Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
With that said it’s an absolute shame that so many people were unable to come out right away and condemn these actions. This was such a softball opportunity to differentiate yourself from people who make excuses for this kind of behavior and to make yourself stand in stark contrast to someone who brags about grabbing people by the pussy. And instead there is stunning silence.
Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
d-usa wrote: Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
Weird there wasn't a thread for Roger Ailes or Bill O'Reilly or Eric Bolling though, huh?
I guess there are some very fine people on both sides.
d-usa wrote: Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
Yes, it's terrible. I will never understand why people go to bat for people who do stuff like this. The last wave of Roman Polanski news, and there were still people defending a man who drugged and raped a child. There are still people who claim that Bill Cosby is innocent and that all those women made it up for money, despite the fact if 9 out of 10 of them were making it up (an utterly impossible number), you'd still have like 6 rapes.
Is...is this surprising to anyone? Hollywood is renowned for being a gakky place full of gakky people, all wrapped up in its own donkey-cave. This reputation exists for a reason. Not sure why people are surprised or shocked by this.
Meh, it’s less that entertainment elites and famous people are not known for this. We all know they can grab them by the pussy, get away with it, and become president.
The real story, and relevance to become a thread, is that he donates to Democrats like crazy. And Democrats have not really spoken out against him or send his donations to an anti-sexual assault non-profit.
d-usa wrote: Meh, it’s less that entertainment elites and famous people are not known for this. We all know they can grab them by the pussy, get away with it, and become president.
The real story, and relevance to become a thread, is that he donates to Democrats like crazy. And Democrats have not really spoken out against him or send his donations to an anti-sexual assault non-profit.
FWIW HRC came out against him today, but has not said if she will be refunding or donating out his contributions yet. I imagine that will happen in a wave now.
d-usa wrote: Meh, it’s less that entertainment elites and famous people are not known for this. We all know they can grab them by the pussy, get away with it, and become president.
The real story, and relevance to become a thread, is that he donates to Democrats like crazy. And Democrats have not really spoken out against him or send his donations to an anti-sexual assault non-profit.
FWIW HRC came out against him today, but has not said if she will be refunding or donating out his contributions yet. I imagine that will happen in a wave now.
...I can't believe I'm going to go there... but, are you assuming that HRC *knew* of Weinstein's actions? Isn't that a bit of a stretch?
Pretty much every politician he donated to should have enough on-hand to give money that equals those donations to a charity that deals with sexual assault.
Getting rid of money tainted by the action of the donor is “damage control from associating with the donor” 101.
Yeah, i think it's less about shared culpability, so much as it's the standard thing to do - like how every company that is caught doing something bad automatically says they are "taking it very seriously", or when you feel bad about something but don't feel like doing anything, you send "thoughts and prayers" - it's a meaningless but expected gesture.
There's a pattern in the Bannon bag of tricks to use sex offense accusations as a political weapon, and the best (but not only) use of this is to ward off attacks against his own side. After the Access Hollywood tape broke, it was Bannon that suggested to Trump to have all of Bill Clinton's accusers gather for a press conference before the second debate. Attacking Bill, and by proxy Hillary, to disrupt attacks on Trump for his own sexual predations.
Needless to say, this is an incredibly fethed bit of cynicism, even by Bannon's standards. And it works, as we can see from the press coverage of this, and by whembly coming here carrying the narrative of this as an attack on Hollywood as a whole.
And that's a real shame. Because it distracts from the actual conversation that needs to happen about all these powerful figures. Weinstein, Ailes, O'Reilly, Cosby, it is great that all these people were finally outed and their victims able to tell their stories and be believed. But none of them were finally outed because we're getting any better at dealing with predators and rejecting them.
Weinstein finally got revealed because his reputation as the guy you went to for critical acclaim and Oscar wins dried up after a long lean patch. Without that cred, his ability to influence people to get these stories shut down faltered, and he was finally revealed. Ailes got outed not when Carlson made her accusation, but when the new generation of Murdoch's decided that Ailes wasn't the guy to lead the next era in FOX News, and they were happy to cut him loose. O'Reilly got done in because Ailes was no longer there to cover for him. Cosby went decades after he'd been a big earner and cultural force before women were finally to speak up and be listened, and it's still a battle to get a conviction against him.
This is a gak state of affairs, and it is something that needs to be dealt with through real and genuine conversation. We need to talk about how money and power builds a culture of silence around people like Weinstein, and allows them to do this to women for years. Instead it's being railroaded in to a spoiling attack on the Democrats, to cover a president with a long history of sexual predations. In effect this attack being used as like this is just a continuation of the protection of those in power, because Trump is powerful, those around him look to diminish the experiences of his victims, in this case by making the predations of another person in to a political quagmire.
No, I mean... I believe him. I totally believe him. It's just incredible. I mean, I can see someone sexually assaulting an 18 year old female actress, but Terry Crews... man.
It turns out the same district attorney that rejected the advice of his own prosecution team to charge Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr for real estate fraud after Trump Sr's lawyer made some campaign donations, also happened to be the same guy who rejected the advice of his prosecution team in deciding to decline to prosecute Weinstein for one of his abuses. This guy recently won his primary election, and is now running unopposed for the Manhattan district. There's some talk about a write in campaign, becuse if that doesn't happen this guy will be DA for another 4 years.
Also, this guy's name is Cyrus Vance, so I'm pretty sure he's a villain from 1990s sci-fi movie who somehow escaped and is now hiding on Earth.
Anyhow, it's a small insight in to how the influence campaign works with this kind of thing. Because the money given both by Trump's lawyer and then by Weinstein's was bugger all in the scheme of things. But that isn't what its about. The point is that Vance had longstanding records of donations from the lawyers for Trump and the Weinsteins. So if Vance was to ignore than and prosecute, he'd be telling all his donors that there's no point giving money because Vance can't be relied on to help you out. That's how the money works. That's one reason people can do anything like this with little fear of reprisal.
Ouze wrote: No, I mean... I believe him. I totally believe him. It's just incredible. I mean, I can see someone sexually assaulting an 18 year old female actress, but Terry Crews... man.
d-usa wrote: Pretty much every politician he donated to should have enough on-hand to give money that equals those donations to a charity that deals with sexual assault.
Getting rid of money tainted by the action of the donor is “damage control from associating with the donor” 101.
Ouze wrote: Yeah, i think it's less about shared culpability, so much as it's the standard thing to do - like how every company that is caught doing something bad automatically says they are "taking it very seriously", or when you feel bad about something but don't feel like doing anything, you send "thoughts and prayers" - it's a meaningless but expected gesture.
Ah... good points.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Meet Tapper hitting the issue on it's head:
Key bit:
You don’t get to pick and choose which ones you find valid and outrageous based on political party
I’m pretty sure that I have heard rumors about Lindsey Lohan being so messed up because her parents whored her around to important people in the business to “help” her career.
It honestly sounds plausible enough to be true, and I would be shocked if she would be the only one.
d-usa wrote: I’m pretty sure that I have heard rumors about Lindsey Lohan being so messed up because her parents whored her around to important people in the business to “help” her career.
It honestly sounds plausible enough to be true, and I would be shocked if she would be the only one.
