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Is anyone else here surprised that the reaction to him being free is so overwhelmingly positive? Assange certainly did great work to reveal government corruptio

Is anyone else here surprised that the reaction to him being free is so overwhelmingly positive? Assange certainly did great work to reveal government corruption and abuses of power. At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret for national interests and Assange seemed to show a lack of regard for protecting this type of information. It often seemed that he was working in his own self interest rather than one that prioritized the interests of the US, humanity and civilization on the whole. I guess.. I just expected more nuanced discussion around this on HN.

ben_w 2y ago
> Is anyone else here surprised that the reaction to him being free is so overwhelmingly positive? Not really, though I am frustrated as it does feel like he's only popular because he's an underdog sticking it to The Man. Even in isolation and ignoring the preceding case — for which he fled to the embassy in order to not risk the very outcome he's now facing (c.f. going to the USA, "Assange would appear in court in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S.-controlled territory north of Guam", even though that wasn't even on the cards at the time he fled) — many other journalists manage to publish damning evidence that seriously upsets their governments without having to solicit for it (AFAICT, no journalists have gotten into trouble for publishing Snowden's leaks, just Snowden himself), while some other journalists who broke the law to get their scoops also faced court for breaking the law to get their scoops: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_arrested_in_the_News_International_phone-hacking_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_arrested_in_the...
- EnergyAmy 2y ago
  There's a pretty big difference in breaking the law to get hot goss vs breaking the law to expose corruption at the highest levels of government. There's limits of course, but whistleblowers should be afforded a lot of leeway, particularly because quite often doing things the "right way" is engineered to accomplish nothing.
  - ben_w 2y ago
    Sure, but that protection (that doesn't fully exist in practice but should) would still go to Manning rather than Assange. Assange is to Manning as Glenn Greenwald is to Snowden. (Except for all the differences which make the legal issues in this case a thing in the first place).
- DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
  > without having to solicit for it Countless journalists solicit classified information all the time. They don't just sit there hoping a story falls into their lap. They make connections in government and actively seek out information, including classified information. This has been completely standard in American journalism for decades.
skilled 2y ago
But of course it is positive. This is a huge deal, even if only one that will benefit himself. I don’t know anything about any secrets that he showed any lack of regard for, but I definitely know about the files he exposed that showed the US government is a bunch of cowards who manipulate people and then use the full force of the law to defend themselves when caught with their pants down. Instead of making people guess what you mean by nuanced, you simply should go ahead and provide that nuanced perspective and see if anyone wants to engage it.
- nikkwong 2y ago
  The US government needs to prosecute actors who infiltrate secure systems with the aim to leak state secrets as a way to prevent this type of behavior from happening in the future. Say what you want; even if the premise of leaking is seeking to enrich the interests of the public--there are many state secrets that are secret for very good reasons, such as protecting the lives of informants, diplomats, etc. There were many documents that WikiLeaks released that seemed to have been released under the auspice of "full transparency" but really served no public good and inflicted a lot of harm. Releasing the names of afgan informants, cablegate, that airstrike video where journalists were killed (can't remember the name specifically), etc. I just don't know if I agree that the public should know everything. Think about the case of the NSA--yes they were spying on Americans in egregious ways and overextending the scope of their mission and authority. But at the same time, we do want a lot of their methods to remain secret. They have thwarted many potential terrorist attacks since 9/11; and if we, and our adversaries, knew exactly how and who they were spying on--I'm sure Americans would be less safe.
  - ktallett 2y ago
    That information has been leaked and has the US been any less safe because of it. I would argue there is nothing to suggest it. Governments aren't above the law and the journalists that were killed and the spying was rightfully publicised. As was the Guantanamo Bay leaks. The public shouldn't know everything but if the public find out because the government act illegally and need to be held to law like anyone else, it is an unlucky consequence of the governments actions.
