Hustler Publisher Larry Flynt Donating $50,000 To WikiLeaks Defense Fund

There’s no confusion as to Larry Flynt‘s stances on free speech and the First Amendment. This is a man who wore an American flag as a diaper to prove a point. And now this is a man who’s donating $50,000 to the WikiLeaks defense fund. “Let’s get something straight: Julian Assange is a journalist,” he wrote in The Huffington Post, adding: “And for many of us, he’s a hero.”

The Hustler publisher conceded that Assange may not be everybody’s conventional image of a “journalist” (mine is Robert Redford‘s Bob Woodward—sorry, Dustin Hoffman, you put me on edge). But he did offer what he knows about censorship, saying that “the free flow of information is ultimately less harmful than the impeded flow of information. A democracy cannot exist without total access to the facts.”

This led him to declare, “Julian Assange should not face a prison sentence. We should have a ticker-tape parade for this brave man.” Somebody’s got a man crush. You can read the entirety of his op-ed over at Huffington Post.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!