So, the sainted Julian is holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy for the foreseeable future, and I’m left wondering yet again why it is that some* so-called ‘feminist men’ are so willing to ignore or dismiss women’s concerns, all in their rush to defend a man accused of sex crimes.
* * *
Here’s George Galloway for example
* * *
Michael Moore
* * *
and our so-called ‘comrades’ at Occupy Wall Street
* * *
I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s noticed there’s a trend going on here, a frustrating and entirely dispiriting trend, of men on the left selling women out, and of our concerns being sidelined or pushed to the back of the queue. It’s that “yeah, of course you can have your equality, but wait ’till after the revolution eh love?” phenomenon, that any woman who’s been involved in left politics for any length of time will be all too familiar with.
* * *
It’s like one minute feminism’s an attractive and right-on proposition for some men, but as soon as things start getting a bit iffy, as soon as one of their own comes under scrutiny, suddenly it’s all boys together and women’s opinions don’t count – or “bros before hos” as I’ve seen it referred to elsewhere.
* * *
And that’s exactly what’s been happening with Assange. I don’t think I’ve ever been so disillusioned with one of my own ‘heroes’ as I was when I saw Jon Pilger outside one of Assange’s first court hearings, explaining that even though he didn’t personally know the man, he was prepared to stand surety for him because he believed this was an issue of justice.
* * *
Well maybe Pilger, Galloway et al would like to have a word with some rape survivors and ask them what they think of justice, and maybe while they’re there they could also ask them how it feels to see big important men falling over themselves and each other to defend a man who’s facing accusations of rape and other crimes of sexual violence.
* * *
Anyone who’s been following social media over the past few days, especially since word first got out that Assange would probably be granted asylum by Ecuador, will be aware of the disgraceful misogyny that’s been flying around, much of it, depressingly, from men who purport to be on the left. Sadly none of this is anything new.
* * *
In fact since I first dared to suggest that Assange might not be as pure as the driven snow, that he might not be the perfect hero everyone wants him to be, I’ve certainly had my fair share of misogynist abuse from the Assange fanboys and the conspiraloons, and I know other feminist writers who’ve covered this subject have faced the same.
* * *
And yet for what? Not for saying we think Assange is guilty; not for accusing him of being a rapist; but for simply challenging the prevailing liberal left conspiracy theory narrative.
* * *
That’s the narrative that suggests that Assange’s two accusers are part of some CIA inspired honey-trap and that the great man himself is the only victim here – a victim of some dark and covert plot. It’s also a narrative that says, yet again, that women who accuse men of rape are not to be believed, and that the rights of important men doing important work should trump a woman’s right to justice.
* * *
Declaring a man to be innocent of rape and other crimes of sexual violence, purely on the grounds that he’s been engaged in important work that many of us would like to see continued, while discounting women’s testimonies and women’s concerns in the process, is just the same old same old, men protecting men protecting men. What a shame then that in any other context so many of those men would be declaring themselves our comrades and feminist allies.
* * *
*I use the term ‘some‘ men in this piece because there are as always some notable exceptions.
* * *
For my previous posts on Assange see:
Why it’s wrong to casually dismiss the allegations against Julian Assange
Assange loses appeal against extradition
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The Rape Crisis National Freephone Helpline is open from 12-2.30pm & 7-9.30pm every day of the year: you can call them on 0808 802 9999
Too Much To Say For Myself 
Excellent article Cath, the thing that got to me over the past 48 hours apart from the sheer volume of people supporting him was the notion that rape accusations need to be seen in a political context. So as long as someone (in this case Assange) is doing a good job fighting the good fight we should ignore the rape claims.
Galloway as usual is a fuckwit saying similar to Assange’s lawyer that it’s ok because non consensual sex isn’t always rape.
The Vitriol that some of us have got on twitter the last few days says everything about assuages supporters – some are now claiming Owen is a CIA stooge because of his article that you link to.
I’ve stopped following Michael Moore and a couple of other people on Twitter over this. One of them is a woman who was trying to use her own status as a sexual assault victim to “pull rank” on a woman who referred to Assange supporters as rape apologists. And, elsewhere, I’ve had to come to an understanding with another female friend that we just won’t discuss Assange.
It’s been disheartening, to say the least, to see people who would ordinarily require a high level of evidence on an issue like this be so utterly credulous where Assange is concerned. (FWIW, I don’t think it’s completely down to misogyny. I think there’s a heaping dose of anti-American hatred helping out here.)
Sweden is seeking to extradite Assange to answer charges he raped two women. These are the facts but misogynist celebrity males are demonstrating yet again their belief men have the innate right of sexual access to any female of any age because men are never guilty of committing sexual violence against women. Don’t be fooled by these men claiming ‘Assange isn’t guilty’ – that is a deliberate attempt at male derailment. Men must never be held accountable whenever they are charged with committing violence and especially male sexual violence against women must they?
Typical male supremacist twisting of the facts and no I am not surprised those pseudo pro-feminist men are showing their true women-hating colours, because they are worse than their bros. who at least do not hypocritically claim to support women’s liberation from male domination.
Galloway is uttering what many, many men believe and that is rape is not rape whenever a male claims ‘but she didn’t say no/she didn’t wake up and say no to me – ergo I haven’t raped a female but merely enacted my (pseudo) male right of subjecting any female to male sexual violence.’
Do not trust any male particularly any male who is white and left wing because like his right-wing bros. he always bands together with other males to maintain the Male Supremacist System and to maintain male power over all women.
It’s the old boys’ network all over again and herstory is rife with similar male hypocrites. Nothing ever changes does it?
I’ve been so sickened by lefty-boys’s usual response but tbh, not even vaguely surprised. I expect sexist creepy dinosaurs like Galloway to be rape apologists and to not see women as quite as human as men are; but is it really pathetic of me to be heartened and almost grateful for the existence of men like Owen Jones? I mean, I know we shouldn’t have to be grateful, men who think they are progressive should not need to be told that women are human too, but how depressing is it that the doormatty part of me can’t help feeling the gratitude. (The other part of me feels wrath and disgust that I do, mind.)
Great article Cath, thank you.
While I do not think Assange is “pure as the driven snow,” what happened to innocent until proven guilty? I think based on the accusations – that he has not denied – the guy may very well be a total douchebag.
But, let’s look at the accusations:
• Initiating sex with a current sex partner while she was asleep. And, who woke up and didn’t say the magic word, ‘no’ – or anything to that effect.
• And, whining about using a condom with another who acquiesced to his pleas – even though she felt ‘uncomfortable’ with the situation. She also admitted she never said, ‘no.’ Though, it is important to point out that this is against Sweden law.
Both women continued their relationships with Assange after the fact. And, didn’t cry fowl until questioned.
It is safe to say this is not – at least to me – cut and dry rape. And, possibly not rape at all. If the first one is rape, then I have been raped a
Dozen times over. The second one, well, the woman wanted sex but preferred a condom and yet she went along with his whining. And, by Swedish law, she apparently culpable herself but wasn’t charged.
Before we go bashing our ‘heroes’ we should look at the situation thoroughly and not just read the headlines. That said, Assange is fair game. Rapist or not, the guy definitely lacks respect for women.
We should also take into account that there has never been this much international interest/furor/expense over sexual assault allegations. While part of me is excited that the issue is being taken so seriously, the other can’t help but to wonder why this case has garnered so much attention given the actual accusations.
I’m sorry you’ve been so badly used by men Barbara.
I think that if they can, the Swedes should bring charges and Assange should be tried in Sweden.
Unfortunately he is currently able to argue that the Swedes have not charged him with anything, and while they say they want him extradited into their custody for questioning, they have refused to say that he will not thereafter be extradited to the US (possibly to face terrorism charges and the death penalty). This could happen without him ever being charged or tried in Sweden.
I believe this is one of the main reasons why people are opposing his extradition. But if Sweden guaranteed that he would not be handed over to the US, and preferably they actually brought charges against him, that would remove the main arguments against him going to Sweden.
Lefty boys have never done anything to fight the patriarchy, with a few rare exceptions, so it’s to be expected that they are rallying round a woman-harming brother now.
The most obvious reason for these men to be claiming that what Assange (allegedly) did wasn’t rape, is because they are likely to have committed similar acts themselves and would be very uncomfortable to see them put in the crime category. Also it’s important to men as a group for rape not to be named as rape in most cases – hence the misleading propaganda about the crimes Assange is accused of. Many people don’t know that penetrating a woman whilst she is asleep is rape for example, and the rapists want to keep it that way. Otherwise they might be stopped.
@Barbara — you have it backwards. Those of us who think that Assange should be sent back to Sweden to face questioning are not pronouncing him guilty. We are merely saying that we think he is not above Swedish law. If he submits to questioning, is charged, tried and found not guilty — so be it. The people who are acting as judge and jury are the people who have decided that they know enough now to state categorically that he did not rape those women.
I’m a bit taken aback at the thought that there are women who are okay with being penetrated while they’re asleep. I don’t care if I’d been married to someone for 20 years, to be penetrated while I was asleep would feel dehumanising. In a caring, respectful relationship, consent for every single sexual encounter would be an absolute necessity to both partners.