AdamJacobMuller 2y ago
I don't think Assange operated in any kind of self-interest per-se, I think he operated based on a principle of maximum transparency. I definitely don't think that is always a positive thing but I struggle to think of anything which Assange leaked which I really disagree with. Probably some parts of cablegate should not have come out as they were very "inside baseball" talk between diplomats and were too easily construed negatively in the media, though, I think for the most part our allies realized that they said the same things about us in their private communications and there was really no major fallout from it. Now, all that said, Assange did break the law and I don't think there should be no consequences for that but the way the US went about this (across 3 different presidencies) is just terrible. Nudging and cajoling and perhaps berating our Swedish allies to jin up a "rape" case against him so he could be extradited from the UK to Sweden and then obviously to the US, and, denying that we were doing that was just dirty on our part. I'm sure if there is a cablegate 2.0 we'd find we did some fairly terrible stuff to persuade our Swedish allies to prosecute this. Ultimately the simple reason I think there is near positive reaction to this news is that everyone understands that even given what he did, it does not merit almost 15 years of prison in some really terrible conditions. Should he have walked away free? Maybe, maybe not but he should have had a fair trial with fair charges and faced a fair jury and he never got any of that, he was effectively extrajudicially jailed.
- deleted 2y ago
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- rudolph9 2y ago
  > he should have had a fair trial with fair charges and faced a fair jury and he never got any of that Could he have had that if he turned him self when he was originally charged?
  - DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
    He would never receive a "fair" trial in the United States. He was accused of espionage, which is in itself incredibly alarming, given that he's a journalist. The law he's being charged under comes from WWI, which was a low point in the history of freedom of speech in the US, and that law is most likely unconstitutional. The law would not allow Assange to argue any sort of public interest defense. Probability of conviction would be near 100%. The US government conspired to assassinate Assange when he was in the Ecuadorian embassy, and many American officials, from the president on down, have denounced Assange, called him a terrorist, called for his execution, etc. The United States is claiming the right to prosecute any journalist of any nationality anywhere in the world if they publish information that is classified in the US.
tboyd47 2y ago
We need more of his type of self-interest and less of the kind shown in the Panama Papers and Epstein flight logs.
wizzwizz4 2y ago
> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret for national interests and Assange seemed to show a lack of regard for protecting this type of information. Julian Assange was an irresponsible arsehole. Doesn't mean his treatment was anything resembling just. While he probably put a lot of people at risk, I've not heard of anyone actually getting hurt as a result of his actions. Given that, and given his treatment in prison, he's more than served his time.
- kbelder 2y ago
  Closest thing I've found in this thread to my own thoughts. I do think Assange was arrogant, personally dislikable, and had a particular grudge against the United States. This is different than my opinion of, for instance, Snowden, who seemed more motivated by a desire to trigger positive reform. Regardless, Assange has been punished enough, particularly given the distasteful manner in which he was found guilty and imprisoned.
grumple 2y ago
Same. Assange was an actor for Russia, and acted against American interests, whether by design or by accident. He played a role in the election of Trump and in the weakening of US standing and intelligence. This soft-handed approach towards anti-American behavior is the culmination of multiple movements in the post-Soviet era where the remnants of Soviet-sponsored communists and other home-grown agitators align themselves with anti-western groups around the world (Russia, Iran, China, various terrorist groups, etc). These groups have a lot of influence in the left in general, and in the current US administration, so it's not surprising that now is the time that Assange gets a friendly deal. Between this and Manning's sentence being commuted, I think a lot of damage has been done to our security apparatuses. What's the dissuade the next kid with delusions of toppling the corrupt American empire from exposing state secrets in a noble act on behalf of our comrades in the benign and honorable states of Russia, China, and Iran?
- metabagel 2y ago
  > These groups have a lot of influence in the left in general, and in the current US administration, so it's not surprising that now is the time that Assange gets a friendly deal. You lost me there. Assange got a deal because the prosecution needed a deal to resolve the case. They didn't do it out of the kindness of their heart, nor because there was any pressure from the administration to do Assange a favor.