Interesting that you mentioned her specifically. I heard on the radio this morning that she has voiced her support for Weinstein.
d-usa wrote: Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
With that said it’s an absolute shame that so many people were unable to come out right away and condemn these actions. This was such a softball opportunity to differentiate yourself from people who make excuses for this kind of behavior and to make yourself stand in stark contrast to someone who brags about grabbing people by the pussy. And instead there is stunning silence.
Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
As a victim of sexual abuse, it took me 8 years before I was able to come forward and talk about it. I'm sorry D, but you can't attack the victim for being silent about it. To have something like that done to you, it's nearly as traumatic as they come, and the best way I've reconciled it, is that your brain would just rather file it away, and forget about it, then make an issue of it.
Today I'm open about it. I was a child when I was raped, on a repeated basis, for a number of weeks. I had no control over the situation, I could do nothing to stop it. I don't feel guilt over it. Plenty of anger still there, but no guilt. As an adult, I can completely understand there being plenty of guilt involved, because the logical side of your brain is telling you that you have the power to end this, yet for some reason you aren't doing it. It's easier to just pack it away and "forget" about it. As Terry Crews said in his tweets (and I feel he's absolutely right about it), sometimes it takes one person to show that courage, to give others the courage they need to finally come forth about it, and no one should denigrate them for it.
You know, in a crappy roundabout way, this might improve the US for the better. Look at the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings, for example, and the conversation that was started about workplace sexual harassment. The net gain was that people are now generally far more aware that they don't need to tolerate this kind of behavior in the workplace, just as Justice Thomas was able to cast a deciding vote in weakening legal protections for sexual harassment in the workplace... um, well, there is more awareness now, anyway, I guess is the silver lining I was fishing for.
d-usa wrote: Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
With that said it’s an absolute shame that so many people were unable to come out right away and condemn these actions. This was such a softball opportunity to differentiate yourself from people who make excuses for this kind of behavior and to make yourself stand in stark contrast to someone who brags about grabbing people by the pussy. And instead there is stunning silence.
Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
As a victim of sexual abuse, it took me 8 years before I was able to come forward and talk about it. I'm sorry D, but you can't attack the victim for being silent about it. To have something like that done to you, it's nearly as traumatic as they come, and the best way I've reconciled it, is that your brain would just rather file it away, and forget about it, then make an issue of it.
Today I'm open about it. I was a child when I was raped, on a repeated basis, for a number of weeks. I had no control over the situation, I could do nothing to stop it. I don't feel guilt over it. Plenty of anger still there, but no guilt. As an adult, I can completely understand there being plenty of guilt involved, because the logical side of your brain is telling you that you have the power to end this, yet for some reason you aren't doing it. It's easier to just pack it away and "forget" about it. As Terry Crews said in his tweets (and I feel he's absolutely right about it), sometimes it takes one person to show that courage, to give others the courage they need to finally come forth about it, and no one should denigrate them for it.
Kimmel's holier-than-thou spiel is getting old though...
However, totallyonboard in never blaming those who didn't speak out about this.
I can see that there's frustration in this that others has tried to speak up about: See Cory Feldman and Elijah Woods.
At the same time, this is an industry that requires you to know the right people to be successful... and it appears, that many of those "people" abuse their position of power in despicable ways.
I hope there are legal actions forthcoming with this... let 'em have their day in court, but by god if the allegation is true that Weinstein raped these women, and it was his staff that help orchastrated it... they all fething need to go to prison.
d-usa wrote: Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
With that said it’s an absolute shame that so many people were unable to come out right away and condemn these actions. This was such a softball opportunity to differentiate yourself from people who make excuses for this kind of behavior and to make yourself stand in stark contrast to someone who brags about grabbing people by the pussy. And instead there is stunning silence.
Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
As a victim of sexual abuse, it took me 8 years before I was able to come forward and talk about it. I'm sorry D, but you can't attack the victim for being silent about it. To have something like that done to you, it's nearly as traumatic as they come, and the best way I've reconciled it, is that your brain would just rather file it away, and forget about it, then make an issue of it.
Today I'm open about it. I was a child when I was raped, on a repeated basis, for a number of weeks. I had no control over the situation, I could do nothing to stop it. I don't feel guilt over it. Plenty of anger still there, but no guilt. As an adult, I can completely understand there being plenty of guilt involved, because the logical side of your brain is telling you that you have the power to end this, yet for some reason you aren't doing it. It's easier to just pack it away and "forget" about it. As Terry Crews said in his tweets (and I feel he's absolutely right about it), sometimes it takes one person to show that courage, to give others the courage they need to finally come forth about it, and no one should denigrate them for it.
My complaint about the silence was aimed at the people he donated to. They should have spoken out against him the day the story broke and dumbed his money as fast as they could.
Victims are often silent for many reasons: shame, feeling blame, feeling powerless. Seeing how long he’s been able to get away with it before getting nailed (mostly because his shield of success hit a dry spell), it would be hard to blame his victims for feeling the way they did.
Victims are always victims, silent or not, and I won’t blame them for his behavior nor for the behavior of others like him.
The real problem is this slimeball is so powerful and his production company so successful that even A-Listers were afraid to publicly call him out - they would be blacklisted and never work again. It has taken a brave nobody to come out and now the floodgates have burst open. You will have a lot of big (bigger?) names coming out with stories. It is such a shame he held so much power to keep it hidden so long.
A brave nobody made no difference. Reporters have been pushing this story for over a decade and were shot down. It’s been general knowledge in the industry.
The only difference now is that his success dried up. A successful rapist is tolerable, but if you don’t deliver awards and success to yourself and those working with you, then you end up having to account for your actions.
MDSW wrote: The real problem is this slimeball is so powerful and his production company so successful that even A-Listers were afraid to publicly call him out - they would be blacklisted and never work again. It has taken a brave nobody to come out and now the floodgates have burst open. You will have a lot of big (bigger?) names coming out with stories. It is such a shame he held so much power to keep it hidden so long.
He belongs in jail for a long time.
He may lose some civil suits ( he won't, they will settle), but he will never spend a minute in handcuffs. The hyperwealthy do not go to jail.
d-usa wrote: A brave nobody made no difference. Reporters have been pushing this story for over a decade and were shot down. It’s been general knowledge in the industry.
The only difference now is that his success dried up. A successful rapist is tolerable, but if you don’t deliver awards and success to yourself and those working with you, then you end up having to account for your actions.
Success is the big reason why people stay quite. Heck, Hollywood as a whole has on multiple occasions cheered, celebrated, and awarded an ADMITTED child rapist that fled the jurisdiction. Some of the stars currently speaking up knew about him and willingly worked with him. Had Polanski been a mid-level B-movie producer, they would have shunned him like a leper.
He may lose some civil suits ( he won't, they will settle), but he will never spend a minute in handcuffs. The hyperwealthy do not go to jail.
I think the issue is the statute of limitation. I think the limit on that is 5 years, which puts most of the accusers far outside the ability to press charges.
I predict this will go away quickly. Too many powerful people implicated, like the Madame list of Hollywood clients.
I don't know, this may be the tipping point on exposing all of this crap in Hollywood. We may learn a lot about some of our favorite stars we didn't want to learn.
I predict this will go away quickly. Too many powerful people implicated, like the Madame list of Hollywood clients.
I don't know, this may be the tipping point on exposing all of this crap in Hollywood. We may learn a lot about some of our favorite stars we didn't want to learn.
It's hard to believe in "tipping" points anymore...
