Assange’s supporters have a narrow view of justice
The real problem with Julian Assange’s supposed open-minded left-leaning followers is they proclaim to support finding the truth at all costs, until it’s a woman claiming rape against their leader, writes Lucy Carne.
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“I am wearing you.”
This was what Julian Assange allegedly said to a Swedish woman who woke to find the Australian having unprotected intercourse with her, to which she had not consented, and in shock asked him if he was wearing a condom.
It was a 2010 summer weekend in Stockholm at the height of the white-haired Queenslander’s rock star status as the global purveyor of truth and human rights.
The other Swedish woman who accused Assange of sexual misconduct that weekend claims he pinned down her arms, lay on top of her and pushed her knees apart, ignoring her pleas for him to wear a condom.
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When he finally relented to wear one, she claims he tore it or the condom ripped before he ejaculated inside her, according to a police report cited by some media.
Assange has always vigorously denied the allegations.
The women allege they asked Assange to take an STD test. He allegedly refused. The women went to the police.
I lost count of the number of times I heard these allegations during Assange’s numerous court appearances in London in 2010 and 2011 as he faced a European Arrest Warrant for alleged unlawful coercion, sexual molestation and rape.
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The case incited heated debate over the definition of rape — at what point does voluntary sex become assault? Is it date rape? Or as Whoopi Goldberg so eloquently put it defending Roman Polanski, “rape-rape”?
To me, it was clear these women had felt they had been put in a position they did not want to be in.
Assange’s lawyer Ben Emmerson QC even made a limited effort in justifying his client’s actions, telling Britain’s High Court: “Nothing I say should be taken as denigrating the complainant, the genuineness of their feelings of regret, to trivialise their experience or to challenge whether they felt Assange’s conduct was disrespectful, discourteous, disturbing or even pushing at the boundaries of what they felt comfortable with.”
RELATED: What now for the WikiLeaks founder?
When the Supreme Court, upheld Assange’s extradition to Sweden to face accusations of sexual offences in May, 2012, he jumped bail and hid in the Ecuadorean Embassy with his cat for seven years.
He was dragged out of the Embassy this week with his bedraggled beard, flashing the peace sign and his signature smirk.
He faces a one-year maximum prison sentence for jumping bail in Britain. There is also an extradition request from the US, which has charged Assange with aiding former US Army intelligence specialist Chelsea Manning to disclose government secrets.
It is not the US he should fear, but Sweden and his female accusers.
RELATED: Julian Assange’s downfall was caused by biting the hand that fed him
While the sexual misconduct charges were dropped in 2017, in the hours after Assange’s arrest in London, Swedish prosecutors have indicated the rape investigation may be reopened.
“We have been waiting seven years for this moment,” one of the women’s lawyers told the Swedish wire service.
But this development has been drowned out by the chorus of ardent followers who believe Assange is a saint. A modern day martyr under attack from the pantomime baddie that is the United States of America.
The problem with his followers is they proclaim to support the truth of the underdog until it’s a woman claiming rape against their leader.
These supposed open-minded, left-leaning intellectuals would, in any other circumstance, believe a woman was entitled to a fair hearing of her claim of rape.
But if it is against Assange, then suddenly these young Swedish women are CIA operatives and are being paid by the US government to ensnare the hero in a honeytrap.
When Assange jumped bail, his many celebrity backers, including Michael Moore, Jemima Khan, Noam Chomsky and Tariq Ali, wrote to the then-President of Ecuador urging him to provide Assange “political asylum”.
Assange’s crime, they declared, “is that of practising journalism” and that he was facing “an attack on press freedom”.
Wrong.
The crimes he was accused of are rape and sexual molestation — not journalism.
This is not about freedom of speech or the right to know. It is about accusations of rape.
I do not know if Assange is guilty or not. Neither do his followers.
But it is imperative that he face justice.
Lucy Carne is the editor of RendezView.
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