- Nasrudith 2y ago
  Try not being a corrupt empire for a change? Unthinkable I know, choosing to not be guilty of horrible crimes for a change! So long as they engage in fucked up shit and cover it up there will be reactions against it in one form or another. Whistleblowers are the most benign form, and themselves are the result of internal channels just being honeypots instead of policing themselves. If they truly cared for their precious opsec they would have robust internal investigations instead of retaliation.
  - grumple 2y ago
    Calling the US corrupt when the world looks like this is just not something I can take seriously: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index
qsdf38100 2y ago
Yeah, sounds like overwhelming positive opinions... JULIAN!! The guy that embarrassed evil powers all over the world! What evil powers? Well, the US, the US, and... the US. I got down-voted by just mentioning he didn't release anything significant on Russia for some reason. I wouldn't be surprise if some of the massive support we're seeing here in this thread is not completely legit.
- qsdf38100 2y ago
  Let me ask a question to downvoters. Actually, wouldn't it be stupid for Russia not to have folks monitoring popular social sites, like HN, subtly (or not that subtly) pushing their views? Western sites are open to the whole internet, anyone can comment in here, it's easy, it's cheap. Why would they not do that?
  - CRConrad 2y ago
    There are people here exhorting others to listen to Putin-Versteher John Mearsheimer, so yes, that seems plausible.
- rubytubido 2y ago
  > What evil powers? Well, the US, the US, and... the US. How dare you Julian? No Russia or China is on the list? No! US can't be evil, only Russia/China can.
  - qsdf38100 2y ago
    Notice how I didn’t say that the US can’t be evil. US certainly can be, but, why stop there? Why not mention other evil powers while you’re at it? Why focus on the US while Russia is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? Invading a country is very concerning, annexing it should considered unacceptable. Russia is doing the later.
    - rubytubido 2y ago
      > Notice how I didn’t say that the US can’t be evil. Yes, you didn't, but the vibe of your message looks like whataboutism defense. > Why focus on the US while Russia is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? Why focus on Russia while Israel is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? > Invading a country is very concerning, annexing it should considered unacceptable. Russia is doing the later. Annexing a territory is very concerning, silently stealing the houses and land using settlers while killing civilians should considered unacceptable. Israel is doing the later.
enlightenedfool 2y ago
You blend interests of US, humanity and civ with ease perhaps out of nationalism. The first is in its own.
epanchin 2y ago
In a democratic society, laws should exist to protect state secrets. Assange’s imprisonment was widely considered to be caused not by democratically formed laws, but by the whims of politics.
- gklitz 2y ago
  > In a democratic society, laws should exist to protect state secrets. Should USA really pass a law to protect Russian state secret? No? Why should Australia or England pass laws to protect US state secrets?
gklitz 2y ago
> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret Yes, war crimes committed by USA and its allies are best kept secret and those committed by others are best exposed, right? He’s not American and America are not “the good guys”. For any given secret, consider if you feel that USA should honor a request by Russia to keep it secret for the best of Russian interacts, if you don’t feel the same then its best exposed. It’s redicules that so many Americans feel that war crimes committed by it and its allies should be kept secret because “we’re the good guys” then turn around and argue that the reason “we’re the good guys” is because we don’t commit war crimes, or when we do we at least have the decency to try to keep it secret because we know it’s bad, unlike the evil enemy who commit war crimes and try to cover it up!
account42 2y ago
> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret for national interests a) This applies to nuclear launch codes, not to the kind of things that Assange leaked even if leaking this is inconvenient or embarrassing for the nation. b) Many of us aren't Americans and don't really care that much about US "national interests".
BurnGpuBurn 2y ago
The right time for a nuanced discussion of the material published by Wikileaks was actually before the US/UK imprisoned this innocent-until-proven-guilty individual, not after putting him in soletary confinement for 5+ years. So no, not surprised. If there's need for a nuanced discussion, a course of action like this will never be the way to go about it. The time for a nuanced discussion has been over for more than ten years, and the argument was lost by the people who incarcerated him.

