I’ve just come away from a Guardian website discussion about Julian Assange feeling disgusted and baffled by the general assumption that seems to prevail on the left that liberal men who are seen to be doing a good job for the cause of free speech, civil rights, socialism, political correctness, whatever, somehow deserve a Get Out Of Jail Free card on charges of rape and sexual assault.
I don’t deny that Wikileaks has made public a lot of information that was in the public interest and Assange deserves commendation for that. I don’t deny that I’m appalled by the US’s sledgehammer-to-crush-a-nut tactics in attempting to shut down Wikileaks and arraign Assange on espionage charges. I would oppose any attempt to extradite him to the States on those, quite frankly, preposterous charges. And I must admit that the timing of Sweden’s issuing of an arrest warrant for him on rape and sexual molestation charges is suspicious, as is the fact that they are acting now after previously ruling he had no case to answer, and it may be that they are, as his supporters claim, plotting an extradition deal with the US once they’ve got him off British soil, which would be quite wrong.
But the idea that the charges on which he is wanted in Sweden are “trivial” and “trumped up” is a misogynist fallacy that I cannot believe is going unchallenged time and time again on left-wing messageboards.
I can’t believe that comments like “This shows the danger of going down the Swedish route of making it easier to convict in rape cases” and “This is another example of why women who make rape accusations shouldn’t have a right to anonymity” are getting more than 700 recommendations in the Guardian’s comment section on the Assange case.
I have no idea whether he really committed the crimes of which he is accused. It may be, as some media outlets allege, that the story of the complainants does not add up. But the way to find out is by having him face those charges in court. No woman who accuses a powerful, charismatic or brilliant man of sexual assault should be denied justice simply because he is so “important” or “doing such a great job”. No accusation of rape is a “small matter” that doesn’t really need to be pursued.
And nor do I buy the arguments that what he is accused of in Sweden “wouldn’t be considered rape in any civilised country”. I think Sweden’s feminist rape laws are a cause for celebration, not denigration.
It’s not that I believe that any man accused of rape must automatically be guilty. Nor do I believe that, even if he is guilty, that necessarily obliterates every good deed he has ever done in his life or that proper legal processes don’t need to be followed or that extenuating circumstances that would be considered in any other crime should be ignored when it comes to rape. When Polanski found himself under house arrest last year, while I agreed he should be extradited to face charges, I found myself almost as irritated by those who, seemingly slipping straight into Daily Mail-reader hanging and flogging mode, didn’t think whether the correct procedures were followed or not in his original trial mattered and by those who felt his real-life actions automatically made his films “misogynist” works that any “real” feminist would boycott as I was by those who argued that he shouldn’t face trial because “He’s such a great artist!”
Let’s separate the alleged rapist from the man’s professional role. If a “great man” is accused of a sexual crime, I don’t believe that means we should ignore or dismiss any great work he has achieved in other areas of his life. But nor, obviously, does it mean that the crimes of which he is accused aren’t serious and shouldn’t be investigated.
And if it’s true, as Assange’s supporters claim, that the Swedish authorities would never have bothered applying for extradition on something as “trivial” as sex crime charges if he hadn’t upset the US government, then in my opinion that’s a sad indictment of how trivially the international justice system treats rape.