This article, like Jones’, seems to oppose both (a) the view that Assange is in more danger from the U.S in Sweden than he is in the U.K and (b) the view that Assange is not guilty of rape (ether because that allegations don’t constitute rape allegations or because the accusers must be making them up). Do you think both views are sexist?
Robert – can I check something with you about your post? You say: “This article…seems to oppose…the view that Assange is not guilty of rape.”
I just want to make sure I’ve understood what you’re saying – do you think that the article is saying that Assange is guilty of rape? [Sorry if I’ve misunderstood.]
Our first principle must be that if a woman says she has been raped, we believe her. If it turns out she lied, then that is indeed terrible, but we must never – NEVER – assume a woman is lying about an allegation of rape simply to satisfy our own political bias, or for any other reason.
It saddens me that so many are accusing these women of making up rape allegations. Especially the people who would normally campaign to the contrary.
I’m downright proud of Owen Jones over this, and that took some saying seeing as I don’t think I’ve agreed with him on anything before (except gender politics and general social liberalism). Misogyny and anti-Jewish racism seem to lie at the heart of the pro-Assange brigade.
I want to see Assange sent to Sweden to face trial for rape, and I think ‘no extraditions to the US regardless of the outcome of that trial’ is a reasonable deal to make in order to achieve that.
If, after such a deal is offered, he reneges his often-stated terms of ‘don’t extradite me to the US and I’ll come to Sweden, in the meantime you can interview me in the UK if you want (Swedish investigators can’t AFAIK)’ and comes up with a new reason/excuse to draw things out, then I’ll be giving heavy reconsideration to my position.
I hope – I dearly hope – that at least some of the lefties beating the ‘defend Assange’ drum are simply very bad at stating a similar opinion and are naively assuming that a resolution of the rape allegations is a desired outcome that goes without saying. If that is the case anywhere: get yourself the hell in order, you dumbass.
Sadly, in an awful lot of cases, it quite probably is an extremely ill-considered ‘defend an enemy of the US hawks no matter what’.
One of the lowlights for me over the last couple of days has been the Youtube clip of a speech that Tony Benn (fitting the profile) made in February 2011 at a ‘Stop the War Coalition’ event, in which he said:
“First of all, the charge is that it was a non-consensual relationship. Well that’s very different from rape which most people would understand to be the seizure by force of a woman for the gratification of a man’s need, and all that’s said of Julian Assange is that without using a condom he was guilty of rape. If that is the charge then I tell you a lot of people in this country would be guilty of rape on a daily basis.”
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyBcqPwuQE8]
The audience’s response? Laughter.
I sat in stunned disbelief (naive, perhaps) when I had watched it, partly because of what Tony Benn had said, partly because of the audience’s reaction, and also partly because I don’t remember his comments getting any coverage at the time they were made.
I would love to know if anyone has challenged Tony Benn on this, and – if so – what his response was. I’ve sent a message to him via a couple of different channels, but neither of which I think are particularly reliable – no response so far.
As far as challenging George Galloway went – absolutely no joy whatsoever. He wasn’t budging. Didn’t give the impression that he thought there was even a shred of merit in any views that were counter to his own, not even to the extent of being respectful of the right of other people to have opinions different to his. His tone was generally mocking, dismissive and arrogant.
And meant to add – much like Cath’s comment on Jon Pilger (whom I was also until recently a bit of a fan of) – Tony Benn was one of the very very few politicians of any leaning that I have ever had any time for.
Do you think Jon, George and Michael would be okay if Tony tagged along?
Why are you dismissing the honey trap theory out of hand? This is not some movie inspired fabrication of a tactic – its a well documented fact that honey traps are set by intelligence agencies – yes, a fact! Please do a little research. And if ever there was someone ripe for its use it was Julian. I’m assuming you don’t believe the US govt to be above such tactics. The timing of course is highly suspicious – as is the x (name removed) connection. Does it not smell just a tad fishy that this woman was an intern at the Swedish embassy in Washington? Or that she’s an active member of the Christian brotherhood – a political movement which it is speculated, provides cover for Swedish agents operating abroad?? Further to this – do you not find it suspicious that x was kicked out of Cuba on suspicion she was operating as an intelligence agent for a foreign power?? And what of all the irregularities surrounding the processing of his case – and the peculiar behavior of x post rape – the tweet deletes and so on – does this not all smell like a rather large pile of fish heads baking in the sun??
‘Our first principle must be that if a woman says she has been raped, we believe her.’
So much for the presumption of innocence.
‘If it turns out she lied, then that is indeed terrible,’
Terrible indeed,
The reason I don’t think Assange should go to Sweden is that I believe there is a very strong possibility that he will end up in a US prison if he does. That’s it. It has nothing to do with the merits of the Swedish case, nothing to do with a secret hatred of women or a narrow understanding of rape or anything else.
If you want to argue that there is no real chance of him being extradited from Sweden then OK we can disagree about that. But stop painting me and other supporters as Assange as apologists for rape.
The point is that Assange is in real danger of being ‘rendered’ to the USA, and, if lucky, treated only as badly as Brad Manning has been over the past couple of years. There is no chance that he would get a fair trial. Even less of decent treatment in custody.
You ought to understand these things and reflect before engaging in nasty, vengeful punishment fantasies in which you ally yourselves with the most evil men on earth. What they have been doing to Afghan women, during the past three decades, is worth thinking about.
Assange, in assisting the revelation of crimes against Iraqis and Afghans, amongst others has done enormous good. Or perhaps you prefer his enemies.
Bear in mind that, before granting asylum, the Ecuadorian government sought assurances that Assange would not be handed over to the US. Further they offered, as he has done, to facilitate any enquiry into the vague allegations made against him. The truth is that the Swedish government, like that of the UK, is as uninterested in justice as it is affording women rights and protection, it is in cahoots with imperialism. And so are those who would hand over Assange to it, to be made an example of.
I totally agree with how disheartening it is to see people who should know better setting us all back on the issue of taking rape seriously. They aren’t all people I admire but certainly I have friends and some lefties in the public eye that I do like are making arguments that they would surely see as reactionary in any other circumstances.
Disappointed doesn’t cover it.
What’s surprised me though is how many women are taking the line that Assange should not face the rape accusations and the arguments they are willing to employ to do so. It’s not just grissled old war horses like Pilger and Galloway.
Probably every debate I’ve gotten into over this in the last week has involved at least one woman claiming it’s a plot or it’s not rape to have sex with someone who’s asleep and all the rest of it. I don’t forgive the men who are making these arguments but I’ve felt particularly let down by the seemingly large numbers of women making these arguments.
Anyway, to see so many people making the case for Assange has been sickening. I simply don’t understand why some people can’t understand that someone can do both good things and bad in their life and that no one should be above the law.
Regarding rape as the worst of all crimes. I disagree. I am a man you might say, what do you know? Well look at this article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8515592.stm
“A majority of women believe some rape victims should take responsibility for what happened, a survey suggests. Almost three quarters of the women who believed this said if a victim got into bed with the assailant before an attack they should accept some responsibility.
One-third blamed victims who had dressed provocatively or gone back to the attacker’s house for a drink.”
How do you explain that Cath?
Being from Scotland – and only on the hypocrisy issue , touch of the Tommy Sheridans – no suggestion of any similarities with the women he was involved in- am sure all consensual relationships – but the belief it didn’t matter
Must admit although i’m a feminist i find the whole timing of the accusations against Assange very suspect. As he’s innocent until proven guilty – unlike the USA laws – the bottom line is that we don’t really know whether these charges are totally made up or not so we shouldn’t jump to conclusions. I’d take issue with the premise of this post and certain of the above commenters as how do you know if Assange is guilty yet?
If this is the way that the political right wanted to split the left in order to weaken support for Assange and shut him and people like Bradley Manning up then it’s obviously working. Find it hard to believe that they would have passed up that opportunity and that this dissent there is amongst us is deliberately engineered. The perfect conspiracy? Maybe he’s guilty, maybe he isn’t – but in the meantime we should exercise caution here.
I wish people who supported or defended Assange actually familiarised themselves with some facts.
Firstly, what Assange is accused of is rape under UK and Swedish law.
Trigger Warning: here’s the allegations against him, outlined by his defence:
“AA felt that Assange wanted to insert his penis into her vagina directly, which she did not want since he was not wearing a condom … She did not articulate this. Instead she therefore tried to turn her hips and squeeze her legs together in order to avoid a penetration … AA tried several times to reach for a condom, which Assange had stopped her from doing by holding her arms and bending her legs open and trying to penetrate her with his penis without using a condom. AA says that she felt about to cry since she was held down and could not reach a condom and felt this could end badly.”
“’They fell asleep and she woke up by his penetrating her. She immediately asked if he was wearing anything. He answered: “You.” She said: “You better not have HIV.” He said: “Of course not.” She may have been upset, but she clearly consented to its [the sexual encounter’s] continuation and that is a central consideration.”