ben_w 2y ago

> Is anyone else here surprised that the reaction to him being free is so overwhelmingly positive? Not really, though I am frustrated as it does feel like he's only popular because he's an underdog sticking it to The Man. Even in isolation and ignoring the preceding case — for which he fled to the embassy in order to not risk the very outcome he's now facing (c.f. going to the USA, "Assange would appear in court in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S.-controlled territory north of Guam", even though that wasn't even on the cards at the time he fled) — many other journalists manage to publish damning evidence that seriously upsets their governments without having to solicit for it (AFAICT, no journalists have gotten into trouble for publishing Snowden's leaks, just Snowden himself), while some other journalists who broke the law to get their scoops also faced court for breaking the law to get their scoops: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_arrested_in_the_News_International_phone-hacking_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_arrested_in_the...

EnergyAmy 2y ago
There's a pretty big difference in breaking the law to get hot goss vs breaking the law to expose corruption at the highest levels of government. There's limits of course, but whistleblowers should be afforded a lot of leeway, particularly because quite often doing things the "right way" is engineered to accomplish nothing.
- ben_w 2y ago
  Sure, but that protection (that doesn't fully exist in practice but should) would still go to Manning rather than Assange. Assange is to Manning as Glenn Greenwald is to Snowden. (Except for all the differences which make the legal issues in this case a thing in the first place).
DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
> without having to solicit for it Countless journalists solicit classified information all the time. They don't just sit there hoping a story falls into their lap. They make connections in government and actively seek out information, including classified information. This has been completely standard in American journalism for decades.

skilled 2y ago

But of course it is positive. This is a huge deal, even if only one that will benefit himself. I don’t know anything about any secrets that he showed any lack of regard for, but I definitely know about the files he exposed that showed the US government is a bunch of cowards who manipulate people and then use the full force of the law to defend themselves when caught with their pants down. Instead of making people guess what you mean by nuanced, you simply should go ahead and provide that nuanced perspective and see if anyone wants to engage it.

nikkwong 2y ago
The US government needs to prosecute actors who infiltrate secure systems with the aim to leak state secrets as a way to prevent this type of behavior from happening in the future. Say what you want; even if the premise of leaking is seeking to enrich the interests of the public--there are many state secrets that are secret for very good reasons, such as protecting the lives of informants, diplomats, etc. There were many documents that WikiLeaks released that seemed to have been released under the auspice of "full transparency" but really served no public good and inflicted a lot of harm. Releasing the names of afgan informants, cablegate, that airstrike video where journalists were killed (can't remember the name specifically), etc. I just don't know if I agree that the public should know everything. Think about the case of the NSA--yes they were spying on Americans in egregious ways and overextending the scope of their mission and authority. But at the same time, we do want a lot of their methods to remain secret. They have thwarted many potential terrorist attacks since 9/11; and if we, and our adversaries, knew exactly how and who they were spying on--I'm sure Americans would be less safe.
- ktallett 2y ago
  That information has been leaked and has the US been any less safe because of it. I would argue there is nothing to suggest it. Governments aren't above the law and the journalists that were killed and the spying was rightfully publicised. As was the Guantanamo Bay leaks. The public shouldn't know everything but if the public find out because the government act illegally and need to be held to law like anyone else, it is an unlucky consequence of the governments actions.