I'm glad that this is finally getting attention, but I agree with D-USA: He only was stopped when he no longer was as influential.
cuda1179 wrote: I think the issue is the statute of limitation. I think the limit on that is 5 years, which puts most of the accusers far outside the ability to press charges.
I had hoped after the Cosby case we'd have seen a wider removal on the statue of limitations on sexual assault - there was, but only a little in a few states. Perhaps this will spur a little more in that direction.
cuda1179 wrote: I think the issue is the statute of limitation. I think the limit on that is 5 years, which puts most of the accusers far outside the ability to press charges.
I had hoped after the Cosby case we'd have seen a wider removal on the statue of limitations on sexual assault - there was, but only a little in a few states. Perhaps this will spur a little more in that direction.
I REALLY don't want statutes of limitations to be lifted. I want these women to have justice, but not at the expense of due process and the rights of the accused to have a fair trial. For example, in the Cosby case, I think the guy is a total POS, and likely did it. However, if I was on a jury I'd probably vote not guilty based on the time it took to come forward. Speaking as a someone who was also victimized, I sympathize, but prosecution must happen in a timely manner.
While I think it is worthwhile looking at the culture surrounding Weinstein, this remains a particularly limited look at workplace sexual harrassment. Right now Bill O'Reilly is back at FOX News, doing work as a guest commentator, and no-one seems all that bothered about it. How the hell is this happening, where there's such righteous outrage, entirely justified, about Weinstein actions and the surrounding cover ups, but then with another sexual predator who's crimes were also covered up in exactly the same way there was no attempt to expand the coverage beyond O'Reilly, and then silence when he was welcomed back in to the fold at FOX?
Anyhow, as to how things like this can go on for so long, Gwyneth Paltrow's story is quite telling. As a young actress she was manipulated by Weinstein in to meeting alone in his hotel room for a script reading for Emma. After the reading he invited her in to his bedroom, where he tried to initiate something. She left.
She didn't tell anyone, in addition to feelings of vulnerability and foolishness, she knew he had ended the careers of girls who had much more work to their name than Paltrow had at that stage of her career in a second. Weinstein had torpedoes Mira Sorvino's career after she tried to speak out*. Paltrow told a few people, her partner at the time Brad Pitt made threats against him. But the thing is - she kept working with Weinstein. She remained on with Emma, her first leading role in a prestige movie. This launched Paltrow's career, and afterwards she continued working with Weinstein. It was in Weinstein's Shakespeare in Love that Paltrow won her Academy Award.
So that's the power that people like Weinstein wield. If you go along he can give a career. If you speak out he can end it just as fast. No wonder he was able to get away with it so long, and no wonder it only ended when his successes dried up and his power diminished.
*I wonder if this is where that horrible rumour that Sorvino's name was read out incorrectly for her Oscar win, denying her the respect that should have come?
cuda1179 wrote: I think the issue is the statute of limitation. I think the limit on that is 5 years, which puts most of the accusers far outside the ability to press charges.
I had hoped after the Cosby case we'd have seen a wider removal on the statue of limitations on sexual assault - there was, but only a little in a few states. Perhaps this will spur a little more in that direction.
Yeah... in my aforementioned situation, I learned that the statute of limitations had passed in Florida, by the time I was ready to come forward about it. That burned me a bit.
Granted, I get there comes a certain point where it becomes really hard to prove, and it can boil down to little more then one word against the other.
cuda1179 wrote: I think the issue is the statute of limitation. I think the limit on that is 5 years, which puts most of the accusers far outside the ability to press charges.
I had hoped after the Cosby case we'd have seen a wider removal on the statue of limitations on sexual assault - there was, but only a little in a few states. Perhaps this will spur a little more in that direction.
I REALLY don't want statutes of limitations to be lifted. I want these women to have justice, but not at the expense of due process and the rights of the accused to have a fair trial. For example, in the Cosby case, I think the guy is a total POS, and likely did it. However, if I was on a jury I'd probably vote not guilty based on the time it took to come forward. Speaking as a someone who was also victimized, I sympathize, but prosecution must happen in a timely manner.
What exactly is the value to society of giving sex offenders a free pass if you wait long enough?
Ouze wrote: What exactly is the value to society of giving sex offenders a free pass if you wait long enough?
It becomes harder to test the validity of a story as time goes on. If an accusation is made immediately, you can get statements straight away, and those statements can be checked against evidence and also checked for internal consistency. But if that statement comes 25 years after the event, there's going to be little evidence to check, and internal consistencies may simply be because it happened 25 years ago and things have been remembered incorrectly.
That said, I'm not a fan of statutes of limitations. It seems the concerns above can be factored in by a judge or jury in considering doubt. It makes sense that such delays would make a conviction harder, not that it would always make a conviction so impossible that we should remove the ability to even try. And the fact that some crimes are exempted from these statutes is evidence that we know we can overcome these limitations and still build a case sufficient for conviction.
Yeah I've definitely on the side of no statute of limitations for some crimes, and sexual assault seems like a no-brainer to me, especially given how we now understand that there are a variety of compelling reasons victims do not come forward right away.
cuda1179 wrote: I REALLY don't want statutes of limitations to be lifted. I want these women to have justice, but not at the expense of due process and the rights of the accused to have a fair trial. For example, in the Cosby case, I think the guy is a total POS, and likely did it. However, if I was on a jury I'd probably vote not guilty based on the time it took to come forward. Speaking as a someone who was also victimized, I sympathize, but prosecution must happen in a timely manner.
16 states in the US already have no SOL for rape or sexual assault. 27 states extend the SOL if DNA comes forward. Some of the states that do have a SOL extend it out as far as 30 years. This isn't a particularly new or extreme idea, and I'd like to see it streamlined across the rest of the country.
I live on the Iowa/Illinois border, and I can't see the sense that if a child is molested and doesn't come forward for 4 years, the perpetrator will be prosecuted here, but would be free to molest again if they live 5 miles away across the river.
Honestly I find it bizarre that we base statue of limitations on when the offense occurred instead of on when an accusation is made. The idea of due process is that legal proceedings shouldn't be drawn out and thus a detriment to the life of the accused, which is funny because the best first line of defense in the courts is drag out proceedings for as long as remotely possible. Anyway I think it's backwards.
The timer for statutory limitations shouldn't kick in until a police report is filed, or an investigation opened (something like that). A defendant isn't in danger, or their life negatively impacted, but no accusing them of anything so to me its always been a bit silly that the timer can run while law enforcement and the courts don't even know that something may or may not have happened.
Why do we focus on asking why victims didn't come forward when there must be scores of others that know. Words like 'open secret' are used because you have other people in film crews and production, with that many projects it defies belief that it wasn't known to go on by a significant number of people. People who know what it means when he 'invites women to his room' and the manner of what goes on but look the other way.
Howard A Treesong wrote: Why do we focus on asking why victims didn't come forward when there must be scores of others that know. Words like 'open secret' are used because you have other people in film crews and production, with that many projects it defies belief that it wasn't known to go on by a significant number of people. People who know what it means when he 'invites women to his room' and the manner of what goes on but look the other way.
It's the victim who has to come forward. If a third party sees something happen, it is not their place to make a public declaration when the victim hasn't yet made the choice to make it public. That is the victim's choice. Certainly if the victim goes public then the third party has a responsibility to provide whatever evidence he has, but it isn't up to him to decide for the victim that it should be made public.