Penetrating someone whilst they sleep is rape whatever way you spin it. You can’t consent. in the second accusation, he physically restrains a woman to have sex with her without her consent, ignoring the fact that consent is dependent on the use of a condom. It isn’t ‘whinging’ – it is a violation of a woman’s bodily autonomy.
David Allen Green explains on his blog why what Assange is accused of is rape and sexual assault under English law, not ‘sex by surprise’ or ‘sex without a condom’.
http://jackofkent.com/2012/06/assange-would-the-rape-allegation-also-be-rape-under-english-law/
Secondly, Assange isn’t in deadly danger of being extradited to Sweden. Sweden has a very strict extradition policy where they won’t extradite someone for political offences, and won’t extradite someone if they risk facing the death penalty or their human rights/freedoms are at stake:
http://www.sweden.gov.se/sb/d/2710/a/15435
They are also not stooges for the US, in fact Sweden has taken a very strong stance against rendition. The UK is potentially very complicit in rendition by the way, as the Belhaj case may well prove. The UK also has a not great track record when it comes to extraditing people to the US, out treaty with them is pretty one sided.
http://www.swedishwire.com/politics/7497-cia-rendition-flights-stopped-by-swedish-military
Thirdly, Sweden is under no obligation to assure Assange of anything. He isn’t above the law, different laws don’t apply to him. As far as Sweden is concerned, he is accused of a very serious crime and they have no reason to treat him any differently than anyone else accused of a serious crime. They don’t have to make him promises and, anyway, no one wants to set a precedent where foreign law enforcement agencies can suddenly start questioning people in other countries. That’s not actually great for human rights.
Fourthly, the process in Swedish law is different to the UK, where charging someone for a crime comes further down the line after questioning. Again, Sweden don’t have to make allowances for Assange.
These are all facts.
Thank you Cath for another amazing post – you rock!
Sianushka
Another great post from Cath – amazing how many people out there on article and blog comments are actually failing to mention the alleged rapes at all until really pushed. On one article on the Guardian website, the alleged rapes weren’t mentioned for three pages of comments, and when they were, the commenter simply made a snide remark about ‘split condoms’ – so confident was s/he in being able to dismiss these rape allegations that s/he hadn’t even felt the need to check what the allegations actually were. That, to me, is one of the true signs of a misogynist society.
Another point, @ Erica Blair:
You commented:
“‘Our first principle must be that if a woman says she has been raped, we believe her.’ So much for the presumption of innocence.”
Forgive me if I’m wrong, but the point is that we tend to treat allegations seriously when they’re made and investigate them as though they are true. If someone says they have been mugged, or burgled, or attacked, society’s first response isn’t to say, “Are you quite sure?” and find reasons that they might be lying – it’s to investigate. A shocking number of people seem to be suggesting that Assange ought not even to be questioned.
@James
Re. your comment above…
> “Regarding rape as the worst of all crimes.”
I can’t find any reference in the article to this. Could you point it out to me?
Irrespective of whether that comment is there or not, your response as a whole is a typical example of the way that Assange supporters try to reframe any discussion to detract from and distort the fact that Assange has been accused of rape. It’s standard straw-person tactics.
To be clear, people who have been raped are not in any way responsible for what they have experienced.
What I make of the survey you mentioned…well – if you want to take the outcomes at face-value, without looking at things like methodology, the framing of the questions, and other factors that may have an influence on the collection and subsequent interpretation of statistics – it means that there is some work to do in changing people’s attitudes to rape. But we all knew that already.
Re. your recent blog post:
This is one of the most scary, baffling and ill-conceived pieces of writing I have ever read.
For those that want to read it, it might be triggering:
http://trueenglishliberal.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/more-thoughts-on-rape-why-relationship.html
And here’s the key passage, also with a trigger warning:
“My view is that only for stranger rape should there be a law against it. Relationship rape, there should be no law against it. You might say that that would mean there would be no justice for the victims of rape. That being raped by someone you know is often worse than a stranger. But if everyone knew there was no law against it, then that would change our interpretation of the sexual act previously known as rape. If a man raped his female friend, because the woman would know that what had happened was not illegal, her perception of what had happened to her would be different. She would see it as less of a bad thing. Because society was not saying it was a bad thing, there would be no social pressure for her to perceive the experience as a horrifying experience.”
You call yourself a Liberal – the two pillars of Liberalism are liberty and equality. Your interpretation of liberty seems to be one of liberty for men, sexual slavery for women. And your version of equality is perhaps two-tiered – all men are equal with one another; all women are equal with one another (but at a lower level than me).
So here’s my summary of your ideology: for men, equal freedom to rape; for women, equal freedom to be raped.
That last bit in brackets should have read: (but at a lower level than men).
And James – I meant to say one more thing about your blog post. I guess you could say that rape itself is ‘taboo’ (although, firstly, ‘taboo’ is somewhat of an understatement; and, secondly, some people don’t even seem to think it’s taboo – they appear to be quite all right with it); but rape is not a taboo subject for discussion. Rape gets talked about quite a lot – sometimes it’s called what it is, but other times it’s called something euphemistic, such as ‘sex-by-surprise’, ‘non-consensual sex’ (the same thing, but it sounds better, doesn’t it?), ‘sex-while-sleeping’. But they’re all talking about rape.
Obviously people should be regarded as innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
However, if someone prevents the evidence being heard in a court of law and spends the rest of their life on the run I’m not sure that this is evidence that they are not guilty of rape either – only that they went to extreme measures to prevented the case being heard.
Assange should put his case in court, and if he wishes to claim it was a honey trap and that a sleeping woman can consent to sex then i’m sure the jury will listen to that with an open mind.
James: if you are a ‘true english liberal’ then why are you making anti-semitic statements like this on your blog?
http://trueenglishliberal.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/porn-is-not-good-thing-howard-jacobson.html
The fact that Howard Jacobson, de Botton, Sonttag etc. happen to be Jewish has absolutely nothing to do with whether they are going to be pro-porn or not. There are plenty of Jewish activitists who are against porn and plenty of Jewish feminists too. I’m disappointed to see someone come on to a feminist blog and attempt to promote a website that contains neo-Nazi views, an ideology which is also fundamentally misogynistic. I thought links to those sort of views were banned on Cath’s blog?
Normally they would be, but I think it’s important to see the kinds of people who are supporting Assange’s attempts to evade answering to the charges.
Also, truth be told, I didn’t check the link before the letting the comment through, so my apologies.
Some feminists may believe they don’t need men’s help, but unfortunately they do. If history’s told us anything it’s that women cannot be mobilised as a political constituency in the way the working class or ethnic minorities can. Therefore feminism can achieve nothing without the help of other movements for social justice.
> “If history’s told us anything it’s that women cannot be mobilised as a political constituency.”
Just gonna chuck one out there: Suffragettes.
@Barbara
“Initiating sex with a current sex partner while she was asleep. And, who woke up and didn’t say the magic word, ‘no’ – or anything to that effect.”
she didn’t say “yes”, either, on account of not being conscious. women’s bodies are not in a constant state of consent to sex unless they utter the “magic” word no. women’s bodies are in a constant state of lack-of-consent until they say “yes”, verbally or non-verbally. being asleep is not a “yes”
@Barbara:
“If the first one is rape, then I have been raped a Dozen times over. ”
then you have been raped a dozen times over (unless there was an understanding between you and your partners that you consent to this, prior to this behavior happening). you having been raped and not suffering negatively from it doesn’t invalidate it as a rape, you know.
No charges have even been laid. Saying Assange is guilty is foolish at this stage.
Also if he is guilty merely because a condom broke, then women who lie about being on the pill should also be considered guilty of rape.
Well. leftist men might be selling out their Feminist sisters but if that’s true they have to recognise that the governments of the UK and Sweden are now clearly 100% behind rape victims.
Between them the two governments have spent millions in legal resources, issued international arrest warrants, deployed dozens of police on around the clock stakeouts and even shown their willingness to smash one of the central pillars of international diplomacy possibly endangering billions in trade deals and thousands of jobs in the process. All this in response to two women’s otherwise unsupported allegations. How times have changed!
@Michael Steane
> “No charges have even been laid.”
That’s because he hasn’t been arrested yet.
> “Saying Assange is guilty is foolish at this stage.”
Yes, some people are saying that they think he’s guilty, but not many people, and certainly not this article. The point at this stage is not whether or not he is guilty but that he has – categorically – been accused of rape.
> “Also if he is guilty merely because a condom broke”
Have you read the allegations? [In case you haven’t, it is alleged that – amongst other things – that he had sex with a woman without a condom when she had expressly made her consent conditional on his wearing a condom. Oh…did I mention that it is also alleged that he started having sex with her while she was still asleep?]
> “then women who lie about being on the pill should also be considered guilty of rape.”
Presumably you mean a situation when a man says that he will only have (unprotected?) sex with a woman if she is taking the contraceptive pill, and she says that she is, so they have sex, but she’s not really taking the contraceptive pill after all? Okay…well…not the same thing, but I guess we can have that discussion. Not here, perhaps, as it would be off-topic. How about you write a blog, laying out your arguments, post a link to it and then the discussion about it can take place in the comments there?
