Julian Assange - Asperger's??

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I agree with you, ouinon. wavefreak58 doesn't seem to be particularly forthcoming as to what makes a person or their actions heroic, other than saying "resolutely graceful" and giving examples of four people, all of whom have been imprisoned and/or subject to house arrest for lengthy periods, seeming to suggest that wavefreak58 thinks sacrificing their liberty is what is particularly heroic about them, because it's not clear what makes them heroic and Assange not, other than he hasn't - yet - been subjected to a lengthy spell inside. It's hard not to come to the conclusive that wavefreak58 might be satisfied if Assange spent the next decade or three inside, and then his "sacrifice" would mean his actions would be worthy to be considered as heroism.

I disagree. From what I've read about his background, I think his actions are more consistent with perhaps being an Aspie, who has grown up in an environment where he and his family have known people who've witnessed and experienced wrongdoing and corruption and criminal activity by those in authority and positions of power, leading to a strong sense of right and wrong, and feeling driven to work to facilitate and strive for social justice. And those early experiences further compounded by a personal sense of injustice due to his custody battle for his son, leading him to appreciate, through very personal knowledge and experience, how wrong those in authority can be, and firing a deep-seated sense of injustice that he, personally, can put his undoubted exceptional intelligence, analytical and IT skills to address. I think his actions are consistent with being on a personal crusade to right the world's wrongs, as a result of witnessing and being on the receiving end of wrongs himself.

EnglishLuLu

So the profile can be summed up to a vigilantist that cannot confirm his sources.

Thank you for explaining, that explains a lot, although I do still struggle to understand your sentence structure and can't always understand what point you're trying to make. I've tried to read it out loud, as you've said you write like it's in the spoken voice, but that doesn't necessarily help, maybe it's the linguistic differences between American English and English English, two people's divided by the same language kind of thing?

You don't need to help me realise my bias against America. I've explained before, I'm not specifically anti-American, I'm all equal opportunities when it comes to being scathing and contemptuous of human rights abuses. You - and lots of other Americans - *think* I'm anti-American, because you've apparently adopted that mentality of 'If you're not with us, you're against us'. You *think* I'm anti-American, because I've made lots of negative comments about US policy and failings of the democratic process and commented on the stupidity of the kind of people who watch and believe Fox News.

But the context here is a case of an Australian citizen, who's currently in the UK, about whom allegations have been made in Sweden... who has pissed off some very powerful and influential US politicians and officials, and there are rumours/conspiracy theories floating around about what, if any, actions have been taken by US authorities and 'players' to smear him, try to influence Swedish politicians and prosecutors, and so on.

Like I said, I'm all equal opportunities when it comes to being contemptuous of corruption, but this thread isn't an appropriate place for my thoughts about corruption in Nigeria relating to the oil industry and politicians siphoning off the country's wealth and leaving people living in poverty. This thread isn't the right forum for my thoughts about China and the system of guanxi and the oppression of political dissidents and ethnic minorities, including Xinjiang Uyghur. (I've actually been hit by a Chinese jingcha (police officer) and I was kind of deported, so, trust me, I'm no fan of the way some things are done over there either.) And I'm certainly not averse to criticising democratic failures in my own country (Blair taking us into an illegal war based on a dodgy dossier and the will of Bush and all his buddies, despite massive public opposition).

If you want to start another thread about corruption and wrongdoing in other countries, such as ooh, I don't know, Russian oligarchs, Uzbekistan, where the cotton trade uses child labour and dissidents are boiled alive, South Africa having the highest rates of rape in the world and how despite the promises the World Cup didn't bring prosperity to people in townships, who were banned from trading from stalls near the newly built multimillion pound stadiums they couldn't afford to enter, because they didn't have enough money for tickets.

Seriously, take your pick, stick a pin in a world map and start a bitchfest thread about corruption and crime in other countries and I'll join in. I'm not specifically anti-American, any more than I'm anti-corruption and crime and bullying and stupidity and failing democratic processes anywhere else.

Did you not read that bit where I pointed out you didn't, in fact, vote in Bush the second time round?

I really despair that you seem to be applying a non-discriminating blanket rule that classified is classified and therefore no what information it is, whether or not it relates to a crime or corruption, the fact that it's classified means no one should know.

You're quite touchingly naive if you think that you can trust your congressmen, senators and president if you think there has been some wrongdoing. Are you not aware of your own country's history? Are you not aware that sometimes it is those very people in whom you place so much trust who are the ones who are guilty of wrongdoing, or are covering it up?

