The messier parts of his story are inconvenient for some of Assange’s supporters. It shows how hard it is, in the modern world, to advocate for a flawed man.
In the years Julian Assange lived in Ecuador’s London embassy, from when the country embraced his asylum claim in 2012 until they evicted him seven years later, the Wikileaks founder was under constant surveillance. Cameras recorded the comings and goings of lawyers, friends, and celebrity acolytes that included Lady Gaga, Bianca Jagger, and former Baywatch star
“We’re all flawed characters and Julian is just one of those,” says Peter Greste, a veteran Australian reporter who is now a professor of journalism at Macquarie University. “You can criticise and admire him at the same time.”when the United States dropped all but one of its 18 espionage charges against him, there was an attempt by some to dismiss the messier parts of his story; as one MP wrote, “many of the arguments against Assange have been discounted over time.
Around this time, Assange had a son, Daniel, who is now an adult and has changed his name. It’s unclear how many children Assange has; in addition to the two born during his incarceration, he has referred to having one in France. In a piece written for thein 2014, author Andrew O’Hagan, a three-time Booker Prize nominee who was hired to ghost-write a biography, quotes Assange’s then girlfriend Sarah asking whether he had been present for the births of all his children.
Wikileaks has been criticised for not redacting names to protect people’s safety or for failing to provide context for the documents, as newsrooms that adhere to journalists’ codes of ethics would have done . That’s why many argue Assange is not a journalist. But the release of the documents did expose a shameful secret that a superpower wanted to hide, and that – holding truth to power – is a central tenant of journalism.
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