Howard A Treesong wrote: Why do we focus on asking why victims didn't come forward when there must be scores of others that know. Words like 'open secret' are used because you have other people in film crews and production, with that many projects it defies belief that it wasn't known to go on by a significant number of people. People who know what it means when he 'invites women to his room' and the manner of what goes on but look the other way.
It was widely known. The whole board of his company knew about it but only cared to say anything when they could use the accusations to kick him out and take over. That Hollywood is run by rapist men is obvious. Media doesn't care much because, hey, guess who are pals with media company executives.
I couldn't give two hoots for Weinstein, but what annoys the hell out of me is the trial by media.
We have such a thing as innocent until proven guilty, in the Western world. Give the man a chance to defend himself in a court of law before we start passing judgement.
d-usa wrote: Jimmy Kinmel’s response to a certain family member really was perfect.
There is no way this thread won’t become political, since the whole issue has been normalized and made acceptable by politics. Im guessing that the political implications (he was a heavy donor to the left, who mostly stayed silent since the news broke) is part of the reason why whembly was interested enough in this event to start a thread.
Weird there wasn't a thread for Roger Ailes or Bill O'Reilly or Eric Bolling though, huh?
I guess there are some very fine people on both sides.
d-usa wrote: Heartbreaking really, I don’t care how much money he pushed their way. Their silence after the fact is a stain on all of them.
Yes, it's terrible. I will never understand why people go to bat for people who do stuff like this. The last wave of Roman Polanski news, and there were still people defending a man who drugged and raped a child. There are still people who claim that Bill Cosby is innocent and that all those women made it up for money, despite the fact if 9 out of 10 of them were making it up (an utterly impossible number), you'd still have like 6 rapes.
Bill Cosby is innocent until a judge and jury say otherwise. It's the only way for society to function, otherwise we have mob justice and nobody wants that.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: I couldn't give two hoots for Weinstein, but what annoys the hell out of me is the trial by media.
We have such a thing as innocent until proven guilty, in the Western world. Give the man a chance to defend himself in a court of law before we start passing judgement.
Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
LordofHats wrote: Honestly I find it bizarre that we base statue of limitations on when the offense occurred instead of on when an accusation is made. The idea of due process is that legal proceedings shouldn't be drawn out and thus a detriment to the life of the accused, which is funny because the best first line of defense in the courts is drag out proceedings for as long as remotely possible. Anyway I think it's backwards.
The timer for statutory limitations shouldn't kick in until a police report is filed, or an investigation opened (something like that). A defendant isn't in danger, or their life negatively impacted, but no accusing them of anything so to me its always been a bit silly that the timer can run while law enforcement and the courts don't even know that something may or may not have happened.
It makes sense because we really don't want to make a habit of digging up old cases from decades ago, where evidence hasn't been preserved, witness memories are no longer reliable, etc. I mean, do you really think there's going to be anything resembling a fair and accurate trial if someone finally makes an accusation 75 years after the crime occurred?
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: I couldn't give two hoots for Weinstein, but what annoys the hell out of me is the trial by media.
We have such a thing as innocent until proven guilty, in the Western world. Give the man a chance to defend himself in a court of law before we start passing judgement.
Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Well, that's your right to hold such a viewpoint, but over the years, I've always stuck to 3 key points in these situations:
1. Accusation does not equate guilt.
2. Trial by media is never a good thing
3. innocent until proven guilty.
We've had a few high-profile cases of celebrities in the UK being accused of child abuse, their reputations dragged through the gutter, only for the whole thing to collapse, usually due to the police trying to make a name for themselves.
If Weinstein is guilty of these crimes, I'll be the first to point the finger at him, but hysterical media trials, are not good for Western society IMO.
Peregrine wrote: Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Do you understand why innocent before proven guilty applies? Because precisely your sort of attitude leads easily to permanent damage to lives of people accused _even when they are innocent_.
Treating accused as guilty before proven like you results in lives ruined. Not even in theory but in practice. Are you willing to pay up for those you accuse falsely?
Ouze wrote: Yeah I've definitely on the side of no statute of limitations for some crimes, and sexual assault seems like a no-brainer to me, especially given how we now understand that there are a variety of compelling reasons victims do not come forward right away.
cuda1179 wrote: I REALLY don't want statutes of limitations to be lifted. I want these women to have justice, but not at the expense of due process and the rights of the accused to have a fair trial. For example, in the Cosby case, I think the guy is a total POS, and likely did it. However, if I was on a jury I'd probably vote not guilty based on the time it took to come forward. Speaking as a someone who was also victimized, I sympathize, but prosecution must happen in a timely manner.
16 states in the US already have no SOL for rape or sexual assault. 27 states extend the SOL if DNA comes forward. Some of the states that do have a SOL extend it out as far as 30 years. This isn't a particularly new or extreme idea, and I'd like to see it streamlined across the rest of the country.
I live on the Iowa/Illinois border, and I can't see the sense that if a child is molested and doesn't come forward for 4 years, the perpetrator will be prosecuted here, but would be free to molest again if they live 5 miles away across the river.
I don't think it's about letting a child molester go free, I think it's about the probability of getting a conviction. I've always thought of statute of limitations as prosecutors telling victims Don't bring me a case I can't make/win. Coming forward years later when the case is essentially one person's word against another's without the hope of physical evidence or third party witnesses or other corroborating evidence being gathered isn't going to lead to convictions. The police are a reactionary force, if you wait too long to report a crime to them then it may be too late for them to convict the perpetrator. I can see how this puts more onus on the victim to speak up which certainly isn't easy but it's due to necessity and not done for nefarious purposes. That said, I don't know what the correct timeframe is for SOL and I think it should be as long as is practical. Unfortunately with horrific crimes like child molestation and rape, the longer the crime goes unreported the greater the probability of the perpetrator victimizing more people.
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TheAuldGrump wrote: Good gods... does nobody remember Stanford White, or the Fatty Arbuckle case?
This is not a new story, it is the same story, over, and over, and over again.
The Auld Grump
Very true. Industries that are built on an exploitative business model, like the entertainment industry (movies, music, sports etc) are going to exploit people. Studio executives, coaches, managers, producers etc. are gatekeepers standing between the talent and their goals and that creates an unbalanced relationship that is rife with exploitation and predation. These scandals are all too common because we've set up a power structure that makes them inevitable.
Peregrine wrote: Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Do you understand why innocent before proven guilty applies? Because precisely your sort of attitude leads easily to permanent damage to lives of people accused _even when they are innocent_.
Treating accused as guilty before proven like you results in lives ruined. Not even in theory but in practice. Are you willing to pay up for those you accuse falsely?
Weinstein's thirty years as a rapist has been an open secret for about as long as it has been going on. People have known about it, people have talked about it but no one has actually done anything until now, when there was an opportunity to kick him out and take over his position in his company. This isn't the right case to be very insistent about him being innocent until proven guilty.
There's also the inertia of the unofficial "this is how you make it in Hollywood" rule, as well as the widespread understanding of sex with a major power imbalance being inherently non-consensual is a relatively new thing.
Peregrine wrote: Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Do you understand why innocent before proven guilty applies? Because precisely your sort of attitude leads easily to permanent damage to lives of people accused _even when they are innocent_.
Treating accused as guilty before proven like you results in lives ruined. Not even in theory but in practice. Are you willing to pay up for those you accuse falsely?