Ex-governor Blagojevich in Chicago.
http://www.slate.com/id/2206364

Political corruption in Chicago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_ ... of_Chicago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fe ... ted_States

Your former Vice President involved in a corruption case relating to Nigeria
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/nige ... alliburton

Nixon and the Watergate scandal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watergate_scandal

Gulf of Tonkin - President Lyndon Johnson using information about an incident that never happened to justify taking America into the Vietnam War
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Military/2 ... -usmi.html
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2261
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident

Particularly with respect to the latter, are you saying that your politicians, including your president, should be allowed to lie to the population and send your military into war and that all information relating to that deception should remain classified and you should never know that politicians have lied to you and sent men to fight and die, and also caused the deaths of lots of innocent civilians?

Assange is in danger of losing his liberty because he is accused of sexual 'misconduct'. So far, his primary (only?) defense is that they are trumped up charges. The four that I cited were incarcerated for their ideas. I can't see any way to equate the two.

There is circular reasoning here. Assange is 'heroic' therefore the all charges conceived against him must be fake. And, conversely all charges against him are fake because he is heroic.

What if he actually DID break the law? Should we turn a blind eye to it? Just because you think the laws in Sweden don't make sense, that give no justification for a free pass. And how is it that an anarchist can without hypocrisy invoke the legal systems of that which he abhors and would tear down? He lit the fire but he won't burn with it?



He hasn't risked anything close to what the actual whistle blowers risk. He gets the adulation while the whistle blowers lose their jobs or worse. And the first time something comes along (the sex issues in Sweden), his primary defense is to cry CONSPIRACY. Is this the best the big bad government can do? Weak sex charges in Sweden? What a crappy conspiracy. Why not just plant evidence at a murder scene? If the shadowy actors in the realms of power are so good at conspiracies, why the heck haven't they made up something the has real teeth in it?

What has Assange done? His "body of work" is to put up a bunch of servers and invite people to give him their dirty laundry. The ones taking all the risk are the ones in the front lines of this. Assange doesn't expose corruption. Peons working in some office somewhere expose corruption. He is Osama Bin Laden, not the poor sucker convinced to strap the bomb to himself. He is the general sitting in the war room directing the deaths of soldiers.



He could start by going to Sweden and facing the investigation head on. Fighting extradition based on speculation of conspiracies is the coward's path.




Of course I know that Anonymous is not Wilkileaks, just an ally. The point is that if I sent him the names of people in Anonymous, he would protect them. The point is that secrecy is necessary for him in certain arenas just as secrecy is necessary for diplomats and governments. This is the hypocrisy of anarchists and people like Asssange, They trumpet the need for transparency except in cases where they need secrecy. Then they justify it in the name of some higher purpose. Isn't this EXACTLY what governments do? Just because Assange doesn't agree with their higher purpose, it's OK?

Not quite.

Vigilantism is more normally associated with people who take the law into their own hands in terms of punishing or seeking vengeance. I'm not sure that's what Wikileaks or Assange does. He doesn't go round like some superhero, beating up the bad guys. Wikileaks and Assange simply publish information and expose wrongdoing. It's then for prosecutors or the public to either seek legal redress and hold them to account in a court of law or to decide to vote out politicians who they believe are unfit to hold office, or for people to make decisions about their spending and use their consumer power against corrupt companies.

And yes, he cannot confirm his sources. He explained that the system was designed to maintain the anonymity of the sources.

It's quite common for journalists not to name their sources. Some journalists have been to prison in order to avoid naming their sources. It's a matter of principle and a mark of integrity and badge of honour for journalists. I've been in a tricky situation myself, when I was put in touch with some activists who didn't want to publicly be named, and so I had to internally 'vouch for' the credibility of the source (and I shared their identity with one editor, because their restriction was simply that they didn't want to be publicly named as the source) but I didn't share that information in the office, even to my other colleagues, in case the information slipped out accidentally. In an age where people like Assange and other journalists travel and have electronic data in their possession, and checked in baggage can be 'lost' or people can get their equipment seized, for example a Wikileaks volunteer had all their electronic equipment seized when returning to the US after a vacation. International journalists had their equipment seized by the Israelis when they attacked the aid flotilla bound for Gaza. Arguably the only way of guaranteeing a source's anonymity in this day and age is to not know who they are.