@Benny
> “The government of the UK…[is]…now clearly 100% behind rape victims.”
Well that’s given me a good wry chuckle this morning. I wonder what survivors of rape would think about that.
> “How times have changed!”
You sound like you would be resentful of survivors of rape getting more support?
@adam
Either its a conspiracy to extradite Assange to the US or these governments are expending enormous resources to detain a man for questioning in regards to allegations of sexual assault. Sounds like you think you know the answer.
@Benny
They’re not mutually exclusive. And spending time and money on pursuing justice and due process in this instance does not translate into the UK government being 100% behind survivors of rape. It simply means that time and money is being spent on pursuing justice and due process, because Julian Assange is currently trying to evade justice and due process. I think even the government itself would have a little inward smirk at the suggestion that they are 100% behind survivors of rape. [“How the hell did we manage to get even one person to believe that?!?”]
So all that is happening, and there could also be a conspiracy to extradite Assange to the US. Now I’m partial to the odd conspiracy theory here and there, especially if the USA is involved, but I’m not convinced here.
Either:
– there is no conspiracy
– there is a conspiracy of sorts, but it’s a really really bad one
– there is a really really good conspiracy masquerading as a really really bad conspiracy
Whichever of those takes your fancy, there are three things that are fixed:
– Julian Assange has been accused of rape
– Time and money is rightly being spent to arrest him so that he has to face those accusations
– The UK government is not 100% behind survivors of rape
Because I haven’t seen any evidence for it. Do you have any?
I haven’t seen any evidence that there is. The US have not asked for his extradition. I’m not aware of any legal proceedings against him in the US. Do you know of any evidence that this is a plan that the US is putting in place?
Do you have any evidence for this? Has Sweden been practising extra-judicial rendition (the UK certainly has)? If not, what makes the danger more real for him in Sweden than in the UK?
“I wish people who supported or defended Assange actually familiarised themselves with some facts.”
I wish the anti-Assange crowd did the same. This thread is riddled with many fundamental mischaracterizations of the facts.
“Firstly, what Assange is accused of is rape under UK and Swedish law.” and “David Allen Green explains on his blog why what Assange is accused of is rape and sexual assault under English law”
No. Actually, that is far from clear. It apparently has become so under UK law for the purposes of the Julian Assange case, but has never been so in any other case. Neither the UK court who said this, nor David Allen Green, nor anyone else who’s asserted this can point to any rape conviction in UK history that corresponds to the scenario alleged here. Not a single one. Note that the same court who seems to have re-defined rape under UK law also re-defined a prosecuting attorney as a “judicial authority” for the purposes of the Julian Assange case. Given the above, this is hardly a “fact”.
“Assange’s two accusers”, “women who accuse men of rape”, “Sweden is seeking to extradite Assange to answer charges he raped two women. These are the facts,” “It saddens me that so many are accusing these women of making up rape allegations.”
All of the above is wrong. There is only one rape allegation here, first of all, not two. And no woman in Sweden or anywhere else in the world has ever accused Julian Assange or raping her. The only persons that have accused anyone of rape here are the prosecutors in Sweden. They are the ones “making up rape allegations”. And when the supposed “rape victim” heard this was what they were going to do with her statements, she became so distraught she ended the police interview, never signed the police summary of her prior statements, and later said she felt railroaded by the police. This makes sense because she was only there over concerns about STDs and what happened was not a rape.
“Penetrating someone whilst they sleep is rape whatever way you spin it. You can’t consent.”
Variations of this come up repeatedly. This refers to the one allegation of rape made by prosecutors (not the woman who was allegedly raped), and involves the idea that she was “asleep” when Assange initiated intercourse. However, this is never something the woman (SW) is on record saying herself. The text where this comes from is the police summary of her interview statements, the one she walked out on without hearing it read back or endorsing its contents, and which is not in her own words, but instead a summary written by the police interviewer, in the interviewer’s words. The only known version of SW describing this in her own words are in subsequent text messages, where she uses the term “half asleep”, which of course also means half awake, or drowsy. Thus, “the facts” here are not that she was “asleep”. We don’t really know what her state was at the time, and we have even less idea what Assange might have thought her state was at the time. If we take the only known description in her own words, she was not “asleep”.
Moreover, and even though this may be entirely irrelevant to the Assange case, I would question the idea that any initiation of sex while a partner is sleeping is automatically “rape”. Partners in a consensual relationship might in some instances assume the partner won’t mind this and just think this might be a playful way to wake them up. It depends on what the understanding of the relationship is between the two people. I think this is what Galloway was trying to sort of get at in one of his comments, though not in a very well-put way. But let’s put the shoe on the other foot here. Let’s say I’m a man with a girlfriend who i’d been having sex with repeatedly during the night. Then we fall asleep and the next morning I wake up to find her performing oral sex on me. I didn’t consent to that, right? But i didn’t tell her to stop when I woke up, and I happily let her continue. If I later find out that she was cheating on me can i have her arrested for rape? Or is someone going to try to “spin it” so that I can’t?
“Sweden has a very strict extradition policy where they won’t extradite someone for political offences, and won’t extradite someone if they risk facing the death penalty or their human rights/freedoms are at stake”
There is something called “Temporary Surrender” between the US and Sweden that could allow for swift extradition. And talk of “no political offenses” or “human rights” is nice, but subjective. All Sweden would have to do is decide it doesn’t amount to political offenses or human rights violations, just as the UK suddenly decided that the allegation of rape here is rape under UK law without any precedent, and deciding that a prosecuting attorney is now a judicial authority, and deciding that the Ecuadoran Embassy can be just no longer an embassy if they want to storm it and arrest someone inside. The problem with going to Sweden for Assange is that once he does he will be immediately isolated in a prison cell for an undetermined length of time, and he would no longer be in a position do anything such as go to an embassy and request asylum if a US extradition did come up.
“As far as Sweden is concerned, he is accused of a very serious crime and they have no reason to treat him any differently than anyone else accused of a serious crime.”
But they are treating him very differently. The examples here are many, but for one, he did an interview with the Swedish police on the one remaining allegation that hadn’t been dropped at that point. Then when others were re-opened, he offered to submit to further questioning for weeks and was refused. Then he left Sweden for the UK with permission, and the next day he’s on Interpol’s Most Wanted list with a Red Notice. That is completely unheard of for a case of this sort. People like Osama bin Laden might get a Red Notice. Gaddafi only merited an Orange. And let’s try to avoid the hyperbole here. Sweden and the UK both probably have thousands of much more serious crime cases going on right now. The most serious allegation is the rape one, which is currently classed in Sweden as “minor rape”, and carries a maximum sentence of four years. As crimes go, that is not a “very serious” one.
The actual facts in this case are much different, and much more dodgy, than many of the anti-Assange folks here seem to believe. A good summary of the facts of the case, far beyond just the above is here: http://www.nnn.se/nordic/assange/suspicious.pdf
I hope people do read it and familiarize themselves with the facts, because most here seem to have so many of the basic facts wrong. And when you know what the actual facts are, this case being pursued against Assange with such unusual and disproportionate vigor starts looking extremely suspect.
jdoc
First off why the scare quotes around the word ‘rape’?
Secondly, no one is suggesting that any initiation of sex while a partner is sleeping is automatically rape. However, penetrating a woman while she’s asleep without her consent is not “initiating sex while a partner is sleeping”: it’s rape.
You can’t, because that’s not rape.
Under section 1(1) Sexual Offences Act 2003 a defendant, A, is guilty of rape if:
_ A intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of B (the complainant) with his penis;
_ B does not consent to the penetration; and,
_ A does not reasonably believe that B consents.
Maybe before you, Galloway and the rest of the Assange fanboys start spouting off all over the place about what is and isn’t rape you all ought to familiarise yourselves with, oh I dunno, how about what the actual law itself says.
Seriously, it’s amazing how much googling Assange supporters are prepared to do in order to find “evidence” to back up their nonsensical conspiracy theories, and yet it seems it’s just too complicated for them to read up on rape laws and other sexual offences legislation.
Way to evade all the relevant points raised about the Assange case, and the false facts about it being asserted by many of your readers here, in order to stay on your finger-waving high horse Cath. You focus exclusively on the point of issue I raised that apparently has nothing to do with the Assange case: whether penetrating a sleeping partner is in all cases “rape”. Maybe your horse is too tall though, and you are too far from the statute you cite to be able to still read its third clause:
“However, penetrating a woman while she’s asleep without her consent… is rape.”
That would appear to depend on what A “reasonably believes” about what B consents to or not. Thus it requires ascertaining what was in A’s head about what was in B’s head. I don’t think this is as simple as you’d like.
On my example above, you say that is not rape because for you the only possible perpetrator of rape is apparently a man, and my example did not involve penetration with a penis. But that doesn’t seem to be how it’s always defined. For example,
1. The crime of forcing another person to submit to sex acts, especially sexual intercourse.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/rape
Under this definition my scenario would be “rape” – if you accept the proposition that me initially being asleep when the act began is automatically and in all cases therefore non-consensual. But if it is not “rape”, and if we hold your view about sleep and consent, then it would certainly still be a sex crime, even if it was not the crime of rape under the law. So you’d agree that I could still get my girlfriend arrested for a sex crime in my scenario above. Right?