AdamJacobMuller 2y ago

I don't think Assange operated in any kind of self-interest per-se, I think he operated based on a principle of maximum transparency. I definitely don't think that is always a positive thing but I struggle to think of anything which Assange leaked which I really disagree with. Probably some parts of cablegate should not have come out as they were very "inside baseball" talk between diplomats and were too easily construed negatively in the media, though, I think for the most part our allies realized that they said the same things about us in their private communications and there was really no major fallout from it. Now, all that said, Assange did break the law and I don't think there should be no consequences for that but the way the US went about this (across 3 different presidencies) is just terrible. Nudging and cajoling and perhaps berating our Swedish allies to jin up a "rape" case against him so he could be extradited from the UK to Sweden and then obviously to the US, and, denying that we were doing that was just dirty on our part. I'm sure if there is a cablegate 2.0 we'd find we did some fairly terrible stuff to persuade our Swedish allies to prosecute this. Ultimately the simple reason I think there is near positive reaction to this news is that everyone understands that even given what he did, it does not merit almost 15 years of prison in some really terrible conditions. Should he have walked away free? Maybe, maybe not but he should have had a fair trial with fair charges and faced a fair jury and he never got any of that, he was effectively extrajudicially jailed.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
rudolph9 2y ago
> he should have had a fair trial with fair charges and faced a fair jury and he never got any of that Could he have had that if he turned him self when he was originally charged?
- DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
  He would never receive a "fair" trial in the United States. He was accused of espionage, which is in itself incredibly alarming, given that he's a journalist. The law he's being charged under comes from WWI, which was a low point in the history of freedom of speech in the US, and that law is most likely unconstitutional. The law would not allow Assange to argue any sort of public interest defense. Probability of conviction would be near 100%. The US government conspired to assassinate Assange when he was in the Ecuadorian embassy, and many American officials, from the president on down, have denounced Assange, called him a terrorist, called for his execution, etc. The United States is claiming the right to prosecute any journalist of any nationality anywhere in the world if they publish information that is classified in the US.

tboyd47 2y ago

We need more of his type of self-interest and less of the kind shown in the Panama Papers and Epstein flight logs.

wizzwizz4 2y ago

> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret for national interests and Assange seemed to show a lack of regard for protecting this type of information. Julian Assange was an irresponsible arsehole. Doesn't mean his treatment was anything resembling just. While he probably put a lot of people at risk, I've not heard of anyone actually getting hurt as a result of his actions. Given that, and given his treatment in prison, he's more than served his time.

kbelder 2y ago
Closest thing I've found in this thread to my own thoughts. I do think Assange was arrogant, personally dislikable, and had a particular grudge against the United States. This is different than my opinion of, for instance, Snowden, who seemed more motivated by a desire to trigger positive reform. Regardless, Assange has been punished enough, particularly given the distasteful manner in which he was found guilty and imprisoned.

grumple 2y ago

Same. Assange was an actor for Russia, and acted against American interests, whether by design or by accident. He played a role in the election of Trump and in the weakening of US standing and intelligence. This soft-handed approach towards anti-American behavior is the culmination of multiple movements in the post-Soviet era where the remnants of Soviet-sponsored communists and other home-grown agitators align themselves with anti-western groups around the world (Russia, Iran, China, various terrorist groups, etc). These groups have a lot of influence in the left in general, and in the current US administration, so it's not surprising that now is the time that Assange gets a friendly deal. Between this and Manning's sentence being commuted, I think a lot of damage has been done to our security apparatuses. What's the dissuade the next kid with delusions of toppling the corrupt American empire from exposing state secrets in a noble act on behalf of our comrades in the benign and honorable states of Russia, China, and Iran?

