Re:Sweden reopens Assange rape investigation, to seek extrad...
by mc32 on Monday May 13, 2019 @07:57AM
(#19898358)
I’m pretty sure just about everyone would interpret that as pre 2016 and post 2016 attitudes and not an arbitrary last year and this year.
Re:Sweden reopens Assange rape investigation, to seek extrad...
by JumpCrisscross on Monday May 13, 2019 @08:13AM
(#19898472)
> just about everyone would interpret that as pre 2016 and post 2016 attitudes and not an arbitrary last year and this year
A poll last month [1] found 73% of Americans have opinions on Wikileaks. The most common response for Julian Assange, on the other hand, was "don't know" (42%, versus 27% responding similarly for Wikileaks).
I'd guess the 38% who find Assange unfavorable is largely unchanged from, say, 2015. I'd also guess his favorability was higher in 2012. (That's what made Correa's political arithmetic around granting Assange asylum stick.)
Under this hypothesis, people didn't start hating Assange more in 2016. His base of supporters simply eroded until most didn't care about him either way. That turned him into a normal person. Normal people don't get to hang out in embassies all day.
[1] https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/20...
I don't think the public has "turned" on him. (That is, I don't think he's more unpopular now than he was a year ago.) It's more like we forgot about him. That took away the teflon coating that let him escape international arrest warrants in a South American embassy, a privilege most of us wouldn't get.
This story is best explained by reversion to the mean moreso than extraordinary current events.