New story surfacing about Julian Assange

[canetoad]

I did a search after a poster linked him to child sex in another thread and found this story on Gawker.
http://gawker.com/5714043/the-creepy-lovesick-emails-of-julian-assange?skyline=true&s=i

Julian Assange, the founder of the world's most notorious secret-sharing operation, has some embarrassing documents in his own past. We've obtained a series of emails detailing his stalkery courtship of a teenager in his pre-Wikileaks days.

Elizabeth (not her real name) met Assange one night in April 2004, about two years before Assange started his now-infamous whistle-blowing website Wikileaks. She was 19 at the time; Assange was 33 and a student at the University of Melbourne studying physics and mathematics. Elizabeth spotted Assange at a bar near Melbourne and approached the older man with the long white hair because he seemed different than other guys she'd met.

----------

Now before this story goes any further I call immediate bullshit. The dates on the emails are in the middle of the first semester at UniMelb. Easter 2004 was 11 April.

Melbourne University is in the heart of the city, less than 1.5km from the middle of the CBD. Keep in mind that Melbourne is a big city; probably about the urban land area of Los Angeles. If she met Assange in a 'bar near Melbourne' it would take six or seven hours to walk, along an eight lane freeway to the nearest country town.

If she was a student, in all probability she was staying in rented or on campus student accommodation which abounds in the vicinity of the University - not in a small town reached by a moonlight stroll down a country road. Laughable.

I await more on this story as my first reactions are that it is another pile of lies cooked up with the intention of smearing Assange.

[Sanity Claws]

1. I also call bullshit on this article

Who keeps emails from six years ago? particularly of someone you say you didn't like.

[canetoad]

2. Yep, that too.

Although she admitted that she didn't have copies of her correspondence to him.

[RainDog]

48. at this point, I assume any sort of "revelation" like this is bullshit

it may or may not be, but the reality is that the ptb have tipped their hands too many times and people would be fools to assume any such accusations are anything other than smear tactics.

the fall back, of course, is mental illness - as tho living with the bullshit that passes for democracy in this nation isn't enough to make people sick anyway, of course.

Gary Webb died for America's sins - but this nation still wasn't redeemed.

[quinnox]

3. who cares if it is true

19 years old is not a child, and many people have relationships with large age differences.

[canetoad]

5. Good point

Who does care if it's true. I certainly care if it's a lie though.

[movonne]

10. I don't think that anything that comes out about him I would believe

at this point....we know what they do...slime, slime and more slime...maybe something will stick...let's not forget Clinton's little thing in the white house.

[pitohui]

4. of course it's bullshit so why link to it?

any story that tries to create a stir about a dude dating a "teen" and it turns out the "teen" is 19 is just evil bullshit to begin with

we need to stop giving these folks attention rewards

or we should all stand up and say, "i'm spartacus and i've dated a 19 year old and gasp! i've had sex w.out a condom" because, really, who HASN'T done those things if they've had any kind of a full life?

[canetoad]

6. Am I reading you right?

You only read internet links if they are true?

This story will be doing the rounds in a couple of days. Forewarned is forearmed.

[cali]

11. It may or may not be bullshit. I tend to believe it, but as quinnox said

who cares?

[leftstreet]

7. unRec

Not you, the article

[Rosco T.]

8. The age of consent in Australia ranges from 16-18....

non-issue, irrelevant, distraction

[glinda]

9. Sounds like she wants fame. But beyond that if him, he is just a guy who is a romantic.

[glinda]

12. I may have been the one to mention that rumor beforehand and I heard NPR say that.

Shame on NPR if they just repeat BS. Like we need another propaganda tool.

[WhaTHellsgoingonhere]

13. MSM's description of Assange getting worse!

Today, CNN raido said he was being held on charges of rape and molestation!

They want dumb-America to call for his execution.

[hlthe2b]

14. he had "long white hair" at 33 years (his pictures clearly don't reflect)

If she was 19 and he was 33--where is the big scandal? More BS...

[gmoney]

18. that's less than the age difference of my last two relationships

[Arctic Dave]

15. It was only a matter of time before these type of stories started to crop up.

Next week they will say he bites heads off of puppies.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. As far as the geography goes, the story seems believable

It doesn't say she was a student; it says she was 19, and the bar was near Melbourne. He was a student, and he took the train back into Melbourne. So all this means is that, one night, he was in a bar near Melbourne, for whatever reason, which is not unusual.

As far as the story goes, Gawker is trying to make too much of it; they call the emails 'creepy' and his behaviour 'stalkery', but she was the one who approached him first, and if a 19 year old (yes, technically a teenager, but a typical age for the people a student meets) approaches you, a man may well get the impression she's interested in you. He didn't give up at once; but some women have funny ideas about "it's up to him to pursue me", and maybe he read her approach wrong. The woman actually says he wasn't creepy, or weird; and that "he's just a funny bugger". Much ado about nothing.

[TorchTheWitch]

39. the phone number and license plate stuff IS creepy

And any woman should see it that way. Assuming the story is true, she didn't give him her phone number, he found it out somehow and refused to tell her how. He sends her an email that incorporates in a riddle her licence plate number. There's no getting around the fact this this behavior IS creepy and IS stalkerish and especially by a 33 year old man no matter how "socially awkward".

[redirish28]

17. 19!?! That's an Adult in every country! How desperate are they?