metabagel 2y ago
> These groups have a lot of influence in the left in general, and in the current US administration, so it's not surprising that now is the time that Assange gets a friendly deal. You lost me there. Assange got a deal because the prosecution needed a deal to resolve the case. They didn't do it out of the kindness of their heart, nor because there was any pressure from the administration to do Assange a favor.
Nasrudith 2y ago
Try not being a corrupt empire for a change? Unthinkable I know, choosing to not be guilty of horrible crimes for a change! So long as they engage in fucked up shit and cover it up there will be reactions against it in one form or another. Whistleblowers are the most benign form, and themselves are the result of internal channels just being honeypots instead of policing themselves. If they truly cared for their precious opsec they would have robust internal investigations instead of retaliation.
- grumple 2y ago
  Calling the US corrupt when the world looks like this is just not something I can take seriously: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index

qsdf38100 2y ago

Yeah, sounds like overwhelming positive opinions... JULIAN!! The guy that embarrassed evil powers all over the world! What evil powers? Well, the US, the US, and... the US. I got down-voted by just mentioning he didn't release anything significant on Russia for some reason. I wouldn't be surprise if some of the massive support we're seeing here in this thread is not completely legit.

qsdf38100 2y ago
Let me ask a question to downvoters. Actually, wouldn't it be stupid for Russia not to have folks monitoring popular social sites, like HN, subtly (or not that subtly) pushing their views? Western sites are open to the whole internet, anyone can comment in here, it's easy, it's cheap. Why would they not do that?
- CRConrad 2y ago
  There are people here exhorting others to listen to Putin-Versteher John Mearsheimer, so yes, that seems plausible.
rubytubido 2y ago
> What evil powers? Well, the US, the US, and... the US. How dare you Julian? No Russia or China is on the list? No! US can't be evil, only Russia/China can.
- qsdf38100 2y ago
  Notice how I didn’t say that the US can’t be evil. US certainly can be, but, why stop there? Why not mention other evil powers while you’re at it? Why focus on the US while Russia is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? Invading a country is very concerning, annexing it should considered unacceptable. Russia is doing the later.
  - rubytubido 2y ago
    > Notice how I didn’t say that the US can’t be evil. Yes, you didn't, but the vibe of your message looks like whataboutism defense. > Why focus on the US while Russia is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? Why focus on Russia while Israel is going for textbook land grab à la Hitler? > Invading a country is very concerning, annexing it should considered unacceptable. Russia is doing the later. Annexing a territory is very concerning, silently stealing the houses and land using settlers while killing civilians should considered unacceptable. Israel is doing the later.

enlightenedfool 2y ago

You blend interests of US, humanity and civ with ease perhaps out of nationalism. The first is in its own.

epanchin 2y ago

In a democratic society, laws should exist to protect state secrets. Assange’s imprisonment was widely considered to be caused not by democratically formed laws, but by the whims of politics.

gklitz 2y ago
> In a democratic society, laws should exist to protect state secrets. Should USA really pass a law to protect Russian state secret? No? Why should Australia or England pass laws to protect US state secrets?

gklitz 2y ago

> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret Yes, war crimes committed by USA and its allies are best kept secret and those committed by others are best exposed, right? He’s not American and America are not “the good guys”. For any given secret, consider if you feel that USA should honor a request by Russia to keep it secret for the best of Russian interacts, if you don’t feel the same then its best exposed. It’s redicules that so many Americans feel that war crimes committed by it and its allies should be kept secret because “we’re the good guys” then turn around and argue that the reason “we’re the good guys” is because we don’t commit war crimes, or when we do we at least have the decency to try to keep it secret because we know it’s bad, unlike the evil enemy who commit war crimes and try to cover it up!

account42 2y ago

> At the same time, some state secrets are best kept secret for national interests a) This applies to nuclear launch codes, not to the kind of things that Assange leaked even if leaking this is inconvenient or embarrassing for the nation. b) Many of us aren't Americans and don't really care that much about US "national interests".

BurnGpuBurn 2y ago

The right time for a nuanced discussion of the material published by Wikileaks was actually before the US/UK imprisoned this innocent-until-proven-guilty individual, not after putting him in soletary confinement for 5+ years. So no, not surprised. If there's need for a nuanced discussion, a course of action like this will never be the way to go about it. The time for a nuanced discussion has been over for more than ten years, and the argument was lost by the people who incarcerated him.