I mean, this is ridiculous. Of course the US government, and several other governments, stands to profit from his being convicted. OF COURSE THEY DO.
But you know who doesn’t stand to profit? Like, at all? The women pressing the charges. Because (a) rape victims almost never profit from taking their cases through the legal system, which is why so few do, and (b) they’re already facing substantive personal smearing and stereotyping and in some cases having Keith fucking Olbermann insist they have “ties” to the “CIA” (oh for FUCK’s sake), and (c) they’re not pressing some airtight case here. Because, as we all know, the only AIRTIGHT rape case is one where Julian Assange jumps out of the bushes with a chainsaw and an assault rifle and you try to fight him back with your bare hands but ultimately he cuts off both your arms with the chainsaw thus “proving” that you “resisted” him, and oh also, he’s not Julian Assange, he’s a homeless man of color named Stabs McMurderson, and you’re not an average woman, you’re a fourteen-year-old blonde white virgin who’s walking home from the Jesus School of Sewing and Homemakery. I would add that the whole thing would have to be captured on tape, but there have been ACTUAL RAPES that were ACTUALLY CAUGHT ON TAPE and they didn’t get through, because the defense alleged that the girl was “faking” unconsciousness because she wanted to “make porn.”
So, no, this isn’t airtight. This is a bunch of stuff that should be classified as rape — and, in Sweden, is — such as “forcing sex on an unconscious woman” and “continuing to have sex with someone after they say no,” but which is almost never treated as an actual crime. And you know who I bet knows that? Given that she’s already been identified as a “feminist,” and as an activist who works against sexual harrassment, I would bet ONE OF THE WOMEN PRESSING THE CHARGES knows that. Because it’s the most basic thing you know, one of the first things you learn, as a feminist who spends any amount of time learning about sexual harrassment and assault. And yet, in her international CIA-funded campaign to frame Assange, she hasn’t come up with a story that won’t expose her to harassment, smearing, slut-shaming, and/or Naomi Wolf.
Which is why, yeah, I really, really, do tend to believe that he raped those girls. When I look at the story these women are telling — a powerful, socially connected man rapes one woman, and she tries to stay friendly and doesn’t push it through the system; that same powerful man rapes another woman, and she tries to stay friendly and doesn’t push it through the system; these two women find out about each other, and realize that he didn’t just accidentally misguidedly rape one woman on accident, but apparently makes a habit out of raping women to the point that he did it twice in the space of a few days, and realize they have to do something about this, because it’s not just them, it’s other women at risk; they try a variety of things outside of the legal system, because God knows pushing this through the legal system will bring no amount of extra trauma and grief upon both their heads; eventually, after repeatedly trying to mediate with him personally and asking the police if there’s nothing else they can do, they try to take him to court, which is their least desirable option and last resort; he runs away — I don’t see a perfectly orchestrated plot. I don’t see a case that was manufactured out of nowhere to bring a guy down. I see something that looks exactly like how rape has played out in my communities.
And it’s why I’m not sympathetic to his defenders, or talking about how valuable Wikileaks is, or apologizing to the woman who had a 24-hour-long shit fit and threatened to LEAVE TUMBLR FOREVER because I called her “Special Agent Mulder” in response to a post where she talked about how much she “believed in conspiracies” and used the phrase “I want to believe.” Because I have less than no patience for the way that liberal and radical communities bury or make excuses for the misogyny that happens within them. Sometimes, to the extent of covering up or protecting men who are known to be physically abusive or sexually violent. This stuff happens in our communities, and odds are we all know about it, we’ve all known that one guy whose girlfriends all had the stories (but he did such important work! He had such good politics) and who was protected because the Left Marches On, over the Left’s girlfriend’s body, a lot of the damn time. I’ve been the only girl who was willing to report that the handsome Marxist activist on campus had dragged a teenager into his room unconscious — she was a high-school student touring potential colleges, she got drunk for the first time and passed out — and then later I heard her screaming for her friend, and I stood at that door pounding on it demanding that if she was okay, show her to me, if she was okay open the door, if she was okay open the door and let her go back to the fucking room where she was staying, and he never opened up, and now his girlfriend (because he had one of those, too) was talking about how he hit her sometimes, just sometimes when he got upset, and I’ve seen what happens, which is: Nothing happens. It goes away.
The US government, and other governments, stand to profit from convicting Assange. But if they had to make up a case to take him down, they’d make up a better one than this. They got lucky. Because he — in my opinion, probably, allegedly — happened to be a repeat rapist, and some women were concerned enough about this to try and stop him. That’s it. And now those women will suffer more than anyone else.
You know who isn’t coming to their defense? The Left. Because we know how that guy operates. I mean, come on.
Sady nails it when she ties lefty defenses of Assange to the defenses of That Guy in smaller radical communities. The Guy who talks the talk, and walks the walk in terms of protests, organising, etc, but is really fucking oppressive in many of his day-to-day interactions. That Guy who no-one calls out. (emphasis mine in the quoted text)
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Oy, Assange.
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