Well, he has already said he needs help and therapy. So he has pretty much admitted to all of these terrible things.
Peregrine wrote:It makes sense because we really don't want to make a habit of digging up old cases from decades ago
We do that for lots of crimes. Murder generally has no statue of limitations. Various kinds of fraud or conspiracy also generally have no limitations. If someone comes forward and says "LordofHats killed Fred" in 1965, there's nothing usually stopping the cops from looking into it. Notably, many states have limitations for sexual assault and rape, but place no limitations on such if a minor was involved. If you stole public money or headed a pyramid scheme, murdered someone, robbed a bank, or raped a kid we'll hunt you to the ends of the Earth, but if you dragged your secretary into the closet and ripped her clothes off eleven years ago your fine because the statute of limitations is 10 years? If anything the way statue of limitations plays out says more about society than the crimes.
Either the evidence exists or it doesn't, but that's a separate matter. I'm purely talking about the logic behind statues of limitation. Schrodinger's cat is incapable of harming you until you open the figurative box to know if it is actually there or not. The logic is that no one should have the threat of unfiled charges hanging over their head (which is totally fair I'm not disagreeing with that), but if there's no accusations or police investigation, there is no threat so why do we start the clock on when a crime, that may or may have never happened, is said to have occurred instead of when a report is filed or an accusation made?
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Prestor Jon wrote: That said, I don't know what the correct timeframe is for SOL and I think it should be as long as is practical. Unfortunately with horrific crimes like child molestation and rape, the longer the crime goes unreported the greater the probability of the perpetrator victimizing more people.
The statues actually vary pretty wildly. You could almost make a bingo board for for how many years a limitation is, say a crime, throw a dart and you'll probably be right somewhere.
Howard A Treesong wrote: Why do we focus on asking why victims didn't come forward when there must be scores of others that know. Words like 'open secret' are used because you have other people in film crews and production, with that many projects it defies belief that it wasn't known to go on by a significant number of people. People who know what it means when he 'invites women to his room' and the manner of what goes on but look the other way.
It's the victim who has to come forward. If a third party sees something happen, it is not their place to make a public declaration when the victim hasn't yet made the choice to make it public. That is the victim's choice. Certainly if the victim goes public then the third party has a responsibility to provide whatever evidence he has, but it isn't up to him to decide for the victim that it should be made public.
It's everyone's duty to report a criminal offence, especially when the victim is too scared to speak out. Otherwise you contribute to the silence and climate of fear.
This article talks about some serious allegations and rumours about the utterly brilliant Louis CK that I didn't know. Feth me, man. Everyone's a monster.
This article talks about some serious allegations and rumours about the utterly brilliant Louis CK that I didn't know. Feth me, man. Everyone's a monster.
Yeah, I read an article awhile back where Tig Notaro brings it up. She talks about how he is an "Executive Producer" on her new show but wants everyone to know he does absolutely nothing on it and has nothing to do with it. Partially because of all of this.
Unfortunately, absent evidence (a la Monica's dress) or corroborating witnesses, the court of law cannot handle this kind of crime. She says yes, he says no, now what? flip a coin, one that is weighted by how successful each lawyer is at smearing the character of the opposing party?
Unfortunately, absent evidence (a la Monica's dress) or corroborating witnesses, the court of law cannot handle this kind of crime. She says yes, he says no, now what? flip a coin, one that is weighted by how successful each lawyer is at smearing the character of the opposing party?
I appreciate how difficult these types of cases can be for our courts, and I don't want to downplay it.
However, the backbone of Western Civilization is that if a person is accused of a crime, then it has to be proved beyond all reasonable doubt that they are guilty, before you take their liberty away from them and throw them in jail.
Unfortunately, absent evidence (a la Monica's dress) or corroborating witnesses, the court of law cannot handle this kind of crime. She says yes, he says no, now what? flip a coin, one that is weighted by how successful each lawyer is at smearing the character of the opposing party?
I appreciate how difficult these types of cases can be for our courts, and I don't want to downplay it.
However, the backbone of Western Civilization is that if a person is accused of a crime, then it has to be proved beyond all reasonable doubt that they are guilty, before you take their liberty away from them and throw them in jail.
Agree 100%.
I do not necessarily think Woody Allen should be in jail. I do, however think he is a fething creep and I cannot enjoy his movies anymore because of that.
While its not the same as seeing your perp go to jail... it's often times easier to litigate in civil court.
Weinstein isn't poor...
He also owns much of his company...
Not to mention the fact that he had his minions help him put these women in compromising positions. If that could be proven, that blows the barn door wide open for liabilities.
Peregrine wrote: Innocent until proven guilty only applies in court. As individuals not acting as representatives of the state we have every right to look at the evidence so far and conclude that the is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Do you understand why innocent before proven guilty applies? Because precisely your sort of attitude leads easily to permanent damage to lives of people accused _even when they are innocent_.
Treating accused as guilty before proven like you results in lives ruined. Not even in theory but in practice. Are you willing to pay up for those you accuse falsely?
This was an open secret in Hollywierd...
I take it you haven't herd the infamous hotel room tapes, yet....
Grab the popcorn and watch the flakes turn on each other as they pick the bones clean after he is put away...
There will probably be three or four more guest stars to the show eating it by the end of the situation. I'm sure we will also see a dress, or movie, or hidden camera action as well, mysteriously volunteered by some honest upstanding paparazzi.
In celebrity cases like this, the court of public opinion might be the only real option a lot of the victims have. And it may be the only power they hold over the perpetrator.
People in power know that the victim won't speak out because they can ruin their career. The victim has to decide "is this worth it, who will believe me, will anything happen to him or will it all happen to me". There doesn't even have to be a legal threat of libel or anything like that for the victim. They know the "cost" of coming forward comes from simply being outcast from the industry.
So will the court of public opinion do the same to perpetrators? Will they have to decide "there will be no legal ramifications here, but who will believe her, who will believe me, is this worth it" and even if nothing ever happens to them in a court of law, could the threat of simply being outcast from the industry cause enough of a deterrent?
This, of course, depends on a culture change that includes all of us. Studios, actors, producers, advertisers, all need to be willing to stand up and say "feth the awards, I don't care how it will help my career, I won't work with this person anymore". People need to be willing to no longer go to any movies involving them.
Within a couple of days we've got from insinuations against the media that they were part of the cover up because they hadn't reported on Weinstein in the past, and now people are attacking the media for trying and convicting the guy before he's had his day in court. This is fething ridiculous.
Why are people shopping around to blame the victims, or the media, or the Democrats, and even Obama? What in the feth is going on? Where did this fething nonsense start, and where will it end? Harvey Weinstein is a sexual predator, and he should be condemned, and anyone who acted to cover up his crime should be just as roundly condemned. That's the list of actual, real villains in this. But a person is not a villain if they learn something horrible happened to a victim, see that victim is remaining silent, and don't go make the decision to make that victim's suffering public. A person is not a villain if they received a story on this, but decided a single anonymous source wasn't sufficient to accuse someone of a crime in a newspaper article. A person is not a villain if they took money from a donor who turned out to be a villain. And no, the media are not now villains because they are reporting on this now with an assumption that the dozens of women who've come forward probably aren't all lying.
Rosebuddy wrote: That Hollywood is run by rapist men is obvious.
Jesus Christ calm down. There's an issue in Hollywood but your post asserts all men in power in the studios are rapists and that's more than irresponsible, it's actually pretty ridiculous.