EnglishLulu

If you could lower the amount of material your responding to me with it would help. I like to focus on very specific details of this direct matter and I think your going in many differing directions to prove or create issues which are not relevant Bush is also one of the most unpopular presidents in history and in a time where the U.S was suffering great anxiety and trauma from terrorism. He also lost the public trust. I do not think he would be re-elected should he be allowed in the future which he cannot now under current law.

The point being is the greater majority of Americans would not endorse killing of innocent life. Let's compare that to Hitler and Germany in WWII where the population for the most part went with it. However war in of itself no nation can prevent in absolute terms criminals within and non-intentional harm to innocent life.

It just seems you simply hate America and are not subjectively reasoning it out but only going after the negatives. In a fluid democracy which changes, adapts and evolves it differs from dictatorships which are more stagnant such as N. Korea for instance. Sometimes I speak in really logical ways and since people don't like what I say they say they don't understand.

Nathan Young

I'm sorry but his system like all systems while some more so then others is flawed.

He seeks to correct perceived injustice but cannot confirm his sources as valid.

*sigh*

Have you been asleep for the past couple of days? Did you miss all the bits about how the fear isn't that Assange will lose his liberty as a result of the allegations of sexual misconduct - NB, they're not charges yet, he hasn't been charged with anything - but the fear is that 'dark forces' are at work and strings are being pulled by third parties, and the thrust of the attempts to extradite Assange to Sweden *aren't* so much to do with getting him to answer to the sexual misconduct allegations (again, at the moment, he's simply wanted for questioning, and the prosecutors could very easily question him in the Swedish Embassy in London, or at Scotland Yard police station in London), but getting him to Sweden from where he can perhaps be more easily extradited to the US. It's that fear of losing his liberty in the US by virtue of being tricked to a country that will collude with the US authorities and fly him to the US that is the cause of his reluctance to return to Sweden.

He is in fear of being extradited from Sweden to the US and in fear of losing his liberty - not as a result of sexual misconduct allegations, but because of his work with Wikileaks. I suggest you read my earlier posts in this thread about links between Swedish politicians and Karl Rove, the complicity of 'liberal' Swedish politicians in illegal extraordinary rendition flights, which they approved, the ongoing complicity of Sweden in the forcible repatriation of Iraqi asylum seekers to a country at war and the failure to respect their human rights by the Swedish authorities.

How many times do you have to be told that Assange has well-founded fears of losing his liberty as a result of his works with Wikileaks and that is the reason why he is now reluctant to return to Sweden (because he fears the Swedish authorities, which have close links with the US, will turn him over to the US and extradite him)?

I have absolutely, categorically, never said that all the "charges" against him must be fake. Again, I suggest you bear in mind that there are no charges, as yet, and actually read what I have said, instead of putting words in my mouth and disagreeing with things I've never actually said. I've never expressed an opinion either way as to whether the charges are fake. I've said that the allegations are serious and need to be investigated, although it seems they were previously investigated and a prosecutor previously decided that there were no charges to be answered and the case was dropped, before the women instructed a lawyer and before a politician got involved and got the case reopened. Off the top of my head, I've also reported on what the English judge said, about Assange having a reasonable expectation - given he's previously been questioned, and a prosecutor has previously decided there's not case to answer - that even if he were to be extradited and questioned it is unlikely that any charges would result.

I've never suggested the allegations are fake, in fact, I said that I thought Assange's lawyer shouldn't have referred to the allegations as a honey-pot, if anything I suggested that it possibly, probably wasn't. But that I didn't rule out that once those allegations had been made by the women, the legal proceedings might have subsequently been used and might be being used by other parties (perhaps to facilitate an extradition to the US).

I really wish that when people are disagreeing with what I say that they'd actually take the care to disagree with what I say and not disagree with something they attribute to me but which I've never said!

*sigh* Honestly, are you *trying* to be dumb? Or are you just saying silly things with the intention of trying to wind me up? So far, I've been taking your comments quite literally and seriously and trying to answer them in all sincerity, but that comment is making me wonder whether you're saying that all tongue in cheek? But for now, I'll answer it in all sincerity.

You say he hasn't risked anything close to what the actual whistleblowers risk. What bit of he's risking his liberty, and even his life are you failing to understand?

Seriously, how can you say that, when he's had numerous politicians and public figures and members of the public openly calling for his assassination?

