The imprisonment of Julian Assange is the part of the movie where the villain finally reveals their true face for the monster they’ve always been, writes Caitlin Johnstone.
By Caitlin Johnstone
CaitlinJohnstone.com
In what Shadowproof‘s Kevin Gosztola calls “a not-so-subtle effort to criminalize the journalism of an adversarial media organization that the United States has spent the last decade working to destroy,” WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been hit with another superseding indictment by the US Department of Justice.
Shadowproof, WSWS, and Consortium News all have solid and informative write-ups on this new development. The indictment adds no new charges, is riddled with inaccuracies, glaring plot holes, and amateurish errors, relies heavily on testimony from a literal convicted pedophile and diagnosed sociopath, and appears to be little more than a feeble attempt to legitimize the injection of the words “hacking” and “hackers” into the prosecutorial narrative.
To quote Assange’s partner Stella Morris, “They didn’t throw the book at Julian. They threw bits of paper found crumpled up in the discard pile.”
DOJ's New WikiLeaks Indictment Has Significant, Convenient Plot Holes | Gizmodohttps://t.co/pJqk5ivMAL
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 26, 2020
The persecution of Julian Assange is a transparent and iron-fisted attempt by the U.S. government to globally criminalize the publication of leaks which embarrass the U.S.-centralized empire, thereby drawing a firm line which journalists all around the world know never to cross.
This is the inverted totalitarian oligarchic empire at its most overtly tyrannical. The imprisonment of Assange was the part of the movie where the villain finally reveals their true face for the monster they’ve always been, where it became clear to anyone paying attention that the US power alliance is as authoritarian and intolerant of real dissent as any tin pot dictator.
But this is the rarest form of imperial censorship. Normally, wherever possible, the power structures which dominate human civilization prefer to do so out of sight and out of mind, ideally having the inmates of the prison serve as their own wardens.
It's incredible to see book after book churn out the same discredited Russiagate hype. When I talked to an editor at a major publisher about doing a book — you know, based on actual facts — they told me their friends would be mad at them if they published it, so that was it. https://t.co/OMTvfve9bl
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) June 25, 2020
Aaron Maté, who as my regular readers already know is one of my favorite journalists on the planet right now, has an interesting new post on Twitter which reads (emphasis my own): “It’s incredible to see book after book churn out the same discredited Russiagate hype. When I talked to an editor at a major publisher about doing a book — you know, based on actual facts — they told me their friends would be mad at them if they published it, so that was it.”
This is a perfect example of the soft tyranny which does most of the key oppression of speech in the empire today. There are no laws prohibiting the publication of Maté’s award-winning journalism on the subject of the mass psychological operation known as Russiagate. Nobody who published such a book would be tortured and facing a 170-year prison sentence like Julian Assange.
Yet the speech remains restricted. Major publishers won’t touch Maté’s work. You won’t see him as a guest panelist on MSNBC or CNN. Not because those platforms are forbidden from doing so, but because they don’t choose to. As former MSNBC host Krystal Ball explained last year, an attitude of conformity has been manufactured from the top down to ensure than those who rise to the top of the most influential platforms are the ones who know how to toe the establishment line without being told. People are hired from the same conformity-enforcing universities by executives who were selected by media-owning plutocrats based on their willingness to protect the status quo their plutocratic kingdoms are built upon, and only those who play ball within that system ever rise to major positions of influence.
Many journalists – either for self-serving reasons or due to genuine befuddlement – are completely misinterpreting Bernie's media critique. The person who explained it most clearly was Noam Chomsky in this 90-second answer to an equally confused BBC host. This will clear it up: pic.twitter.com/AgznEp3LB1
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 13, 2019
“How can you know that I’m self-censoring? How can you know that journalists are-” Marr objected.
“I’m not saying you’re self-censoring,” Chomsky replied. “I’m sure you believe everything you’re saying. But what I’m saying is that if you believed something different, you wouldn’t be sitting where you’re sitting.”