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Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: I couldn't give two hoots for Weinstein, but what annoys the hell out of me is the trial by media.
We have such a thing as innocent until proven guilty, in the Western world. Give the man a chance to defend himself in a court of law before we start passing judgement.
This is a nonsense standard that people like to claim, but no-one actually lives by. Afterall, in 1995 OJ Simpson had been accused of murder and found not guilty. By your standard you would have been fine introducing him to your daughter, and happy when it started to lead to a relationship between the two.
It is essential that the courts maintain innocent until proven guilty. That is a key element of the rule of law. But it's an absolute nonsense to demand every individual acts completely neutral until the court case is heard. Human beings don't function like that and should not function like that.
You know I've never really liked NBC (in so far as I can "like" any TV news). I don't really know why I don't like them and never have, but I don't and never have and now I feel justified in that sentiment
This is TMZ... so not sure if accurate... if it is... hooboy.
...
The contract says as long as Weinstein pays, it constitutes a "cure" for the misconduct and no further action can be taken. Translation -- Weinstein could be sued over and over and as long as he wrote a check, he keeps his job.
....
Sure...we'll keep ya, as long as you paid us back for settling harrasment cases.
OgreChubbs wrote: I never heard anyone say he threatened them just bribe them....
The one girl I seen said she did things for a job and money..... Doesn't that just mean she is just a prostitute.
No, feth that. Bad take. Really horrible, awful take. He didn't just bribe them. He didn't just walk up to random girls and say he'd put them in a movie if they screwed him. If he did that it would be close to the prostitution claim you made. But it isn't what Weinstein did. What he did was give the pretense of a normal employment relationship, used that to lure the girls in to places where they were very vulnerable, and then used his position of power to assert pressure on them to submit to various sex acts. If they went to speak out afterwards they were threatened with being shut out of Hollywood, denied an ability to earn a living in their profession of choice. This was likely not just a threat, but something Weinstein did to several girls.
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Howard A Treesong wrote: It's everyone's duty to report a criminal offence, especially when the victim is too scared to speak out. Otherwise you contribute to the silence and climate of fear.
If a victim is working through the issue in their way, and you take it on yourself to ignore their wishes and do what you think is best for them, you're an donkey-cave. This doesn't mean you accept a culture of silence, but there's way to fight that without removing women's right to make her own choices.
OgreChubbs wrote: I never heard anyone say he threatened them just bribe them....
The one girl I seen said she did things for a job and money..... Doesn't that just mean she is just a prostitute.
No, feth that. Bad take. Really horrible, awful take. He didn't just bribe them. He didn't just walk up to random girls and say he'd put them in a movie if they screwed him. If he did that it would be close to the prostitution claim you made. But it isn't what Weinstein did. What he did was give the pretense of a normal employment relationship, used that to lure the girls in to places where they were very vulnerable, and then used his position of power to assert pressure on them to submit to various sex acts. If they went to speak out afterwards they were threatened with being shut out of Hollywood, denied an ability to earn a living in their profession of choice. This was likely not just a threat, but something Weinstein did to several girls.
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Howard A Treesong wrote: It's everyone's duty to report a criminal offence, especially when the victim is too scared to speak out. Otherwise you contribute to the silence and climate of fear.
If a victim is working through the issue in their way, and you take it on yourself to ignore their wishes and do what you think is best for them, you're an donkey-cave. This doesn't mean you accept a culture of silence, but there's way to fight that without removing women's right to make her own choices.
A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
Yeah... well, maybe if the guys ex-wife had done more then just move on with her life, and pretended he'd never do it again, I wouldn't have been raped as a child.
*She wasn't a victim, she was the bystander. The guy was a serial child molester. She was aware of it.
I get it, coming forward when a victim might not want you to can be seen as a dick move. It's a pretty hard proven fact though that sexual predators will repeat their actions. They will find new victims. That is why it is everyone's responsibility to try to stop the process, whether you were a victim, or a bystander.
djones520 wrote: Yeah... well, maybe if the guys ex-wife had done more then just move on with her life, and pretended he'd never do it again, I wouldn't have been raped as a child.
Things are very different when the victim is a child.
And there is a massive difference between not making public what a victim is currently keeping private, and doing nothing.
Children are different and not what is being talked about. There are laws that explicitly state that if one knows something is happening to a child they are legally obliged to report. Even if one isn't sure but just suspects abuse to a child they are legally obligated to report it. If one works around or with kids that is basic training.
Ahtman wrote: Children are different and not what is being talked about. There are laws that explicitly state that if one knows something is happening to a child they are legally obliged to report. Even if one isn't sure but just suspects abuse to a child they are legally obligated to report it. If one works around or with kids that is basic training.
Adults are a different story.
I disagree. Sexual assault is sexual assault. Do you think it's any less damaging to an adult then it is to a child? I'd wager it can be more so. Children are resilient, they are more likely to recover from injury. I still have some quirk's in my life due to my circumstance, but by and large, what happened then has almost no effect on me today, and that was with zero counselling or the like.
If we want to look at examples of how changing a system to make bystanders more involved in everything, we can look at the US military, and how they've responded to sexual assaults over the last number of years.
Rates have dropped by as much as 25%. Want to know whats changed in the last several years about our training? An emphasis on bystanders getting involved. That's been the largest target of focus, and it's working.
Whether you agree or not it doesn't change the law. Laws can be weird like that.
Sexual assault is sexual assault.
That is nice of you to say but sort of pointless as a retort since no one has argued otherwise.
Do you think it's any less damaging to an adult then it is to a child?
Who argued it was either? The statement had nothing to do with quantity or qualitative measurement of emotion and/or physical pain or some other ridiculous measure it only had to do with how the law approaches abuse of a child versus how it approaches it as an adult.
I can't imagine you suddenly woke up a few minutes ago to the fact that the law, and not just in the US, treats children and adults differently so this sudden attempt at deflection from that fact seems a bit feckless.
as for the incident being discussed it is less a "Hollywood" thing than a power thing. It wasn't that long ago the British found out about Jimmy Saville being a horrible pedophile. Taken from another forum:
This reminds me of the whole Jimmy Saville business over here in the U.K., the difference really is he was marginally powerful in comparison and he liked his victims waaay younger.
He was a political donor too ( though he was Conservative) comedians would occasionally get in a joke at his expense when the opportunity presented itself which was rarely since he was known to be litigious.
Then when the news broke (not long after he died) it turned out he had enjoyed his position of power to gain access and then silence his victims and had even had Cops or The BBC for example squash any stories before they got out.
After that it was like toppling dominoes and as many of his peers of that time were charged for similar, you rarely get someone so sleazy in a position of power without that level of sleaze being far more institutionalised.
djones520 wrote: I disagree. Sexual assault is sexual assault. Do you think it's any less damaging to an adult then it is to a child? I'd wager it can be more so. Children are resilient, they are more likely to recover from injury. I still have some quirk's in my life due to my circumstance, but by and large, what happened then has almost no effect on me today, and that was with zero counselling or the like.
It isn't about whether a child or an adult is more precious, it's about letting an adult make their own life choices, while knowing children need adults to make many decisions for them.
Rates have dropped by as much as 25%. Want to know whats changed in the last several years about our training? An emphasis on bystanders getting involved. That's been the largest target of focus, and it's working.
