> 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.
Dunno if there was any "nudging and cajoling and berating", but from all I saw, those Swedish women (yes, plural) seemed to legitimately have a case. As I understood it, the case was dropped only because there seemed no chance to get him to Sweden to stand trial.
So whether he should have had no punishment at all, or sixteen consecutive lifetimes of hard labour, for spying, he's sure no saint -- and quite possibly deserved jail time -- in other ways.
My understanding of the case was that he consensually visited prostitutes in Sweden, which is legal, where he engaged in consensual sex with them.
Again, consensually, he did this without wearing a condom.
However, under Swedish law, that is rape and the charge is against the customer (not the provider).
So, yes, the women agreed on the facts of the case (Assange showed up and we had sex without a condom) but it was entirely consensual though illegal.
While I do have some understanding of why Sweden has a law like this (to encourage condom use) I don't think it fits anyones conventional definition of rape and under normal circumstances this would not be an offense that the Swedish government would be extraditing someone for (it's a nominal fine in most cases).
Please if I misunderstood something let me know, because, it has been years since I significantly researched this and it's one of the most politicized cases in memory.
> My understanding of the case was that he consensually visited prostitutes in Sweden, which is legal, where he engaged in consensual sex with them.
Again, consensually, he did this without wearing a condom.
Prostitutes have nothing to do with it; of the two women who reported him at least one was a political activist who was, AFAICR, originally supposed to guide him around at the organisation(s?) where he was to be a guest speaker, but ended up hosting him in her home. (I got the impression she was, at least originally, pretty much a groupie of the romanticized image of him.) The other one may have been a friend or acquantiance of the first, or otherwise a "similar type". Far from prostitutes.
> However, under Swedish law, that is rape and the charge is against the customer (not the provider).
> So, yes, the women agreed on the facts of the case (Assange showed up and we had sex without a condom) but it was entirely consensual though illegal.
Been a while since I lived in Sweden, but I go back there every year and nobody I know has ever mentioned any such bizarre law. It would also most likely have been mentioned in news media in neighbouring countries, so I'd probably know about it even without going there, if it existed.
> While I do have some understanding of why Sweden has a law like this (to encourage condom use)
It doesn't. You have been utterly duped.
> Please if I misunderstood something let me know, because, it has been years since I significantly researched this and it's one of the most politicized cases in memory.
Getting stuff so utterly wrong, it's really rather hard to believe you ever "significantly researched" anything about this, because the picture you're painting has nothing whatsoever to do with the truth. (Well OK, sure, for all I know he may have also gone to prostitutes, but that has nothing to do with the rape allegations.)
Your "research" sounds as if it must have come directly from some kind of cross between an Assange fan site and Incel HQ. Just try the other Wiki in stead -- -Pedia, not -Leaks. They're usually at least somewhere close to the truth.
Dunno if there was any "nudging and cajoling and berating", but from all I saw, those Swedish women (yes, plural) seemed to legitimately have a case. As I understood it, the case was dropped only because there seemed no chance to get him to Sweden to stand trial.
So whether he should have had no punishment at all, or sixteen consecutive lifetimes of hard labour, for spying, he's sure no saint -- and quite possibly deserved jail time -- in other ways.