In Australia, there is no shortage of Far Right headbangers:
“The Australian Protectionist Party firebrand joins a growing number of controversial far-right candidates chasing the xenophobic vote at next month’s council elections.
Australia First, the anti-immigration party hoping to fill the political void left by One Nation, is running 23 candidates across western and south Sydney and the Blue Mountains, up from 15 at the last council poll.
The party’s website takes aim at the Channel Ten program The Shire and its sprinkling of ethnic characters, labelling it ”media contrived assimilation”. Several candidates attempt to link urban sprawl and rate increases to immigration.
The artist Sergio Redegalli, who painted the controversial ”Say no to burqas” sign outside his Newtown workshop, is making a first-time bid for Marrickville Council as an independent.
Mr Folkes, 42, an industrial painter from Rozelle, wants Leichhardt council declared a ”sharia-free zone” and would scrap council grants to multicultural groups.
”There is a vacuum in politics at the moment. We believe that a lot of people, in time, will definitely vote for us,” he said.History indicates that day is a long way off. Mr Folkes attracted 289 votes, or 0.6 per cent of the vote, when he ran as an independent for the seat of Balmain last year.
A University of Western Sydney immigration expert, Kevin Dunn, said only 12 per cent of Australians held negative views towards cultural diversity and that anti-immigration candidates typically polled badly.
But their agendas could influence council decisions on issues such as building mosques or religious schools, especially during times of national unrest over boat arrivals.”
Niall Ferguson, taken apart in As a Harvard Alum, I Apologize.
Tom Doran at Huff Post looks at Assange’s case in a new way, replete with plenty of sarcasm and lack of taste, a bit like Assange supporters:
“Did the Perpetrator Ever Direct Any Really Awesome Movies?
If YES, congratulations! You weren’t raped. Now, this one can present difficulties to some. When you’re a powerful Hollywood director and use your influence to get a 13-year-old girl alone with you, then ply her with drugs and forcibly sodomize her, you might think a description like, off the top of my head, “scumbag rapist” would be appropriate. But let me ask you something: Have you ever played a rape victim in a movie? Well, have you? I thought not. That’s why you should respect the superior wisdom of Whoopi Goldberg.
If NO, proceed to the next question.
…
Does the perpetrator really, really hate the United States government?If YES, congratulations! You weren’t raped. In fact, I think it’s rather impertinent of you to raise the question, don’t you? Don’t you know how many innocent people are being killed by drone strikes? Don’t you know about Bradley Manning? Don’t you know about all the other, much more reassuring subjects we could change this one to? Julian Assange is a visionary who speaks truth to power. He has bigger things on his mind. That’s why, during his address from the balcony of the Ecuadorian embassy, he didn’t mention you or your accusations once. Why are you so offended? I’m just saying you don’t matter.
If NO, then tough luck. You were raped. Well, probably, but don’t worry. Courts always take the side of the accuser, they’re well-known for it. In fact, your chances of attaining a conviction are… Oh. Well, you really should have thought of that before being born a woman.
Good luck! “
Behind the Paralympics makes depressing reading.
A Near-Lynching in Jerusalem. How this all reminds me of the Troubles.
I thought Ellie Mae O’Hagan’s comment to be insightful and worrying:
” I wrote this on @owenjones84’s facebook page about the last few days re #Assange and I think I want to share it on Twitlonger, even though it will invite yet more abuse:
What has disturbed me most is the speed at which certain Assange supporters have so easily lapsed into using the worst types of rape myths. They accuse the women of having suspect motives, of being sluts and liars, and that they’re more mendacious and prone to lying than those who accuse others of any other type of crime.
And what’s more worrying is that these supporters do it apparently with no awareness of the fact that their slurs against these women aren’t just unique to this case, but are the same slurs that are trotted out every goddamn time a woman accuses a man of rape. Just look at the DSK of Ched Evans cases for further proof of that.
I am deeply concerned and depressed that there seems to be a certain branch of the left (yes, mostly male) that sees misogyny, not as a deep-rooted form of oppression which must be opposed by both men and women, but as a tool to further their own arguments in support of certain politics and the figureheads attached to them. “What this woman is saying doesn’t chime with my world view. Thank God misogyny allows me to totally invalidate it!”