Getting involved, yes. Contacting the victim to say they know what happened and will support them if they come forward, yes. Deciding they will make the event public when that is not what the victim wants right now? feth that.
Howard A Treesong wrote: Why do you keep saying 'make public' without the consent of the victim. I'm talking about going to the bloody police not the papers.
Yeah, so police investigate. Now given we're talking about you making a statement without her agreement, either that knock on the door from the police comes out of the blue to the victim, or it comes after you discussed it with her and she told you not to. Either way that's more people who know about something she had not yet decided to tell people about. So that's great for the victim.
And then what? For this new process to be useful to anyone it doesn't just end with a complaint. It need to get turned in to a charge, and an arrest, and prosecution. These are not things done in private.
Heard on the news this morning that Weinstein was even forcing women to wear specific brands of dresses on the red carpet. Particularly from his wife's brand.
OgreChubbs wrote: I never heard anyone say he threatened them just bribe them....
The one girl I seen said she did things for a job and money..... Doesn't that just mean she is just a prostitute.
Your opinions are consistently garbage and you should be ashamed for expressing them in a public forum.
They did an act for money and roles, whether you consider that act reasonable is upto you but ovbiously they did.
Also no shame in not following the sheep. In my book he is a pig for doing such things while married and deserves to lose everything and they are flewzies who will do anything for a moment of fame.
Question everyone because everyone lies to make their sins look less evil then an others.
Also just because I disagree with you please reframe from trying to insult me, do grow up and understand a public forum is for debate ( multiple sides of a point discussing a topic and showing their view point) not everyone posting I agree. If you do want that pull a face book delete all posts that do not agree with you.
I would gladly agree that he is a rapist and a sex criminal if someone can provide a sample where the acts the preformed did not provide any benifit or no payment was recieved. By lawsuit or otherwise.
I would gladly agree that he is a rapist and a sex criminal if someone can provide a sample where the acts the preformed did not provide any benifit or no payment was recieved. By lawsuit or otherwise.
Stipulating that someone must have sex with you if they want to work in the business is definitely coercive. It doesn't matter if the work they then went on to do was of benefit to the women, it's still rape.
Tannhauser42 wrote: Heard on the news this morning that Weinstein was even forcing women to wear specific brands of dresses on the red carpet. Particularly from his wife's brand.
That's not necessarily strange, although that kind of marketing should be up to the actor/acrtress in question and be paid for. Requiring his wife's brand rather smacks of nepotism, but that is nowhere near the level of scumbaggery he's being accused of now.
I also do not agree that someone who sues for rape and consequently settles out of court is suddenly a prostitute because they settled for whatever reason.
Howard A Treesong wrote: Why do you keep saying 'make public' without the consent of the victim. I'm talking about going to the bloody police not the papers.
Yeah, so police investigate. Now given we're talking about you making a statement without her agreement, either that knock on the door from the police comes out of the blue to the victim, or it comes after you discussed it with her and she told you not to. Either way that's more people who know about something she had not yet decided to tell people about. So that's great for the victim.
And then what? For this new process to be useful to anyone it doesn't just end with a complaint. It need to get turned in to a charge, and an arrest, and prosecution. These are not things done in private.
That's a bunch of nonsense. If you know a serious crime, like assault or rape has occurred you have an obligation to report it to the police. It's not ok to ignore criminals committing violent crimes and we have rape shield laws to protect the anonymity of victims. When you don't stop rapists and child molesters they keep on assaulting people. Look at the Sandusky case, the Penn State administration knew Sandusky was raping kids but didn't go to the police, 10 years later a school principal discovers Sandusky is raping students there and calls the police. In the intervening decade between McQueary's witnessing Sandusky molesting a kid at Penn State and the school principal calling the police Sandusky raped multiple children. Why was that allowed to happen? Because Penn State administrators in the athletic department didn't want to deal with the negative publicity of a criminal case against Sandusky. It's inexcusable to enable sexual predators to victimize more people.
Tannhauser42 wrote: Heard on the news this morning that Weinstein was even forcing women to wear specific brands of dresses on the red carpet. Particularly from his wife's brand.
That's not necessarily strange, although that kind of marketing should be up to the actor/acrtress in question and be paid for. Requiring his wife's brand rather smacks of nepotism, but that is nowhere near the level of scumbaggery he's being accused of now.
Oh, I agree, taken on its own, the red carpet thing would normally just be seen as a simple trade of favors: "be a walking billboard for my wife's new clothing line and I'll get you a movie part." But it's when you add it in with all the rest of his acts that it becomes just one more shameful act demonstrating how he used his influence to dominate and control women.
sebster wrote: Within a couple of days we've got from insinuations against the media that they were part of the cover up because they hadn't reported on Weinstein in the past, and now people are attacking the media for trying and convicting the guy before he's had his day in court. This is fething ridiculous.
Why are people shopping around to blame the victims, or the media, or the Democrats, and even Obama? What in the feth is going on? Where did this fething nonsense start, and where will it end? Harvey Weinstein is a sexual predator, and he should be condemned, and anyone who acted to cover up his crime should be just as roundly condemned. That's the list of actual, real villains in this. But a person is not a villain if they learn something horrible happened to a victim, see that victim is remaining silent, and don't go make the decision to make that victim's suffering public. A person is not a villain if they received a story on this, but decided a single anonymous source wasn't sufficient to accuse someone of a crime in a newspaper article. A person is not a villain if they took money from a donor who turned out to be a villain. And no, the media are not now villains because they are reporting on this now with an assumption that the dozens of women who've come forward probably aren't all lying.
The victims are always blamed, it's the American way, it's on the bingo card for a reason. You can't have a rape trail without the obligatory "look how she is dressed" defense. Look at how the women accusing trump were treated.
Blaming Obama & the dems is just a cheap political attack to keep their base riled up and afraid of "those" liberals. It's what keeps them going to the polls and voting R. They believe the girls accusing Clinton, but not the ones accusing Trump nor O'reilly. I bet Weinstein won't get his job back ever, but it's amazing how fast O'reilly did. Can't let a good spin doctor go to waste it seems.
A general reply to people who replied to my earlier comments.
For the record, I'm not downplaying the horrific crime of sexual abuse, but one point needs to be made:
We don't know that these people are victims until Weinstein is charged, due process occurs, the defence and prosecution make their case in a court of law, and finally a judge and jury decide Weinstein's guilt or innocence. If Weinstein is found guilty, then, and only then, can these people be called victims IMO.
For sure, in some types of crime, there are obviously victims. A guy found dead with a knife in his back is obviously a murder victim. Somebody who is assaulted, is obviously a victim of assault etc etc
But in specific instances such as this, when accusations are often based on rumour, hearsay, evidence is lacking, and it's X's word against Y, etc etc then I feel we have to be careful before we label people criminals or victims. None of this is clear cut, black and white.
As I said earlier, I don't give two hoots for Weinstein, and the sheer number of people accusing him of crimes, is probably an example of where we can apply the law of averages.
All I'm saying is that ancient, hard fought rights, the foundation of Western Civilisation, should not be sacrificed for the sake of some media circus.
sebster wrote: Within a couple of days we've got from insinuations against the media that they were part of the cover up because they hadn't reported on Weinstein in the past, and now people are attacking the media for trying and convicting the guy before he's had his day in court. This is fething ridiculous.
