Rushing to discredit his two women accusers is wrong way to protect Wikileaks founder.

[struggle4progress]

By Meghan Murphy, 30 Aug 2012, TheTyee.ca

... Feminist author and activist Jaclyn Friedman finds the reaction from many progressives infuriating. "They are so eager <to support Assange> that they will throw aside women's rights to our bodily autonomy if it means defending someone who is supposed to be a lefty hero," she said ...

There should be a line between assuming Assange's guilt and actively seeking to publicly discredit the women. It is irresponsible and dangerous to create a narrative that says that a rape isn't possible because a woman threw a party for, was "friendly with," or at one point admired her rapist.

So while Assange's supporters cheer at Ecuador’s offer of asylum many are simultaneously looking for "holes" in the women's stories. They talk about justice as though it's a one-way street -- being sure to remind us over and over again that Assange has only been accused and that we therefore cannot assume his guilt. And this is true. No one but Assange and the women know, at this point, the truth. But must we work so hard to assume the worst of the women who've made the claims? ...

"This is a perfect example of how we allow rape culture to flourish," says Friedman. "This isn't just about the Assange case. When rape myths are perpetuated in the popular media it makes women less likely to report." So when we publicly accuse women of lying or when we question whether or not what happened was actually rape, we ensure that women who do experience sexual assault will continue to be fearful about coming forward ...

http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2012/08/30/Assange-Rape-Charges/

[Bonobo]

1. You're right. There is no need to discredit the women who didn't accuse him of rape.

But while I think it would be rape to penetrate a woman while she is sleeping if she is not willing, I think, in this case, her willingness was implied to him by asking him if he had STDs and then continuing to have sex with him after she woke up.

No where in her statement did she say she was having sex against her will.

No one says the women are lying. In fact it is THEIR statements and not Assange's that convince me that the charges are crap.

[struggle4progress]

3. Swedish court ordered arrest. Assange appealed that in Swedish court and lost. He was arrested in UK

and contested extradition, lost that case, lost on appeal to High Court there, lost again on appeal to Supreme Court there. He was given a fortnight to appeal to Strasbourg but jumped bail. He belongs in Sweden now. If the case against him is as bad as his supporters continually claim, he'll very quickly walk away free

[Spider Jerusalem]

4. Letting him go on is not the same thing as consenting in the first place.

The fact that she let him continue doesn't say to me "no, that wasn't rape". And I think it's probably a mistake to presume that acquiescence is the same thing as willingness. And in fact if he did penetrate her while she was sleeping, without a condom, despite her insistence that she wouldn't have sex without protection? She may have assumed that if she said "no" he'd just go on anyway, since he'd already shown himself to be utterly indifferent to her wishes and willing to take what he wanted anyway.

And one of the women has in fact called it "rape", according to her ex-boyfriend:

Then Sofia said that she had been raped by Julian Assange, in that he had initiated unprotected sex with her while she lay sleeping. Sofia said that she had asked Assange
if he was wearing anything and that Assange had replied, “Yes, you.”

The interviewer asked Seth how Sofia had reacted to that. Seth said that Sofia had
related that she was shocked and did not know what to do. Seth said that, given Sofia’s
definite views on the use of condoms during sex, he could imagine that she was very
shocked and afraid. He knows how important it is to Sofia that a condom is used when
she has sex.

http://www.nnn.se/nordic/assange/docs/protocol.pdf

Which kind of rubbishes your claim that there are "no accusations of rape".

Also you have a kind of loose definition of "against her will" that doesn't really cover some of the actual realities of acquaintance rape, I'm afraid.

[Zalatix]

2. Thank you for posting that. She speaks what I've been thinking but couldn't put into words.

We should be able to oppose a kangaroo court trial for Assange while not totally dismissing the claims of the women who accused him.

This issue needs to end in a fair trial. Can either side ever hope to get such a thing?