Julian Assange: Guilty?

 
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ELISE COBY

The Breakdown:
    Based on our class discussion, my view of Julian Assange got put in a very new, and questionable
perspective. The Australian activist, editor, publisher, and Co-founder of WikiLeaks has remained a controversial topic for nearly ten years over the argument of his questionable captivity over telling the truth with no actual charges held against him. 

Previously, Assange has been found guilty of hacking activities and yet managed to avoid jail time. Then, in 2006 with the co-founding of WikiLeaks, thousands of classified documents including anything from film to national security to war had been published. Most controversially, the leak of Chelsea Mannings documents which contained the killing of hundreds of civilians went unreported. According to BBC News's article,
"Julian Assange: Why is the Wikileaks co-founder a wanted man?", 66,000 civilians had been killed and prisoners had undergone torture from Iraqi forces. 
    Here's where it gets complicated :
    The U.S government made it CRYSTAL CLEAR that it was seeking to prosecute Assage for the leak via Wikileaks. While I suppose the act of "leaking information" is normally a negative connotation, Assage leaked truthful information about the United States. Assage is now being held in one of the highest security prisons for it. Because of this, the question remains, how high has the bar been raised for journalists? Is any journalist in danger at the very hands of our own government for publishing truthful information? 
Where I start to really question the transparency and veracity of the government is when action is almost always taken when something stands in the way of its reputation. If we take a look back into our history we can uncover a very old and very new issue dating all the way back to 1722. It always circles back to the idea of source reveal. In 1964, the court established truth as an absolute defense, thus, you cannot lose a liable suit. We are all protected by the first amendment - just as much as a New York Times journalist. the First Amendment can't pick and choose who it applies to. most commonly judges interpret this decision very narrowly and there are many different types of situations involving the First amendment and the Grand Jury. This is why the system can be so patchy and uncertain. 
    Back to Assange, my question is, did he lose his First Amendment rights because he embarrassed the government and its cover-up of the killing of 66,000 innocent civilians or because he breached a system of federal documents? I can see a charge coming out of hacking and the leaking, however, the information leaked was truthful. Assage's last hope was for President Trump's pardon. Now that Mr. Trump is out of office, he will be going nowhere. I am a faithful American and I do love my country, however, I do not 100% trust our government, I know things are kept from us, I don’t believe that is an unpopular opinion. There is most definitely an issue with transparency. I do think certain things of course should be kept confidential for the safety of our country but reading about the leak in which 66,000 innocent civilians were killed legitimately brought me to tears and it will remain something I am disturbed about. I do not support hacking or breaching of any sort, I think Assage had absolutely no business digging around illegal material but I do believe his situation could have been handled much better instead of being completely silenced over something of validity and truth that our own country was responsible for and I'm torn about it.
Note: Assage did not use violent action, he used freedom speech

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