Was reading this and being totally agreeful all the way through .. until I got to the thinly-veiled Assange reference – and it reminded me of something that pissed me off mightily back when the whole thing was assploding all over twitter.

I have to take issue with it – there’s an implication here (“global conspiracy”?) that anyone who thinks that Assange’s asylum claim is genuine and that he faces a real threat is somehow a “rape apologist” or at least sexist. In fact, the “rape apologist” thing is not just an implication, it’s something that’s been said directly to me on twitter (including, most upsettingly, by the otherwise brilliant Sarah Ditum). I’ve tried to explain why this is not the case – though, admittedly, I’ve only tried on Twitter in 140 chars. I might as well have attempted to embroider my thoughts onto someone’s jumper while they’re cycling past me, during a hurricane.

I’m not going to re-hash the legal arguments about the extradition threat. It’s very dull. Suffice it to say that we may well disagree on that. Personally, I’m not sure the legalities are massively relevant – I didn’t think torture was legal, nor Guantanamo, nor the Iraq war. Ho hum. Seems to me that the mighty can make their own laws when they need to.

But this isn’t really about whether or not we disagree – it’s about whether or not we respect each other’s right to disagree on the seriousness of the threat to Assange – without assuming that the other is a CIA agent/idiot/misogynist/George Galloway etc.

What I’m asking here is that you (and anyone else reading this) simply accepts that I (and many, many others like me) believe what I say I believe about the extradition threat. I believed the US was after Assange before the allegations were made, and long before asylum was requested. I believe that Assange has few options available to him to avoid the long reach of US injustice and the risk of imprisonment and torture for his role in Wikileaks. It’s not a political convenience (with all that might imply about my gender politics) and Julian Assange is not my “hero” or “darling”. And it’s not that I think the rape allegations are less important than Assange’s rights. But nor do I think they automatically trump any other concerns in this bizarre and unique case. This is shit I’ve thought about, a lot. I still believe what I say I believe. Yet I meet this, again and again. Back in July, my belief in this US threat merely made me a kooky “conspiracy-theorist”. But I can hardly complain about being mildly patronised by people who reckon they know better – hell, it’s one of my favourite pastimes. Since August though, this same belief has suddenly made me, at best, a thoughtless sexist and, at worst, some kind of misogynist or rape apologist. It’s beyond irritating – it’s massively offensive.

Sorry for long comment on old post, triggered largely by remembered hurt from someone else Hope this finds you well, wise and powerful.

Nelson
x

ps. And to some bloke above me there in the comments… no, you can’t oppose any woman’s right to decide what to do with her own body and still be left-wing. To be a leftie you need to truly understand, right down at the base of your tail, that there’s no way of dividing the world into “them” and “us” – there’s always just “us”. Everyone you meet still exists when you’re not there and, behind their eyes, they have their own thoughts and aspirations, just like you. This happens like, literally, ALL THE TIME. It’s mad. Srsly.

pps. To Internet Warriors who have missed my point and want to show me articles called “Clever Reasons Why It’s Ok To Dismiss Any Risk To Assange And Insist That Even Though There’s Definitely No Risk Whatsoever That He Could Be Extradited, It’s Still Impossible For Sweden To Publicly Confirm That There’s No Risk Whatsoever That He’ll Be Extradited – by David Allen Green”, I’ve read them. All of them. And loads of other stuff about it that you haven’t read. We will still disagree. But thanks. Tell you what, have a link to a proposed solution by those radical extremists at Amnesty, instead:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/sweden-should-issue-assurance-it-won-t-extradite-assange-usa-2012-09-27

Of course you can’t be *your* type of left wing, and pro-life. Of course you would judge them as being ‘wrong’ for disagreeing with you. But you are not the arbiter of left-wingness, and being excluded from *your* club of left-wingers doesn’t exclude people from the entire left wing because you are not the entire left wing, you’re some people.