[bemildred]

19. LOL.

:popcorn:

[JackRiddler]

20. I guess anything to avoid talking about Pfizer experiments on children in Nigeria

or the attempted Gulf of Tonkin incident by Yemen and the US against Iran

or the pressure on sovereign nations not to prosecute crimes involving Americans

or the UK holding cluster bombs for the US in violation of the cluster bomb treaty

or spying on and stealing the DNA and credit cards and passwords of UN officials

or bombing people in Yemen and then saying you didn't

or

or

or

http://wikileaks.ch

[malaise]

43. Ding ding

we have a winner.

[Hannah Bell]

46. yeah, let's talk about how creepy assange is. *is* he too old to phone a 19-year-old?

the public wants to know, dammit!

[JackRiddler]

21. Oh, boy, we're going to hear about every sexual encounter he ever had or didn't have.

Es muy importante!

[krabigirl]

22. The girl was 19? Uh, this is a non-story.

[WillyT]

23. Can You Say... "Scott Ritter" ???

Interesting pattern, no?

:shrug:

[lunatica]

24. She was 19? And he was 33? Wow!

What the hell is wrong with that?

[BlackHoleSon]

25. Gawker is on a mission

to sleaze this guy!
I was going to register to post a response to this laaaame article when I discovered that you have to audition to be a poster there.
You have to audition - I shit you not!
Anyway, the girl approached him, eventually he went away - there is so little there there it makes cotten candy look like lead.

[EFerrari]

26. We should flood them with stories. Julian Assange dated my dog and cats!

He took them to strip joints! He didn't tip the wait staff!

lol

[WinkyDink]

27. "Child sex"?!?!?! SOMEbody needs some reading comprehension.

[canetoad]

30. And that might be you kiddo

You'll need to scan the Assange threads in LBN and GD but someone definitely mentioned something they saw on NPR and that's what I was following up.

I might add there are a lot on this thread who don't seem to recognise the fact that I AM THE FUCKING MESSENGER. I do not agree with the details of this story. I think the slurs and smears on Assange will only get worse as the PTB try to discredit him further. DO NOT SHOOT THE FUCKING MESSENGER.

[Matariki]

28. LIARS LIARS LIARS

And seriously, why the fuck are you repeating bullshit lies.

This is so fucking obvious it's disgusting.

[Odin2005]

29. 19 does not = Teen. BS hit piece.

My 21yo friend's BF is 11 years older than her, he's no evil, stalker. :eyes:

[Psephos]

31. He sounds a bit scary in those letters.

It sounds like a lot of posters in this thread are treating the idea that the girl being 19 at the time is the issue. It's not.

I wouldn't want any of my female relatives involved with someone who treats a newly-met woman that way. I would be wondering when he was going to lose it.

The article also links to J.A.'s online dating profile, and an overview of blogging about his amorous self.

http://gawker.com/5712623/julian-assange-boasted-about-asian-teengirl-stalkers-in-online-dating-profile

http://gawker.com/5620888/the-sexual-demigod-wikileaks-founder-worshipped-by-christian-women

Ick.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

34. And we have a nibble!

:eyes:

[Psephos]

35. If the letters, dating profile, and blogging records are made of whole cloth, we'll know soon enough

Pretty impressive bit of trickery, creating all those verifiable records years ago, in anticipation of this moment.

:eyes:

[Hassin Bin Sober]

37. Well you just keep an eye on this important story!

And I'll rustle up some clutching-pearls and smelling-salts to keep handy for you. Heck, I might even throw in a fainting-couch if need be!!

[Psephos]

38. You're the one who shows how "important" it is through your efforts to mock it away.

It will die on its own if you don't keep painting it important that way, you know. I don't listen to what people say, I listen to what they do.

BTW, when you've got a spare moment after setting up the fainting couch, do explain how these clever smear merchants were able to plant these creepy letters and bloggings backwards in time.

Right after you post another argument-free, rictus-smile trivialization, of course. ;)

MilesColtrane asked downthread why J.A. can't be both a douchebag AND a freedom fighter. That sounds about right to me. I don't need to personally admire someone in order to admire something they've done.

[TorchTheWitch]

40. well, this is interesting...

From the dating profile under the "I spend a lot of time thinking about" category... "Changing the world through passion, inspiration and trickery."

Trickery???

[Lyric]

32. I was 19 when I moved in with Rhythm, who was 32 at the time.

We've been together for almost 12 years now. And all this time she's really just been a creepy stalker instead of my soulmate and life partner. Who knew?!

:rofl:

[MilesColtrane]

33. Can't he be a douchebag AND a freedom fighter?

[Marr]

36. It's amazing how much we hear about the sex lives of people who make the powerful uncomfortable.

Isn't it?

I don't care if Assange is a crack smoking prostitute. He is not the story, and these kinds of smears don't make those leaked documents any less real.

[Edweird]

41. 19 is not 'child sex'.

[the redcoat]

42. I hereby declare "I don't give a shit"

Nothing he did in the past can somehow erase the existence or impact of Wikileaks.

Assange could be revealed to be the biggest asshole on Earth, that wouldn't mean Wikileaks never existed.

[jeanpalmer]

44. You really should edit your post

There's nothing there about child sex. It's a slander.

[Norrin Radd]

45. That explains it;

my girlfriend said that she's been hearing from generally uniformed people that they are under the impression that Assange is a "child molester," which caused her to assume that they were hearing and seeing the term "sex offender" in the MSM used in relation to Assange and possibly were making a judgemental leap.

[JackRiddler]

47. What can one say, except: Fuck Gawker and its slander machine.

33 year old guy courts 19 year old, you may not like (I note she approached him, in the story) but an article that calls her a "teenager" before mentioning that means 19 (giving us all a chance to imagine 13), and also the OP's vague insinuation of "child sex" are pretty obvious.