But back to the more relevant points, found by all that awful Googling I did. No woman in Sweden or anywhere else in the world has accused Assange of raping her. And the idea that the woman that Swedish prosecutors have alleged was raped was “asleep” when this began is not a “fact”, contrary to the common belief here. The facts would suggest she was not asleep.
And my post did not contain any “nonsensical conspiracy theories”, but thanks for throwing that in there. Stay on that high horse.
@jdoc
> “I wish the anti-Assange crowd did the same.”
It’s not an anti-Assange crowd. It’s a ‘really getting quite angry with all the rape apologism and rape denial’ crowd.
I think it’s also a crowd that would prefer that people said/typed rape rather than “rape”.
@jdoc
So Cath quotes the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and you quote…erm…www.freedictionary.com?
Crazy assange cultists like jdoc live in their own bubble. Of course rape is a serious crime in Sweden, even if it’s the lesser of the three types of rape. If there is evidence that points to assange’s innocence then those will be raised by his defence attorney at the TRIAL, they should not be used to dismiss the charges outright. Two courts and two prosecutors have deemed the case strong enough to continue but now the cultists want to stop the juducial process because of what excactly? Oh yes, Assange is a saint and can do no wrong
Adam, I type “rape” in some cases where the context is disagreement over what different people mean when they’re using the term.
On this issue, it seems that Cath believes that “rape” occurs whenever a man inserts his penis into a female partner when she’s asleep, regardless of the nature of their relationship or any other consideration. Now, this is going off on a tangent because it seems like this question is irrelevant to the Assange case, as the evidence suggests she was not asleep at the time. But the prosecutors have framed their arrest warrant accusations with her being asleep, and this is seemingly what has been considered when the UK court said this would be rape under UK law (though I think this also assumes the warrant’s premise that Assange “designed” the actions to “to violate the injured party’s sexual integrity”. That is, assumes provision 3 of the statute is satisfied.)
Where I’m stuck on Cath’s definition though is that this kind of “rape” (any penetration while the female is sleeping) must be a fairly common occurrence. Can you or any else find another case in the UK (or the US is fine too), where a scenario along the lines here:
couple has consensual sex multiple times, falls asleep together, male wakes up first and initiates intercourse again, female wakes up due to the insertion, says nothing in protest, and they proceed to have sex to completion…
winds up in a charge of or conviction for rape? Surely this scenario must have happened in the UK or the US countless times. Can you or anyone else produce such a case?
According to what Cath and some others here seem to be saying, this scenario should be unambiguously rape. If this is so unambiguous, where are the precedents?
@jdoc
In your last post, you say: “On this issue, it seems that Cath believes that “rape” occurs whenever a man inserts his penis into a female partner when she’s asleep, regardless of the nature of their relationship or any other consideration.”
In her last post, Cath said: “no one is suggesting that any initiation of sex while a partner is sleeping is automatically rape.”
The second half of your post is based on what you said in the quote above being correct. It’s not.
That said, if there are indeed few or no examples of the scenario you present being reported or leading to a charge for or conviction of rape, there are a number of possible explanations for this over and above “Well, it’s obviously just not happening” or “It must happen a lot, but it can’t be rape because there are no (or only a few) examples of it being reported or leading to a charge or conviction.”
Those possible explanations are:
– rape is under-reported
– even if it is reported, often there will be no charge, or the charge will be for a lesser offence
– even if there is a charge, often a conviction will not be secured
There may be other explanations beyond those.
And there are many other factors underpinning those explanations, such as attitudes and beliefs about rape, and gender bias in the criminal justice system.
I think Helena Kennedy’s ‘Eve was Framed: Women and British Justice’ is a really good read on this subject.
jdoc
Except that A is not expected to have some weird psychic knowledge about what’s in B’s head. A is supposed to make efforts to actually find out, i.e A is legally bound to make some kind of effort to gain consent from B.
Here’s section 1(2) of the Sexual Offences Act:
And here’s the definition of consent:
and then we move on to:
The CPS legal guidance on the act states:
And finally here’s what was said in the High Court Judgement when Assange lost his appeal against extradition:
The court went on to say:
Having this “discussion” on the Labour Representative Committee FB page and good grief…it’s unbelievable. The usual stuff is being peddled, “not rape”.. (er, how do they know?) and honeytrap etc. etc. One bloke argued that it couldn’t be rape as one of the women had had sex with Assange before (echoes of Galloway) and it’s not like stranger rape (creating hierarchy of rape). When some of us argued with this guy he accused us (women) of having “issues” from our past (huh?). Another bloke said “can it be rape if the woman orgasms”? And “It can’t be rape re Assange as the woman just lay there and said nothing”…
I am mortified by these comments. Assange aside, it exposes a lot of leftie men and their medieval views on rape and consent especially when St Julian is champion of rights and freedoms and worshipped by many of the Left therefore can’t do any wrong and the women must be lying. I don’t know what happened but surely the way forward is for Assange to face his accusers and answer these allegations in Sweden.
“it is difficult to see how a person could reasonably have believed in consent if the complaint alleges a state of sleep or half sleep, and secondly it avers that consent would not have been given without a condom. There is nothing in the statement from which it could be inferred that he reasonably expected that she would have consented to sex without a condom.”
Yeah, no reasonable way to expect… except that she did consent to sex without a condom, and did so all the way to completion. Even if she was at first asleep she consented to having sex without a condom when she awoke. Kind of blows that whole theory out of the water.
Oh wait, his penis had been inside her for a second, so it was “too late” to say no.
@Adam:
‘@Michael Steane
> “No charges have even been laid.”
That’s because he hasn’t been arrested yet.’
The Swedes don’t say Assange is “wanted” for rape, because they lack sufficient evidence to allege that he has committed rape. If they had substantial and credible evidence that rape is what Assange did, they would be presenting that evidence in their extradition request.
If all they want to do is question him, what has stopped them, all these months, from traveling to England and asking questions there?
Abuse of process in pursuit of a man against whom evidence is extremely weak does nothing to help women who have been treated badly by the justice system, however many of those there may be, and however bad their treatment may have been.
“Excusing rape” is another issue entirely, and has nothing to do with the questions raised about Sweden’s strange obsession with Julian Assange.
I realize that some will continue to refuse to see that, and all I can do is sigh.
@Fingal
Completely wrong. Have you not even read the verdicts from the English courts? There is nothing weak about the evidence, the reason he hasn’t been charged is that in Sweden, charges are brought late in the process, much later than in the UK. He is not wanted simply for an police interview, but for the final questioning that has to be done before charges are filed. After that, the trial will commence in 2 weeks. He is wanted “on probable causes” which is the highest of the two classifications. Just like 99% of Assange sycophants, you don’t know anything about the case
Assange, and feminism’s so-called male allies
And sadly, some of its female allies.
Here’s Lisa Longstaff in today’s Guardian:
It is not for us to decide whether or not the allegations are true and whether what happened amounts to rape or sexual violence – we don’t have all the facts and what has been said so far has not been tested.
from:
We are Women Against Rape but we do not want Julian Assange extradited.
@Benny: “Between them the two governments have spent millions in legal resources, issued international arrest warrants, deployed dozens of police on around the clock stakeouts and even shown their willingness to smash one of the central pillars of international diplomacy possibly endangering billions in trade deals and thousands of jobs in the process. All this in response to two women’s otherwise unsupported allegations. How times have changed!”
And if anyone believes this is because Sweden has all of a sudden gone all zero-tolerance on *all* ambiguous and borderline cases in which rape is alleged (even if not by the putative victims), rather than only on those cases that permit righteous-sounding accusations to be made against a person who has severely embarrassed the elite of the New World Order, I’d be *very* interested in the evidence. Is Sweden now a very bad place to be accused of rape if you’re just some average Johan in Sollentuna, or only is it only a big problem if you piss off the CIA, or Halliburton, or the Pentagon (assuming those are substantially different entities)?
@St Ulfsten:
So Sweden’s legal procedures require measures contrary to common sense? Am I back in Little Britain?
Mr. Average: “Um, how about if you ask the questions in England, since he’s here and doesn’t seem to want to leave?”
[keys tapping on computer keyboard…]
Ms. (or Mr., if you prefer) Petty Bureaucrat [with insincere sadness]: “…Computer says no.”
There’s a lot of mischaracterization of Assange’s supporters as “worshippers”, or “sycophants”. A lot of us believe he’s done a lot of good, and since there seems to be a lot of rage against the patriarchy, I would point out that it’s the elites of that patriarchy who have been stung.
My attitude towards Assange is not worship, or sycophancy, it’s rational support for his actions. If you want proof that Assange has done what those patriarchal elites consider serious damage, just look at their Ahab-like pursuit of a person accused of a crime that, normally, they (the patriarchy) would almost certainly consider unworthy of notice, much less prosecution.
It is completely misguided to make Julian Assange a scapegoat for all unpunished, or insufficiently punished, rapes. Of which I hope we can agree there are far too many.