After getting literally hundreds of abusive and misogynistic messages over the last few days, I started feeling totally hopeless about the struggle of feminists. But perversely, it is almost a source of luck that I have been on the receiving end of misogyny in my life (in fact, last weekend I ended up running into a garage for cover because I was being followed by a man down the street who kept shouting at me to stop – thank God he wasn’t a prominent left-wing activist eh, or I might have been asking for it). My own personal experiences have taught me that this is a fight feminists must continue, no matter how exhausting it gets. “
The Vagenda Magazine has a rewarding post on Competitive Rape Defining, useful if you ever meet George Galloway.
Edinburgh Fringe women strike back.
Week Woman has Vaguetionary – Words of the Week are ‘Legitimate Rape’ and ‘Misspoke’.
Norm on the Kipah walk.
Who could forget Legal myths about the Assange extradition. I have come to the conclusion that discussing these issues with Assange supporters (and I have tried, many times) is about as successful as trying stick a wet Kipper to the outside of an in-flight Boeing 747 using spit and sawdust as adhesive.
Not for getting this well argued, Why doesn’t Sweden interview Assange in London?
A Green and driving a Jag.
The F word blog’s weekly round up is instructive.
Dawn H Foster’s reflection is very powerful:
“It’s depressing, but it’s more depressing when you realise these people are taking these beliefs back to the bedroom. And when they’re having their views validated by friends, and others online, and detectives in rape units falsify evidence to collapse cases, and senators believe you can only get pregnant through rape if you enjoyed it, it can’t end well. “
Meanwhile in Ecuador:
“QUITO, Ecuador (AP) — In granting asylum to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange last week, Ecuador’s foreign minister described a generous national policy of accepting political refugees. But that generosity may have its limits.
Aliaksandr Barankov, a former financial crimes investigator from Belarus, is in imminent danger of losing that status and being sent home, where he says he is afraid he will be killed because he has denounced corruption at the highest levels of government.”
Craig Murray, conspiracy theorist and a very strange bloke, has just named on of Assange’s victims on BBC Newsnight. What a despicable little shit he is. I shall remind him on that everyday on his Twitter account, @CraigMurrayOrg.
Craig Murray’s dreadful site is www.craigmurray.org.uk, his Wiki entry is here.
Finally, when some apologist for rape, or an Assange supporter, says to you “He did nothing, much.” please refer him (and it will normally be a bloke) to this Guardian page from 2011.
Soupy One 
Your concern for rape victims, moral panicky split second righteous indignation, intense attention to the cases under discussion and “non-conspiratorial” discourse integrity didn’t suffice for you to google for 30 seconds before smashing Craig Murray for mentioning the widely known name of xxxxxxxxx Do try those 30 seconds now, before you and the remaining mob make a fool of yourselves. At least that — even if you don’t even care knowing who Craig Murray is.
Thank you for your condescending contribution, Mr.Esteves.
I am well aware who Craig Murray is I have followed his activities for the years.
I am afraid your misanthropic behaviour of naming a victims of Assange’s sexual assault cuts no ice here
In fact we just reinforces the impression that you don’t see any problem with Assange’s treatment of women or Craig Murray’s rants,
and as such you are not welcome here.
An angry troll rants!
In run-on sentences half-truths abound.
He chokes on his spit.
Soupyone, how do you know how Assange treats women? How do you know he committed sexual assault? You’re an anonymous blogger out there in blogland but you claim to know something to be a fact that transcends any normal requirement of examination of the truth.
I suppose, in your extraordinary wisdom and unique insight into principles of natural justice, Assange is already guilty and any trial would be a mere perfunctory exercise like we had in the good old days of Medieval Europe, or in more recent times in Pakistan and Afghanistan. No trial, automatic guilty verdict, straight to gaol or the hangman’s noose.. or the stoning pit. I wonder if we can apply the same method of swift, retributive justice to those accused of murder, theft, fraud, … criminal defamation?