There are numerous politicians and public figures and members of the public who want him to be extradited to the US and charged with "treason" (D'oh, he's not American, he's Australian). And did you not read what I said previously about how the US treats journalists who say or do things that they don't like? They try to kill them, they keep them in extra-judicial detention for years on end.

Given America's track record, he's actually risking a lot. He's risking his life and liberty by exposing corruption and criminal activity.

(And that's without repeating the details relating to China and Russia, another couple of countries that have been embarrassed, which don't react to kindly to that kind of thing, and the risks he faces on that score.)
*sigh* Really? Again? No, it's not cowardly. Yes, there's speculation, and I've outlined some information upon speculation might be based. But he's said they have been informed by well-placed sources that the US authorities were preparing an indictment against him. Subsequent news reports suggested that was in fact true.

I've no idea what Assange would do if he had that information. Neither do you. For someone who's just complained about speculation, you've just been speculating.

Just as you put words in my mouth and then disagreed with 'me' when I never said such a thing, you've likewise put words in Assange's mouth and disagreed with 'him' when in reality you've no idea.

Incidentally, I'm just wondering though, have Anonymous started any illegal wars lately? Apart from 'the World's First Cyber War' that is? Have they killed anyone? Have they killed any journalists or children or other innocent civilians? Have they covered up any killings? Have they polluted land or water with toxic chemicals and covered it up?

If the information was inaccurate or faked, then as a publisher he is still subject to defamation laws, so people have legal redress if there's a problem.

Again LuLu I must submit to your superior intellect then as I am dumb like you say and confess that unlike you my rhetoric is simple and to the point. What a politician says is not necessary the law, nor the endorsement of a people and or party and I also believe they say those things at times out of fear. If I recall correctly despite all these persecutory complexes that just don't add up my government has not sought to kill him in it's collective democratic process? Some politicians will put their dirty feet in their mouth and the other party will use in in their rhetoric. All part of the evolving, constantly changing and dynamic democracy.

I'm really smart or am I not? You can come up with reasoning that may sound similar especially throughout history and find one grand puzzle in completion in result but it is a vast psychosocial complex. The problem is in rationalism absolute does not dictate opinions which is a right of yours but that does not make your assessment fact. So in your circular reasoning you paint a monster and believe it which you are entitled to your opinion. You have the right to your belief but as there are in any political conflict there will be the extremes and I and others will pick it apart likely to your dissatisfaction less it's ok for you at times to be wrong.

Last edited by ci on 19 Dec 2010, 10:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

From LuLu: If the information was inaccurate or faked, then as a publisher he is still subject to defamation laws, so people have legal redress if there's a problem.

Given the nature of classified information it cannot be said confirmed or not confirmed.

How would we know? They're anonymous.

The problem here is that you are perfectly willing to see a conspiracy and I am not. I consider it cowardice that Assange hides behind a team of lawyers. You do not. It would appear that we have little or nothing upon which we agree that would allow a constructive dialog.

What part of I am not specifically anti-American, I am contemptuous of corruption by all politicians and businesspeople and officials whatever their nationality, are you failing to understand?

I can't speak for Germany and the Germans, as I'm not German, and I wasn't even alive then.

Tbh, your sentence structure in this post is much clearer and easier to follow than it has been in some of your other messages. I really don't pretend not to understand you (or anyone for that matter) just because [you think] I don't like what you say.

If you want me to be really blunt, I genuinely wondered why I was struggling to understand what you had written considering that you're American and therefore I assumed English was your first language, although I wondered whether perhaps you were from an immigrant family and maybe English wasn't your first language, or failing that I suspected you might be a bit 'special needs' and I was politely trying to ascertain whether you had problems communicating clearly in English.

I'm actually used to working in international environments with colleagues for whom English is their second language, and I've worked as an editor correcting the English language news scripts and articles of people whose first language is Chinese, Arabic, Swedish, German, French and so on.

I'm used to making sense of difficult to understand English, and I was genuinely struggling to understand what points you were trying to make. But it seemed a bit rude to ask you outright: Hey, dude, what d'you mean, are you special needs, or what?

So, no, I wasn't pretending not to understand you, I genuinely wasn't understanding what points you were making. For example in one sentence, there seemed to be three disparate constituent facts/issues that I could make out, but I couldn't understand the overall point you were trying to make in that sentence, hence why I broke it down and addressed those bits individually, because I was trying to do you the courtesy of trying to engage with you and answer what I thought you were getting at, although I really wasn't sure.