A jackals’ fight. At the moment, all it offers half the population of the planet is a choice between two different kinds of rapists.
Yes, well, reserving judgment doesn’t seem to be what the author of this article is proposing. In the context of your analogy, she seems to side very heavily with the larger jackal against the smaller.
The willingness to distort legal procedure beyond recognition in the pursuit of a person accused (not convicted) of conduct which, if it legally qualifies as rape, is *surely* at the less-significant end of the rape spectrum, calls to mind the buzzard who declares to his associate, “Patience, hell! I’m gonna kill something!”
I still await anyone to show me any precedent for a “rape” conviction (heck, even any sexual assault charge), for the following scenario:
couple has consensual sex multiple times, falls asleep together, male wakes up first and initiates intercourse again, female wakes up due to the insertion, says nothing in protest, and they proceed to have sex to completion…
I’m waiting.
I conclude there is no such “rape” anywhere in the history of the civilized world, and Cath – and many of her followers – simply hate and loathe male sexuality (males “penetrate” people, those Violent and Evil monsters!) and is trying to abuse semantics to railroad hundreds of millions of men into prison for something which has never been a crime anywhere in the history of civilized society, ever.
If I’m wrong – SHOW A PRECEDENT!
If you can’t, I conclude that you are a present danger to civilized society, and everyone who cares about freedom or justice should be on guard against your deranged sophistry.
I ask again, SHOW A PRECEDENT for the following:
couple has consensual sex multiple times, falls asleep together, male wakes up first and initiates intercourse again, female wakes up due to the insertion, says nothing in protest, and they proceed to have sex to completion…
SHOW ANY PRECEDENT FOR THIS
I know that you can’t show any precedent, and you will not show any precedent, because there has never been any such so-called “rape” in the known history of the civilized world, ever, anywhere, until Julian Assange. Oh but it’s just due to “under-reporting”. No, it’s due to this premise being a radical, dangerous and despicable revision of all know history of civilization.
If I’m wrong – SHOW A PRECEDENT.
You CAN’T and you WON’T, because there is none. You will instead cite snippets of comments about “consent”, and spin those. Show an actual legal precedent.
You can’t and you won’t. Because the world as it exists hasn’t yet decided to criminalize male-ness, but you’re working to change that.
Only one person other than myself has commented on the very suspicious timing of these allegations!
And what of the fact the key accuser – A – has a rather strange employment history which includes an internship at the Swedish Embassy in Washington – to say nothing of her being kicked out of Cuba on suspicion of spying…
THIS IS MIND BOGGLINGLY SUSPICIOUS !!! And points a big red arrow toward the honey trap theory
Further to this suspicion – S – the co-accuser – who does not share A’s suspicious employment history – felt PRESSURED by A to file the complaint!
It is more than plausible that A is a Swedish intelligence asset. I have a friend in the intelligence community and according to her – A’s employment profile and political affiliations are typical methods of cover for a field operative.
So this HUGE – while worthy – debate about rape inevitably carries on – it may all be completely irrelevant to what appears so bleedingly bloody obvious to me – and that is the US has asked the Swedish Intelligence Service to ensnare Assange. Perhaps they provided profiling of Assange which pointed to the likely success of a honey trap – wild speculation, yes
BUT…
would some folks please speak to the dodginess of the case against Assange – the tweet deletes, her being the one to arrange Assange’s stay – coming back a day early while Assange would still be there contrary to the the original arrangement, A pushing S to file the complaint, the bloody TIMING of all this, the FACT that honey traps are a known tactic of intelligence services around the world – the Israeli and Russian intelligence services both admitting on the record to use them.
AND THE TIMING – OH GOD, THE TIMING !!!!!!
One in England : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9496948/Student-jailed-for-raping-sleeping-woman-in-halls-of-residence.html
And another one from Scotland:
http://local.stv.tv/edinburgh/108032-man-raped-a-woman-who-lay-sleeping-after-she-had-been-drinking/
You’re welcome.
So you agree that if an anti-establishment person commits a crime, they should be above punishment purely by virtue of being anti-establishment?
Because when feminists like Cath and I say stuff like that, we get accused of misandry and all sorts; but we’ve been saying all along that this is about left wing people, especially men, simply wanting to get their hero off the hook and have him be above the law.
I don’t really see how to read your statement otherwise, unless you believe that the perpetrator’s political or other affiliation makes a substantive difference in the degree of damage done to the victim of a crime?
Do you have a specific example where the legal process was distorted beyond recognition? I’d like to see a citation of the law in the relevant judiciary (Swedish, EU or British) and an explanation of how it has been distorted in the specific case. I’ve read extensively on this topic, including the majority of the legal documents pertinent to the case (the warrant, the charges, the UK court rulings etc) and I haven’t seen anything suspicious, but I accept that I might have missed something.
Given that the pursuit of him is for the purposes of putting him on trial, having an expectation of him being already convicted is odd; most people who are tried for crimes have not already been convicted of them, except in the case of appeals I suppose.
Two British courts have ruled that it does; do you have a substantive legal dispute with their judgements, based on the letter of either English or Swedish law, on on case law?
Do you have a link or reference to a legal definition of the rape spectrum? I am not aware that such a thing exists. There is a legal discrimination between rape and sexual assault, but insertion of a penis into a vagina without consent is explicitly rape according to British law. In fact it’s the definition of rape. I haven’t read the entire Act, but in the relevant passages I saw no mention of a spectrum. Could you point me to a source on this?
I also think it would be more consistent of you to choose one stance: that the pursuit of Assange is illegal, or that it is legal but we should fight against it because of his politics. Otherwise it’s contradictory – should we break the law for him, or support the law for him? Incoherent.
That should be “or in case law”. Apologies.
jdoc,
Could I suggest that if you wish to challenge the Supreme Court’s judgement there are ways of going about that, but one of them isn’t to come pleading for understanding on threads like this.
Had Assange been sent back to Sweden before having the opportunity to exhaust the legal procedures in England, he might have felt an injustice had been done.
However the finest legal brains in England have defended him in its highest court and he lost his case.
Now it doesn’t matter what you think went on in bed between Assange and the two women who have complained, as the Supreme Court, whose judges are I suggest in a far better position to decide, have refused his appeal against extradition and it is now the women’s turn to seek their day in a Swedish court.
@MarinaS:
“‘ In the context of your analogy, she seems to side very heavily with the larger jackal against the smaller.’
So you agree that if an anti-establishment person commits a crime, they should be above punishment purely by virtue of being anti-establishment? ”
====
That’s a pretty long interpretive reach you’ve got there. No, that’s not my belief, nor did I say anything remotely resembling that. I’m sure it’s harder to take issue with what I actually said than it is to argue against a blatant mischaracterization, but it’d be even easier just allow my statement to stand.
As for the “rape spectrum”, it’s not a matter of law, it’s a matter of common sense. A lot of rapes occur, that’s an unfortunate fact. Not all of them are equally heinous, in terms of physical injury, or of how blatant and obvious the lack of consent is. Law enforcement has limited resources, so not all reported rapes can be investigated with equal vigor. (The limits on law enforcement resources is just as true in cases of murder, so this isn’t a question of “excusing” anything.) Priorities must be set, and some cases just will not, as a matter of reality, get investigated.
It may be that existing law enforcement and judicial systems do not make rape a sufficiently high priority, or allocate enough resources for pursuing and prosecuting rapists. If that’s true, then it’s quite strange that *this* is the one they go all-out on. Or maybe it is your belief that Sweden is such a safe place, in terms of the crime of rape — that there are so few rapes committed there, whether between strangers, between people out on a date, between family members, or between any two people, at any level of acquaintance or violence, — maybe you believe that the allegations against Assange describe an extreme case in the Swedish context. I believe otherwise, but I’m certainly willing to look at evidence in support of that notion, if you have any.
As to whether it’s legal or illegal, that remains to be seen. But clearly, the chain of events is hard to explain as a simple, straightforward police process, for reasons that have been detailed already. The lack of interest in interviewing JA further before he departed from Sweden. Dropping the case, and then re-opening it at the request of a more highly-placed (and more politically significant/active) official. The Swedish refusal to travel to England to ask questions, indicating that what they wanted was not actually to hear Assange’s answers to the questions, but to get him into Swedish custody. The obvious and very un-secret vindictiveness of many American officials and politicians against Wikileaks. The sealed indictment. In the not-unrelated case of Bradley Manning, the disregard of the rules governing imprisonment before trial (*that*, I believe actually *is* illegal). The refusal of the US, UK, and Swedish governments to guarantee no extradition to the US in return for Assange’s traveling to Sweden. All of this raises doubts as to the integrity of the judicial process.
Whether a set of actions is legal or illegal is a matter of definition, and the legal system in question reserves to itself the right to do the defining. The issue here is that the system itself has been corrupted by powerful political interests.
If there were not a credible expectation that Assange would be on his way to Gitmo or Leavenworth if he were extradited to Sweden, then sure, he should go. But if he were not Julian Assange, the Swedes would not be pursuing this case, they would have let it remain dropped. Again, if you can cite facts that show this level of pursuit in similar cases, I’d be interested.