But if you can see how unfair that attitude is (tho’ i seriously doubt it), then please explain why it should be acceptable to publicise the name of an accused person of a serious crime who is subsequently acquitted. What if it transpires that Assange is innocent of this alleged crime? You and others, who are so quick to protect the self-revealed and widely known identity of one of his accusers, are completely contemptuous of his rights to anonymity as someone who is supposed to be presumed innocent.
“how do you know how Assange treats women? “
From the women’s statements, he held one and forced her legs open.
He screwed someone while they were asleep, without consent.
I don’t claim to know everything, but I took the time to read the evidence, did you?
That’s how.
Yes, I took the time to read their statements. Did you read Assange’s statement via his lawyers? He said he didn’t do what was claimed. But I don’t *know* that to be true. Anyone can make statements. 2 + 2 = 5 – there’s a statement. “Soupyone stole my wallet” – there’s another. It doesn’t get us very far though, does it?
At issue is whether accusations justify revealing the names of those accused. In the unlikely event of Bradley Manning being acquitted and freed, he’d be a target for harrassment from right wing nutjobs. All because his name and face have been plastered all over the web as a warning to others about questioning the official line.
You might know about a woman called Lindy Chamberlain. Her very young baby was taken then presumably killed and eaten by a dingo (wild Australian dog). She was later arrested and convicted for murder but not before her reputation was totally destroyed by rumour, inuendo and nasty attacks on her personality. The whole nation was divided over her guilt. Even after her appeal saw her acquitted and two coronial inquiries exonerated her of any involvement, she was still harrassed and threatened by haters. So bad was the injustice, her marriage was destroyed, family broke up and she moved ot the US to escape the continued harrassment. The incident happened 31 years ago and haters are still after her whenever she visits Oz. Every time I hear that stupid joke on TV (including Seinfeld) about dingoes eating babies, I’m reminded that ordinary people really are heartless scum.
So while victims of crime are understandably anxious about their identities being revealed to the public, can you see the damage caused by revealing the names of those accused of committing crimes? Acquitted or not, they are destroyed.
Please do not make faulty assumptions about my views, let us stick to the facts.
So you’ve read the women’s statement?
Answer me this:
1. Is it considered rape in Sweden or the UK if you screw someone when they haven’t given consent, as they are half asleep?
2. Is it considered rape when you hold a woman’s arms and force open her legs, going against her expressed wish to use a condom?
Well?
Of course there should be no assumption over Assange’s guilt – that’s for a court to decide – but some of his fans seem to be making assumptions about his innocence and about the motives of the women involved. They then make further assumptions about the motives and views of those who disagree with them, and demonstrate their extremely low level of sensitivity to sexism as they do so.
No, to both questions. See below. But then, as Claes Borgstrom would say, I’m not a lawyer therefore I wouldn’t know. It’s interesting that your outrage is conditional on the jurisdictions of UK and Sweden. I always thought that rape was a universal crime.
1. A woman doesn’t need to give consent when she wants to be screwed, otherwise she just might be waiting forever. When she’s half asleep, she might be just as happy to have a surprise – it’s called a healthy sexual relationship – maybe you could find one for yourself.
2. Failure to read someone’s mind is not a crime – except in your book. And as for holding a woman’s arms down and forcing her legs open, I guess you have to ask her. People have weird sex lives involving all sorts of weird shit that is not for me, you or anyone else to judge. But this is not about a real crime. It’s about your own hatred of men. Good luck with that!
Jemand,
Ahh, I see.
So in answer to my question, is it considered rape in Sweden & UK if you screw someone when they haven’t given consent, as they are half asleep? You answered no.
Further, you consider holding someone’s arm, forcing open their legs and trying to penetrate them is not rape.
Well, it is fairly clear that you haven’t read the evidence and that you are a rape apologist.
The legal opinion in Britain is very clear, Assange’s actions, of not obtaining consent and forcing himself upon someone, *IS* legally rape, in both Sweden and the UK.
Someone recently said that there are few defences of Assange which don’t involve rape apology or conspiracy theory.
I hadn’t fully appreciated that until reading your comments, but your arguments are rape apology.
I suggest reading further on my blog. I have covered the legal issues.
Also see, http://amiobjective.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/assange-case-common-misconceptions.html