I am also reminded of a quote from the movie “My Dinner with Andre”:
“I think that New York is the new model for the new concentration camp, where the camp has been built by the inmates themselves, and the inmates are the guards, and they have this pride in this thing that they’ve built—they’ve built their own prison—and so they exist in a state of schizophrenia where they are both guards and prisoners. And as a result they no longer have—having been lobotomized—the capacity to leave the prison they’ve made or even to see it as a prison.”
Did you know that depending on what country you live in, so-called “free-range” eggs are often anything but?
In the USA, for example, all that is required for chickens to be considered “free range” is for them to have “access to the outdoors.” In practice what this means is that thousands of birds are crammed into tiny, unhygienic, multi-platform barns designed to fit as many animals as possible, and then a tiny door is opened on the far end of the barn leading to some small porch area which most of the chickens never even find their way to.
The USDA imposes no requirements that the chickens ever go outdoors, or even on what “outdoors” technically needs to look like, so in practice what you get is a bunch of “free range” hens never venturing anywhere near the door, and having no reason to try to do so.
This is exactly what the much-touted “free speech” of the western world looks like in practice when it comes to platforms with major influence. The door is technically open for The New York Times or CNN to elevate voices which dissent from the official imperial narrative about what’s going on in the world, but they choose not to, because a system has been designed which disincentivizes them from doing so.
Mass media outlets are the factory farms of speech. Nothing is free, humane, or organic about either such construct. A healthy world, which we will hopefully we one day see, will have neither.
Caitlin Johnstone is a rogue journalist, poet, and utopia prepper who publishes regularlyat Medium. Her work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking her on Facebook, following her antics on Twitter, checking out her podcast on either Youtube, soundcloud, Apple podcasts or Spotify, following her on Steemit, throwing some money into her tip jar on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of her sweet merchandise, buying her books “Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone” and “Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers.”
This article was re-published with permission.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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It is very intersting. . .Congratulations Caitlin Johnstone!
What about popular sentiment in other countries? Does the USG have the whole world locked down?
Think free speech exists in the good ol’ USA? Well, think again…
Chris Hedges is running as a Green, check him out.
“Major publishers won’t touch Maté’s work” or any political work not aligned with mass media narratives.
All such work must go to unknown publishers or be self-published, and then is suppressed by Amazon et al.
Pirates and the USG suppress political works by giving away free digital copies, killing revenue to the source.
The USG refuses to investigate or allow prosecution of the copyright pirates regardless of extensive evidence.
“Major publishers won’t touch Maté’s work” or any political work not aligned with mass media narratives.
All such work must be self-published, and then is suppressed by Amazon or other diversions to other works.
The USG and no doubt others suppress political works by giving away free digital copies, killing revenue to the source.
The USG refuses to investigate or allow prosecution of the copyright pirates regardless of extensive evidence.
Based on what I’ve seen in the public schools, this kind of self-censorship also applies to teachers, especially the “woke” ones. While they speak openly (and rightly so) about the evils of racism, the issues of class, empire and neoliberalism are rarely touched on. When they are mentioned, it’s almost always in a history class, giving the impression that “these problems are not so relevant in today’s world”, especially as a critique of contemporary American society. A typical example is how MLK is treated. His ideas about racial justice are ubiquitous, yet his ideas on economics or war are virtually invisible.
Good analogy! Our mainstream media acts exactly like a monopoly. Therefore, behind the scenes it must be a monopoly. In a free society truth would be a more valuable commodity than lies. Since the MSM suppresses the truth and pushes lies, there must be some sort of collusion to prevent the more valuable commodity from reaching the market. This would logically occur at the level of controlling stock ownership behind the appointment of the CEO and the Board of Directors. Where is Teddy Roosevelt? Elliot Ness? I’m glad CN is keeping on this story.
That clip from Andre – wow
CBS already owns the British 60 Minutes TV show- report on Julian Assange. It is better than anything being shown on American TV. It was shown on TV in England.