Well, I quoted what you said right there, so if that’s not what you said, what did you say? What does it matter that there are powerful forces who dislike Julian Assange? What difference does that make to whether or not he should stand trial for the allegations brought against him? Does the existence of greater evil absolve him of responsibility? If not, why did you bring it up?
As for you other point, David Allen Green rebutted pretty much all of them in the New Statesman this week. I suggest you read his piece, it’s very good, and unlike you or I, he’s actually a lawyer.
@Fingal
Again, your ignorance is showing. There is nothing strange about the police process.
“The lack of interest in interviewing JA further before he departed from Sweden.”
There was no lack of interest. The prosecutor tried to get hold of him but he didn’t answer. Haven’t you read the verdicts yet? The judge called Assanges Swedish lawyer “an unreliable witness” because he lied about the attempts by the prosector to get in touch with Assange
“Dropping the case, and then re-opening it at the request of a more highly-placed (and more politically significant/active) official”
Again you are wrong and apparently don’t even bother to google the most basic of facts.The original prosecutor dropped the case. This was then APPEALED by the lawyer for the two women. (there’s nothing strange about appealing juducial decisions) A more senior prosecutor re-examined the case and it was opened again. Of course the new prosecutor is a more senior than the first one, nothing strange about that. Thousands of appeals of prosecutor decisions are files each year in Sweden. Only a minority are granted but that still leaves several hundered re-opened cases each year, again, nothing strnge about the Assange case. But that doesn’t stop ignoramuses like you from talking about stuff you have no idea about
“The Swedish refusal to travel to England to ask questions, indicating that what they wanted was not actually to hear Assange’s answers to the questions, but to get him into Swedish custody.”
Why should the Swedish authorities follow the whims of Assange – that’s absurd! He is the suspected criminal, he’s in no position to demand anything from Sweden
“The refusal of the US, UK, and Swedish governments to guarantee no extradition to the US in return for Assange’s traveling to Sweden”
Let me quote from an article in the New Statesman:
“It would not be legally possible for Swedish government to give any guarantee about a future extradition, and nor would it have any binding effect on the Swedish legal system in the event of a future extradition request.
By asking for this ‘guarantee’, Assange is asking the impossible, as he probably knows. Under international law, all extradition requests have to be dealt with on their merits and in accordance with the applicable law; and any final word on an extradition would (quite properly) be with an independent Swedish court, and not the government giving the purported ‘guarantee’. ”
The tin foil hat conspiracies about CIA honeytraps and connections to the Manning case are ridiculous. This matter concerns RAPE and not wikileaks activities.
how do you do those blue quote things?
[blockquote] and [/blockquote], except with brackets instead of [] brackets. Your quoted text should go where the word “and” is in my example. (hope this works)
Didn’t work – it should have said “except with greater than/smaller than signs, i.e. the triangular brackets.
@MarinaS:
Nobody is defending rape. Nobody is saying JA should be above the law. Nobody is claiming specific, detailed knowledge of an elaborate conspiracy. (Well, maybe some are, there are a few nuts in every crowd.)
Some of us just don’t think that the crime of rape trumps *every other* consideration, especially when no violence is involved and the complainants seem to have had, at worst, mixed feelings about the events in question, at least at the time and in the immediate aftermath. Some of us find the conduct of the authorities to be fishy. Some of us find it entirely credible, based on the track record, that the US would seek to extradite Assange from Sweden, and don’t think that Sweden would necessarily be particularly resistant, based on the strange conduct of their prosecutors so far. I’d pursue it further, but everything you claimed in your newest response to me has been rebutted numerous times. Green’s article was also rebutted in detail by another writer at NS and also by Glenn Greenwald, so it’s not a matter of lawyers vs. non-lawyers. Maybe it’s you who needs to read up a bit.
Apparently the word “rape” launches some very primitive circuitry in some people’s brains, and shuts off everything else, not excepting the ability to reason. If you prefer the comfort of your own private set of facts unrelated to what the reality-based community experiences, I leave you to it.
I may have misattributed what St. Ulfsten said to MarinaS. Apologies.
MarinaS did say this though: “Well, I quoted what you said right there, so if that’s not what you said, what did you say?”
If you find “she sides with the larger jackal against the smaller” to be indistinguishable from “I believe anti-establishment people should be above the law,” then no meaningful conversation is possible.
Ta.
@Fingal
LOL, nothing has been rebutted but your crazy conspiracy theories! Name one thing in mý post that was wrong! And givr a detailed explanation please.
It is clear your know nothing about the Swedish judicial system. you didn’t know the differance between someone being charged , you didn’t know about the prosecutor’s decision being appealed, you know nothing yet you plretend like you’re the expert.
That is such a shitty argument Cath – you should be ashamed of yourself. You know full well (or should know) that under section 4 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 they would be guilty of the crime of causing sexual activity without consent, which is for all intents and purposes the same as ‘rape’ – except it can be committed by a woman – and like ‘rape’ can also carry a life sentence.
It’s just crass to argue that you can only call something rape if that is how English law defines the term, based on that forcing your wife to have sex with you before 1991 wouldn’t be rape either. The fact is the act is equally criminal and it’s equal reasonable to call it rape in everyday language, whatever the legal semantics are.
@St Ulfsten — just saying LOL doesn’t make you right. Doesn’t mean I’m wrong, doesn’t mean Greenwald and the NS writer (name forgotten but retrievable if it goes to court) didn’t rebut all of the legal mumbo-jumbo in support of the anti-Assange hysteria.
But you’re free to continue to believe it does. And free to palaver as if none of those rebuttals had been published. Free, even, to present the appearance of a NWO psy-op intended to divide the opposition. Knock yourself out.
@Fingal
Explain to me then what is fishy about the investigation. Normal Swedish procedures have been followed, but because you don’t know shit about how the Swedish system works, you compare them to the UK and think it is “fishy” when Swedish police or prosecutors don’t work exactly like the UK ones.
Why must the whole Swedish judicial system bend over backwards ro accomodate Assange? He is in no position to demand anthing. The UK judges also considered the point if it is unproportional to demand that Assange go to Sweden and found that in a serious case like this, it is NOT.
The Assange cultists have from day 1 demanded that no rules or laws should apply to Assange, he is free to do whatever he wishes and how DARE those evil Swedes even investigate him. You and people like you are a danger to a civilized society. No one is above the law.
We have also seen ALL the usual misogynistic crap like,
the women are lying sluts
the women didn’t kill Assange on the spot, then it can’t be rape
they partied afterwards, then it can’t be rape
they had agreed to sex with him earlier and under different conditions, then it can’t be rape
from his sycophant followers, many of whom claim to be leftist and progressive
You and misogynists like you are DESPERATE to explain away and minimise the womens’ suffering and unwilling to even consider the possibility that they are telling the truth. A criminal case should be decided BY A COURT OF LAW, and not random morons on the internet. That is the differance between you and me. I’m not discounting the possibility that he is innocent of rape, but I want it to be investigated and tried in court. You just want him to be freed without any legal proceduces, why?
@StUlfsten:
OK, there’s plenty of blatant foolishness in your most recent comment, but I think that for the half-dozen people left in the audience at this point, I’ll just take this one bit:
“The Assange cultists have from day 1 demanded that no rules or laws should apply to Assange…”
See, I think you’ve kind of overplayed it there, and destroyed your credibility for whoever is still watching this show. I mean, I know the point is to overstate, because many people will believe that at least *part* of what you say is at least *partly* true. And in most cases, and with most people, that’s not a bad starting assumption.
But that statement I quoted reveals either that you live in a private realm of paranoid fantasy or that your disregard for the truth is deep and fundamental.
The rest of your comment is equally unhinged, but I suppose that’s part of the craft of chaos-agent propaganda. I admit you had me going for a while.
Doesn’t matter. Nobody’s reading these comments anymore.
Fingal
You have destroyed you credibility by claiming that normal Swedish police procedures are part of a vast conspiracy to get Assange. You have destroyed your credibility by claiming that Assange is entitled to special treatment. A Police investigation is not a negotiation between the suspect and the police. If suspects had the right to veto police actions then 99.9% or more of all criminals would go free. Two Swedish courts and three UK ones have decided that it is proper and proportionate to have Assange go to Sweden and be tried for the alleged crimes.
Since I and you are reading these comments why don’t you explain to me then why you think it is right for Assange to deny justice for the two women by evading his trial.
And it IS true that many of Assanges followers have FROM THE START maintained that the allegations are all 100% bullshit, Assanges lawyer said that consensual sex w/o condom was a crime in Sweden(a lie of course), Assange himself said that Sweden was “the Saudi Arabia of feminism”(laughable). And while it is of course not unusual or wrong for a suspected criminal to deny guilt, what IS wrong is the insistence that there is no need for a trial or investigation, that this matter should just be solved by a vote among internet nutjobs.
Neither you, Michael Moore, Glen Greenwald or nor anyone else have presented even a shred of evidence to prove the ridiculous conspiracy theory that the two women were paid by the CIA to accuse Assange of rape.
