this does not seem like rape?
Not sure I understand what you are asking. Do you need help with reading? Not really interested in that. Maybe see if there is a class near you. Good luck.
I think you’re the one who doesn’t understand. I’m effectively accusing you of rape apologism. Because that’s what you’re doing. You’re saying an act of rape, assuming it happened, doesn’t really “count” or that the people involved who believe they were raped were “asking for it.”
I’m effectively accusing you of rape apologism. Because that’s what you’re doing. You’re saying an act of rape, assuming it happened, doesn’t really “count” or that the people involved who believe they were raped were “asking for it.”
Aha. I see. Then I wasn’t wrong about suggesting improving reading skills. It might also instead be related to logic and inference. In either case, sounds like a you-problem. Good luck with that!
Why would the spooks leave material evidence. The conspiracy doesn’t have to be very large to work.
I have to say that the suggestion that the absence of any evidence of a conspiracy is itself evidence of a conspiracy is some truly 10/10 pants on head conspiracy-brained logic. Very impressive.
Nah. People think that conspiracies need to be some large crazy hyper complex operation with many moving and confusing parts, but they don’t have to be. It’s far easier to keep things under wraps if your conspiracy is small — only involving a handful of people — and, you have the ability to throw people in jail for the rest of their lives if they leak it i.e. the US security apparatus. I could see a small team of spooks being given the free rein to concoct a honey trap for assange and making it stick, all without any real public physical evidence. It’s not the wildest thing versus all of the Q-anon nonsense.
username checks out
AFAIK the only reason one would rather fight extradition to the U.S. in the UK than fight extradition to the U.S. in Sweden is because one committed a heinous crime in Sweden.
Afaik the charges were just a tool fabricated to be used against him.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the US did something like this, but considering the rampant history of powerful men in media/tech having a penchant of utilizing their power to sexually assault women, and the fact that there have been multiple reports from people working for wikileaks reporting him for sexual harassment… I dont really doubt that he did sexually assault someone.
to face trial over leaking military secrets.
Yea it’s definitely about the rape charges.
We hold people accountable for that stuff here in America, you think we’d just let rapists be in charge of every aspect of our society? Here? Never!!
Yeah, the statute of limitations ran out. Says a lot about our society if publishing publicly funded data has stricter penalties than raping 3 women. Either way the guy is a shit stain rapist and idgaf what happens to him. I’ll save my sympathy for Snowden and Manning who haven’t raped anyone.
I give a fuck about what happens to him because he’s being punished as a journalist, not as a rapist.
If you think this will stop at journalists who happen to be rapists, you are sorely mistaken. At this point we’re basically legalising treatment not that far from Kashoggi for journalists who handle military leaks, even the responsible, non-rapey ones.
if we punish rapists for rape, good luck finding any non rapist journalists!!!
Just fucking unhinged
Yes, that would be an unhinged take. Good thing that it’s also nothing close to what I wrote. Try actually reading what you reply to and not strawmanning.
I literally said that they’re not punishing him for rape. What they do to him now will be what they do to all journalists publishing things the military doesn’t like.
I love the way you twist other peoples’ words. Very masterful.
I honestly have no idea what kind of aneurysm it takes to draw that from what I wrote
He should go to prison if he’s guilty of rape, he should definitely not go to prison for Wikileaks.
He has not been sentenced already, I hope you know that. I hope you also know the effort that he and his team made to have the trial been done where he was de-facto prisoner, but also the completely lack of flexibility from those who wanted him to simply step out of the embassy to arrest and extradite him.
The timeline and the events are very well narrated in Stefania Maurizi’s book. It’s almost gross how much the rape accusations have been used to try to get to him and how poorly both British and Swedish authorities behaved, probably obeying to the US (colonial power much).
sweden is well known for bowing to US requests. just look at the history of the unlawful attacks on the piratebay and the sham court they were passed through to get sentenced on no broken laws.
not to mention Sweden’s constant bullshit in other data related sectors pushing american (hollywood) agendas into EU (and thankfully failing). the pay to take action against the will of the people IN A DEMOCRACY must be the recipe for immortality or some such because i don’t see why they would otherwise be able to legally betray their countrymen.
Let’s be even more specific. Sweden has a history of looking the other way on US extraordinary rendition:
The men were later subjected to torture.