So far as I recall, I never said you were "dumb". If I did, please feel free to quote me and bring it to my attention. Sheesh, I wish people here would actually read what I wrote, instead of objecting to things I haven't said!

I did, however, ask if wavefreak58 was trying to be dumb, because s/he was repeatedly asserting that Assange wasn't risking anything, when there have been numerous reports in the media that politicians and public figures have called for him to be killed, and it's reported that the US authorities are looking to find reasons to prosecute him, and there are suspicions that demanding his return to Sweden is a ruse by which to facilitate his extradition to the US. To repeatedly assert that Assange isn't risking anything in the face of all those media reports to the contrary is, to me, being a bit dumb.

And, again, I've never said that the government has sought to kill him (yet). I said politicians and public figures and members of the public.

Personally, I don't think the fact that a politician is speaking as an individual politician and not the collective voice of the government is any excuse. A politician ought to be more responsible and more respectful of the fact that they are members of a branch of government, which is made up of the executive, the legislative and the judiciary, and I don't think the place of politicians to pre-empt the judicial process and call for a person to be killed. To my mind, it's incumbent on a politician to be respectful of the other branches of government. Politicians would expect the judiciary not to interfere in politics except insofar as they are permitted as part of the system of checks and balances. Likewise, politicians should stick to their remit and they should not interfere in the judicial process, at most they should call for Assange to be brought to justice.

Do I understand your next bit correctly? So, I "paint a monster", and I'm entitled to do that. (If by pointing out human rights abuses and abuses of power, and failures in the democratic system you think I've painted a monster, so be it.) But you and others will pick apart what I've said because you think I'm wrong.

Okay, fine, you think I'm wrong. Erm, how, precisely, am I wrong about corrupt politicians? Are you saying Watergate didn't happen? Are you saying Blagojevich wasn't corrupt? Erm, how, precisely, am I wrong about (rogue) members of the military killing innocent civilians and journalists? Are you saying the dead bodies are fictions of their grieving families' imaginations? That the video footage is faked? Are you saying that Karl Rove doesn't have close links with Swedish politicians, even though he apparently worked on the prime minister's election campaign? Are you saying that Sweden wasn't complicit in extraordinary rendition?

Come on then, tell me, what have I said that's wrong. If you can disprove anything I've said, then I'm happy to stand corrected. Just like I was happy to stand corrected when wavefreak58 challenged me about referring to Assange's "body of work" I agreed that was clumsy phrasing.

Feel free to tell me what I have said that is wrong.

Oh, so now you're talking about them as individuals? Before you were talking about them as Anonymous and as if they were members of some kind of group with a membership list that could be leaked. Anonymous, the collective, or any members of it, referred to a cyber war.

Last time I checked, they hadn't called for an invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan or anywhere. Unlike Bush and Blair and all their warmonger friends.

It's not that I'm perfectly willing to see a conspiracy. It's that I prefer to keep an open mind about information that I've read or seen or heard that I can't personally confirm. What I call a possibility that I'm prepared to keep an open mind about - that the US authorities might be working with the Swedish authorities to extradite Assange (given that there are apparent documented close links between the two countries and their politicians) - you call me seeing a conspiracy. All I'm saying is I don't know either way. Unless and until the US authorities make their move, and the latest news reports are that they have prepared some indictments.

As for hiding behind a team of lawyers... you might want to check your constitution. The right to legal counsel is a person's constitutional right under the 6th amendment.

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."

If you disagree with that, you might want to start a campaign to have the 6th amendment to the constitution overturned because you think people on the receiving end of serious allegations are cowards if they seek to hide behind a team of lawyers and shouldn't be allowed to do so.

I look forward to hearing details of your new campaign to abolish the 6th Amendment rights to legal counsel.

The article by Catherine Bennett ( sic? ) in The Guardian, "So, Assange, why won't you go back to Sweden?" at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... intcmp=239 has attracted 1,086 comments so far.

EnglishLulu and mercurial you have convinced me of Assange's perfect right, as a law abiding and moral citizen, to stay in the UK pending the Extradition Hearing's ruling on Sweden's motives, etc.

A little light relief, :lol a wonderful site, ( several pages ), "Design the next great hair style for Julian Assange"! :lol : http://99designs.com/other-design-tasks ... eaks-59769 It's brilliant.
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