This must be the final word on the matter…
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/09/the-assange-case/
Pips: must it? Must it really? My, aren’t we authoritative today.
You do know Julian Assange is not a whistle-blower, right? Or is that too much “paid media” bias for you? Or does it even matter? “Jean Charles de Menesez was shot in London, therefore two Swedish women are lying” is an argument now?
Whether you believe Julian Aasange to be a whistleblower or not is actually irrelevant to the point Craig Murray was making. What you and I would agree on is that Assange has greatly angered the US administration just as the whistleblowers Craig refers to have.
I’m not yet aware of your opinions in any detail but I suspect most people on this thread would have and largely still do share Julian’s attitude and opinions regarding US hegemony. But this solidarity has now been shattered into a million angry shards and these once friendly voices are now wholly preoccupied with addressing these accusations of rape.
Craig Murray was simply outlining what appears to be a highly suspicious pattern of events – a pattern which occurs over and over – expose/embarrass the US administration in a significant way and you will be dealt with. If you are male then you will likely be smeared with accusations of a sexual nature.
It seems that any suggestion this is what has happened to Assange is laughed at. Well, here’s the problem with that dismissive attitude. Slander – often of a sexual nature – IS an acknowledged tactic of intelligence agencies – and is used to discredit or blackmail individuals. This is a fact people – not speculative – an openly admitted-to strategy by retired intelligence agents the world over.
And given this to be the case then nobody would deny Assange to be a prime candidate for such a strategy – especially given he proved immune to all other methods employed to silence him.
All of this is to say nothing of the mind bogglingly suspicious employment history of one of Assange’s accusers – her CV reads like something out of a bloody spy novel – it SCREAMS Swedish intelligence asset.
And when did people get so bloody sure that espionage, covert operations and the like are just the stuff of Hollywood movies??
– the US deploying special forces during the Vietnam war to murder SOUTH Vietnamese community leaders in their beds – to help generate anti North Vietnamese sentiment – and therefore support in the South for the US war effort – documented fact
– the US government dispensing airborne pathogens from maintenance sheds in a handful of schools – in poor largely African American communities of course – during the fifties – to asses the pathogen’s spread rate and lethality – documented fact
But the idea that the US is behind a sex smear of public enemy number one…
Ridiculous!!
Honey. What do you mean, “believe”? It’s not a question of belief. It’s a question of maintaining a minimal connection with reality.
Did Julian Assange work for a government organisation? No.
Did Julian Assange pass secret documents to an outside agent? No.
Did Julian Assange make any potentially incriminating discoveries about a government agency? No.
See? Not a whistle-blower. Espionage might be real, but he didn’t engage in any.
Facts, reality, actual things that actually happened in the actual world where other people also live, as opposed to in your head: these are not fascist myths. They are not control mechanisms of the man, any more than they are an artefact of the “liberal bias” right wingers like to complain about.
You’re sounding like Glenn Beck, do you realise that? Aren’t you even a little tiny bit embarrassed?
Okay so i’ve obviously hit a bit of a nerve here – given your response is rather light on argument and all about delivering ‘witty’ insults.
You haven’t provided any counter arguments for my points so i can only assume you have none – thus the personal attacks.
I’m getting a picture of who you are however – you’re one of these clowns – not unlike the many masquerading as journalists and employed by the big papers – those who say Assange’s fear of US extradition is nothing but paranoia stemming from his delusions of influence – and that Sweden has dealt with this case of sexual accusation as it has any other – and that Sweden’s history of political subservience to the US either doesn’t exist or has no relevance in this clear cut case of double rape.
Speaking of those not living in the REAL WORLD!!
Are you actually suggesting the US is not baying for Assange’s blood?? That Sweden’s handling of this case is not outrageously irregular ???
In reading through your wafer thin retort one more time – a final irony has revealed itself. It was the tone to some degree – the party popper points delivered as if they were had grenades.
But I won’t ask if you’re embarrassed by your own indignant self righteous chest thumping and finger pointing – a true Glen Bec protege would be blissfully unaware of the fact 🙂
And OMG what an appallingly weak point you make!!
Assange is – technically speaking – not a whistleblower – okay, fine but there’s this website you see – called wikileaks – and I’m not sure but I think he had something to do with it – writing impenetrable firewall code that an army of US employed techies can’t seem to hack – anyway this site – which its rumored he built from the ground up – from a single thought in his head to a global game changer – it’s done a bit of whistle blowing wouldn’t you say?
And the US – again this is just stuff I’ve heard – don’t much like this wikileaks thing. Now the proof that their blood is in fact boiling regarding its existence is a little thin. All there is to support the rumor is them somehow shutting down PayPal MasterCard payments made to the site – no biggy
HE BLEW THE WHISTLE ON THE WORLD’S GREATEST SUPERPOWER !!
…exposed war crimes committed on a mass scale – re the Iraq files how many unreported civilian deaths was it again? Oh and did you catch that little clip where the defenders of the free world massacre a hand full of civilians with 50 cal canons from the air conditioned comfort of their attack helicopter??
This reality which you apparently live in and I don’t – does it consist of you and your cat?
I’m not trying to be witty (comes naturally) or insult you, so stop congratulating yourself about hitting a nerve. You don’t get a troll cookie just yet.
What I am trying to do is get to you to engage with the difference between fact and conjecture, proof and suspicion. I think I may have come too late into your life to have much success there, however.
And I’m allergic to cats.
I would like to discuss this further – minus the Glen Bec comparisons or arse clown labels
I do get your point about conjecture vs fact – a valid one – but the US administration – they’re just such a bloody great elephant in the room on all this – are we just supposed to ignore and not investigate the marvelous convenience these accusations against Assange represent for them??
And to be fair you didn’t aknowledge Craig Murray’s rather salient point – backed up with several examples – that individuals who do embarrass the US admin. are often smeared with allegations of a sexual nature
That would be Craig Murray who named two alleged rape victims on national TV. Hmmmm, I’m afraid he lost any remaining credibility* he may have had with that stunt.
*He didn’t actually have any left, not after his ‘nasty bitter man hating femnazis’ post.
Found this on another thread…
Both women were outed in 2010 in the NYT and Huffington Post. Counterpunch had both names by Aug 14th, 2010.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/09/14/assange-beseiged/
By 2011, major print media worldwide (including Paris Match) are publishing their names.
Just to confirm –
-You believe there is nothing irregular or extraordinary in the way this case has been handled both by the Swedes or by the international authorities re for example the issuing of the red notice – that is to say – if it had been someone less infamous it all would have gone ahead as it has
-You find nothing suspicious about the timing of the charges – or that the primary instigator of contact with the police was once an intern at the Swedish foreign office in Washington – slight whiff of fish heads right about here for most
-You believe the US govt does not wish to extradite him from Sweden to put him before a grand jury – and even question this jury’s existence
Btw what does the cat say about all this??
Assange has not been charged with anything, he has been accused of rape, and was willing to co-operate with Swedish police, who allowed him to leave the country after initially questioning him about the allegations. Then some time later they sought to extradite him from the UK, and he was willing to again co-operate if he got assurances from Sweden that he would not be further extradited to America where he might face the death sentence, they did not make these assurances.
“Declassified US Air Force counter-intelligence documents, released under US freedom-of-information laws, reveal that military personnel who contact WikiLeaks or WikiLeaks supporters may be at risk of being charged with “communicating with the enemy”, a military crime that carries a maximum sentence of death.”
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/us-calls-assange-enemy-of-state-20120927-26m7s.html#ixzz28QjHbLOD
And he’s sought political asylum, which I assume most people agree is a legitimate process. Seeking asylum is not “above the law” as some people seem to claim, it’s perfectly legitimate and very important international law.
That doesn’t mean he didn’t commit statutory rape in Sweden, but we’ll probably never know now because of all this other stuff that is going on.
It’s wrong to assume that:
1. He is guilty of rape.
2. He doesn’t have a genuine fear for his life.
3. The US government will never seek to extradite him.
People claiming to know that the USA won’t seek to extradite him from Sweden, obviously have absolutely no way of knowing this. If he did go to Sweden and was charged with rape, he would not have an opportunity to seek political asylum should the USA seek to extradite him.
It’s all pretty complicated, and I’m definitely no fan of Assange or WikiLeaks but seeking asylum is perfectly legitimate.
Perhaps if the USA didn’t have the death penalty, people would be less concerned with the possibility of him being extradited.
Yeah, the issue is more complex than that. Obviously leftist men and women of all kinds sometimes need to be more attentive to everything from race and gender, but if one honestly believes that Assange is innocent, then there IS no selling out of women inherent in protecting him. While I agree that people were perhaps a little quick to defend him given the seriousness of the charges, the fact is that he’s innocent before proven guilty and that there was a lot of suspicious timing. It reminds me of the issues in the Middle East; It’s not selling women out to note that the concern that conservatives suddenly showed about women’s needs in Afghanistan and Iraq were totally disingenuous and insincere.
For all those expending great amounts of energy debating what might or might not constitute rape in which jurisdiction…
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/a-bayesian-take-on-julian-assange/