Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Who Guards the Guardian?, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
From reading the New Yorker article, they had the documents for quite some time before publishing anything, and the government knew that they had them and was threatening them, so it must have been a consideration.
That refers specifically to the GCHQ revelations, which followed the original NSA reports.
Greenwald obtained the files from Snowden in May this year, unbeknownst to the governments. The first round of stories appeared in the Guardian only two or three weeks later, in the first week of June. There was no time to develop the stories, let alone read documents that would have shed light on them. It was dumb, but I guess Greenwald gave them little option.
Bart Gellman at the Washington Post said Snowden also wanted to rush publication -- he wanted a guarantee in exchange for the Prism Powerpoint that Gellman would publish within 72 hours. Gellman, quite rightly, refused to make any such guarantee to his source.
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Hard News: Who Guards the Guardian?, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
(the company that started Big Bruv was Guardian-owned at the time).
I had not realised that -- but, yes, from the Endemol UK article:
The company originated from Peter Bazalgette's sale of his television company to the Guardian Media Group (GMG) in 1990. In 1998, Endemol acquired a 50% stake and the division was named GMG Endemol. Endemol bought the company outright from GMG in 2000.[1]
The company was originally known as Broadcast Communications.
Things weren't so bad until the GFC hit the other Guardian Media Group companies:
Guardian Media Group exists to support the core purpose of its owner, Scott Trust Limited: to secure the financial and editorial independence of The Guardian in perpetuity,[6] but in the 2011/12 year the group lost £75.6 million,[7] and for the three years up to June 2012, the paper itself lost £100,000 a day - leading Intelligent Life magazine to question whether The Guardian can survive.[8]
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Hard News: Squatting in the Square, in reply to Geoff Lealand,
We lived, for some months in the 1980s, through a London winter in a squat adjacent to the Lambeth Walk. I had romantic notions of the place (…doing the Lambeth Walk) but , god, it was a dismal place. Corrugated iron everywhere, grills that slammed shut on the few sad shops at 5pm, general despair pervading..
Yes. There were a lot of places that were pretty bleak in the 80s. That made the Square all the better -- people pulled together. The squatter's cafe could be hired for something like £3 and we used it for expat Christmas parties a couple of years running. The chefs were Sue and Janis, who went on to found Cafe Astoria and other places on their return to Wellington.
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Hard News: Who Guards the Guardian?, in reply to John Elijah,
Enjoy your work Russell
Thank you! Nice Gravatar you have there.
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Hard News: Who Guards the Guardian?, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
Who knows if that would have been successful, but possibly better to get something out there so an injunction would serve less purpose?
In Britain, I don't think it would have made sense to tip off the government for just that reason. I'm more thinking of the benefits of knuckling down for two or three months and presenting a really indestructible story, with appropriate infographics. As it was that first Prism story didn't really make it clear what Prism was. And the one that followed, the NSA call database story, left out the quite important context that Sy Hersh had broken that story in (from memory) 1997, leading to an ACLU lawsuit -- but it was still going on. By comparison, the later stories that Guardian journalists have had time to work on have much more focus.
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The teenage musician says the disconnect between her life in Auckland, New Zealand, and the messages behind the top songs of the music charts she's dominating inspired her to write the hit.
"I was just sort of reeling off some of the things which are commonly mentioned in hip-hop and the Top 40. I did get a little ridiculous on it, but the sentiment's there," O'Connor says. "I've always loved hip-hop, but as a fan of hip-hop, I've always had to kind of suspend disbelief because, obviously, I don't have a Bentley. There's a distance between that and the life I have with my friends going to parties and getting public transport and doing the things that every other teenager does."
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Okay. I wasn't entirely happy with this thread concluding with exchanges with someone who had so little empathy with its themes. And a reader has sent me this, because she'd prefer it appeared anonymously. I think it's worth re-opening for.
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"While I'm saddened and disheartened by the judges comments referred to in the original post, I'm not at all surprised. Which probably saddens me most of all.
My biggest regret in my life is making the mistake of pressing charges against someone years ago and agreeing to go through the court process. While I was warned by the cop in charge that there would likely be a fair amount of blame-throwing and “what were you wearing and how were you acting?” I was nowhere near prepared to sit on a stand for a day and a half with the guy in question shooting eye daggers at me while his lawyer bought up every possible scenario he could think of that made me look like a bit of a slut. And I wasn't even legal age at the time of the incident in question.
Other (older) girls got involved and the victim-blaming at their trials were even worse. “What were you wearing?”, flirty letter exchanges were brought up, “But you went to his house and drank wine with him, did you not?”, etc etc etc.
And after a few years of this, with multiple complainants laying multiple charges, the guy is still walking the streets every day.It's the very reason that there wasn't a question in my mind, when I was later raped in my bed by someone that my flatmate had let sleep on the couch, that there would be no way in hell I'd ever make a complaint.
I'd been drinking. We'd flirted earlier. Despite the fact that he woke me up to hold me down, cover my mouth and rape me through my tears and attempts to get him off me, I'd invited it on myself. And that's what everyone would think as well.
How could they not when the system that's supposed to protect and serve justice believes that?
I don't know what it is. Whether it's a result of too many false rape complaints. Or simply an old school way of thinking that rules the courts. Or whether it's just what people think.
Like, you can't rape a prostitute, right?
Fuck that.
The thing I find the hardest about what I've seen first-hand is that if I ever have a child that has a similar thing happen, there's no doubt in my mind that I would forbid them from ever taking the matter to court.
Apparently things have changed since I was there, but from what I can tell, not too much. I'd say that while the particular scenario that started this thread was highly public, there's a whole lot of people within the court system that think exactly the same. And a whole lot of complaints that are rationalised with that kind of thinking. Until that changes, I don't see that any wider public thought is going to change. And even if it does, will it make any difference?
There's no worse feeling than being told, over and over, what you already feel might be the case anyway.
Yes, I think women do need to be careful.
Because I've seen what happens when we don't.
As have far too many others.
But I also know that after years of living in fear, I'm not going to live half a life because some bastard dictates what I should and shouldn't do to keep the “bad men” off me. I run when it's not quite light because I love running when it's not quite light. Sometimes I wear tight jeans because I like knowing my butt looks good.
Us women tend to be pretty good at knowing what we want. And trust me, if we want to have sex with you, we'll let you know.
It's just a damn shame that far too many people seem to think that anything less than that is inviting danger."
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Hard News: Rape and unreason, in reply to Dean Papa,
Don’t get angry at me.
It's a bit late for that. Your whiny self-obsession in a thread where people have really put themselves and their experiences on the line has made me angry.
A quick look at your short commenting history suggests you're more bother to keep around than it's worth. So you are banned. Please don't attempt to come back.
I'm also going to close the thread at least for the time being. Thank you to everyone who who has contributed to it in good faith. It's been very important, but I'm not sure if there's much more to be gained at this point.
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Hard News: Rape and unreason, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I was operating on the presumption that it went without saying that no rational or decent person would suggest the victims of terrorist attacks on public transport bear at least some responsibility for their fates.
My reading of the jury decision that the original post is about is that the jury saw no responsibility on the part of the victims for the aggravated robbery – but that at least some of jurors applied a different standard to the indecent assault that took place at the same time as the robbery. That the victims naturally bore no blame for the robbery – but somehow did for the indecent assault. Which is ghastly.
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Hard News: Rape and unreason, in reply to Helen Marie,
Still confused. I thought writing something might help with that. I don’t know that it has.
I hope you do feel eventually that it has helped, Helen, because the clarity and honesty of what you’ve said is of value to everyone else here.