It should be shown here on U.S. TV 60 Minutes as well.
Please ask the U.S. 60 Minutes TV show to air the English 60 Minutes TV show- on Julian Assange- in the U.S.
Send an email-60min (at) cbsnews.com
60 Minutes Phone- (212) 975-3247
On behalf of Julian, and Freedom of the Press and Free Speech-
Thank you.
Done. Thanks
Why is the Australian Government not defending Julian Assange?
If there has been any defending of him by any Australian Government Leaders, we Americans have not heard of it.
Was the English 60 Minutes TV show about Julian Assange shown in Australia?
It has not been shown here in the U.S. on TV, although we were able to watch it online.
Hopefully, you don’t think this is a really new phenomenon. Us old hippies can tell you… Janis told you what freedom really was – Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose….and Buffalo Springfield told you why. Paranoia strikes deep. Into your heart it will creep. It starts when you’re always afraid, step out of line and the man comes and takes you away…..
And I would like to add that my free range chicken eggs really are. Those little dinosaurs get to cruise the acreage eating whatever bugs, beetles, and seeds they can find and the eggs are the best I’ve ever had.
“Mass media outlets are the factory farms of speech.”
The ever-quotable CJ produces another priceless gem.
From 1949 to 1987 when Reagan abolished it, the USA actually had a fairness doctrine requiring media to allow alternative views on controversial subjects so that readers/listeners/viewers (I do not know how extensive it was) could have access to both or all sides of stories and judge for themselves. Hardly surprising that Reagan got rid of it, and I have heard that Evangelical Christians were extremely proud of their success in getting the fairness doctrine removed, never to return.
First America does not have a Department of Justice. Only a recorded message machine repeating trump demands.
Second America does not have a Legal system, Only controlled judges installed by McConnell and trump.
This will cause 40 to 60 years move problems for our reform after trump and McConnell are put in prison.
Assange must have something on the government that he does not realize. The American government needs to be tried by the United Nations International Criminal Court for crimes aginest humanity.
journalism at its best. rehabilitates, somehow, the tainted credibility of the branch.
Actually, I often think free speech is not much of a problem for the American power establishment.
The population is so conditioned and indoctrinated and pushed by social pressures that very little meaningful or risky free speech takes place.
Remarkably little.
Much of what Americans call “free speech’ today is just trivia or marginal screw-ball stuff, like the endless circles of nonsense over vaccines or medical masks.
Good God, look at the full range of politicians in Washington from both parties.What an intellectual and philosophical desert!
There is almost nothing there, except a few newcomers who are treated with contempt or widely ignored.
I love your cynicism and way with words. You speak for me. But I want to add a little Pollyanna X. They ain’t ignoring us any more. They aren’t ignoring AOC and Squad. They are spending scads of money trying to run her out of office. They are spending scads of our tax dollars hiring and arming Nazi cops to stop BLM. They’ve paid Madcow and her ilk millions to act as the steers in a bullfight—take the first goring so the Matador can do his butchery safely. And who watches them any more? Biden voters. T-rump lovers. Things are shifting. And the Ofuckas and the Nancy Baloneys are in for a big surprise. I hope it’s a vaca in gitmo, along with Dick and Bush.
Right on, It’s a good metaphor, pointing out the relativity of what the word “freedom” means
“It’s freedom of speech. As long as you don’t say too much
..now they’ve got us hypnotized and hysterical”
– Sons and Daughters – Neville Brothers
To quote Assange’s partner Stella Morris, “They didn’t throw the book at Julian. They threw bits of paper found crumpled up in the discard pile.”
The persecution of Julian Assange is a transparent and iron-fisted attempt by the U.S. government to globally criminalize the publication of leaks which embarrass the U.S.-centralized empire, thereby drawing a firm line which journalists all around the world know never to cross.
———
I got a momentary mental dissonance, the image of a gigantic iron fist throwing bits of crumpled paper. Then I realized that it is quite accurate.