Why are people shopping around to blame the victims, or the media, or the Democrats, and even Obama? What in the feth is going on? Where did this fething nonsense start, and where will it end? Harvey Weinstein is a sexual predator, and he should be condemned, and anyone who acted to cover up his crime should be just as roundly condemned. That's the list of actual, real villains in this. But a person is not a villain if they learn something horrible happened to a victim, see that victim is remaining silent, and don't go make the decision to make that victim's suffering public. A person is not a villain if they received a story on this, but decided a single anonymous source wasn't sufficient to accuse someone of a crime in a newspaper article. A person is not a villain if they took money from a donor who turned out to be a villain. And no, the media are not now villains because they are reporting on this now with an assumption that the dozens of women who've come forward probably aren't all lying.
The victims are always blamed, it's the American way, it's on the bingo card for a reason. You can't have a rape trail without the obligatory "look how she is dressed" defense. Look at how the women accusing trump were treated.
Blaming Obama & the dems is just a cheap political attack to keep their base riled up and afraid of "those" liberals. It's what keeps them going to the polls and voting R. They believe the girls accusing Clinton, but not the ones accusing Trump nor O'reilly. I bet Weinstein won't get his job back ever, but it's amazing how fast O'reilly did. Can't let a good spin doctor go to waste it seems.
Victim blaming is as common as accusation is proof of guilt.
What happened to innocent til proven guilty? Until convicted of a crime one should not be allowed to public accuse someone of it. I believe that's called inflamitory remarks.
sebster wrote: Within a couple of days we've got from insinuations against the media that they were part of the cover up because they hadn't reported on Weinstein in the past, and now people are attacking the media for trying and convicting the guy before he's had his day in court. This is fething ridiculous.
Why are people shopping around to blame the victims, or the media, or the Democrats, and even Obama? What in the feth is going on? Where did this fething nonsense start, and where will it end? Harvey Weinstein is a sexual predator, and he should be condemned, and anyone who acted to cover up his crime should be just as roundly condemned. That's the list of actual, real villains in this. But a person is not a villain if they learn something horrible happened to a victim, see that victim is remaining silent, and don't go make the decision to make that victim's suffering public. A person is not a villain if they received a story on this, but decided a single anonymous source wasn't sufficient to accuse someone of a crime in a newspaper article. A person is not a villain if they took money from a donor who turned out to be a villain. And no, the media are not now villains because they are reporting on this now with an assumption that the dozens of women who've come forward probably aren't all lying.
The victims are always blamed, it's the American way, it's on the bingo card for a reason. You can't have a rape trail without the obligatory "look how she is dressed" defense. Look at how the women accusing trump were treated.
Blaming Obama & the dems is just a cheap political attack to keep their base riled up and afraid of "those" liberals. It's what keeps them going to the polls and voting R. They believe the girls accusing Clinton, but not the ones accusing Trump nor O'reilly. I bet Weinstein won't get his job back ever, but it's amazing how fast O'reilly did. Can't let a good spin doctor go to waste it seems.
Victim blaming is as common as accusation is proof of guilt.
What happened to innocent til proven guilty? Until convicted of a crime one should not be allowed to public accuse someone of it. I believe that's called inflamitory remarks.
Sure and I bet you think Paddock is innocent as well right? he was never convicted of anything, so he's as innocent as they come. Don't call Paddock a mass murderer, that's inflammatory.
Not all crimes end up in a criminal trial, the rich rapists and molesters like to settle out of court, including certain churches, so that basically means there are no priests that rape children, none of them were ever found guilty so don't talk about it at all
What you're proposing in this situation is really just another layer of victim blaming.
So... secret trials then? After all, for a public trial, one needs a public accusation first. That's not inflammatory, that is all part of due process. I'll take the messiness we have over a secretive criminal justice system anytime and every time.
What happened to innocent til proven guilty? Until convicted of a crime one should not be allowed to public accuse someone of it. I believe that's called inflamitory remarks.
Weinstein being a rapist has been an open secret for decades.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
If this is knowledge of the crime after the fact, then you are right. If I witness it, the victim has no say. As a mandated reporter, I am required by law to report all abuse that I witness, regardless of what the victim says. If not, I can face legal consequences.
Red Harvest wrote: So... secret trials then? After all, for a public trial, one needs a public accusation first. That's not inflammatory, that is all part of due process. I'll take the messiness we have over a secretive criminal justice system anytime and every time.
We can have public trials while still shielding the identity of the victim. It's generally required if the victim is underage.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
If this is knowledge of the crime after the fact, then you are right. If I witness it, the victim has no say. As a mandated reporter, I am required by law to report all abuse that I witness, regardless of what the victim says. If not, I can face legal consequences.
Yup... samething with institutions who deals with kids (ie, elementary schools).
I remember playing LA Noire for the first time. A mission on the Traffic Desk goes in to this and as this story comes back I can't help think about this. It only make me think of Roman Polanski, how they all stood up and applauded him as Harrison Ford stood there, no emotion on his face. Polanski having been convicted raping a young underage girl in a hot tub of a friends home, another director whom escapes my name. He then ran off to Canada and hasn't come back since, a wanted criminal. And I can only think how they, the Hollywood elite, liberal in much a sense gave this man a God damn award.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
If this is knowledge of the crime after the fact, then you are right. If I witness it, the victim has no say. As a mandated reporter, I am required by law to report all abuse that I witness, regardless of what the victim says. If not, I can face legal consequences.
Depending on the job, one doesn't even have to witness the crime in order to be mandated to report it. For example, I teach at a university and one of the policies put in place in the last five years is mandatory reporting of suspicion of an abuse. For instance, if I am talking to a student, and in our conversation they let slip a bit of info of some sort of physical or sexual or verbal abuse or possible self harm, even in passing, I am obligated to tell the student I have to report what they said to student affairs and I have to report it. Failure to do so can result in termination. When people complain politically about universities being "safe spaces", that is one of the main points of what the university policy actually means. Of course, the people complaining often don't really understand the policy at all and regard the concept of "safe spaces" as some sort of infringement on speech.
As another example, it has long been the policy for primary shcool teachers in the US to have to report suspicion of abuse among their students to their superiors.
djones520 wrote: A bystanders role isn't to protect the victim, it's to protect the community.
Had a bystander spoken up about it, it could have prevented more victims.
A predator never stops at just one.
I agree that it is good to break cultures of silence and stop similar things happening to other people, but the fact remains you have no right to choose to make the crime public when the victim is not choosing to do that right now. "Hey everyone, Judy is keeping it quiet but she got raped" is an obvious dick move.
If this is knowledge of the crime after the fact, then you are right. If I witness it, the victim has no say. As a mandated reporter, I am required by law to report all abuse that I witness, regardless of what the victim says. If not, I can face legal consequences.
Depending on the job, one doesn't even have to witness the crime in order to be mandated to report it. For example, I teach at a university and one of the policies put in place in the last five years is mandatory reporting of suspicion of an abuse. For instance, if I am talking to a student, and in our conversation they let slip a bit of info of some sort of physical or sexual or verbal abuse or possible self harm, even in passing, I am obligated to tell the student I have to report what they said to student affairs and I have to report it. Failure to do so can result in termination. When people complain politically about universities being "safe spaces", that is one of the main points of what the university policy actually means. Of course, the people complaining often don't really understand the policy at all and regard the concept of "safe spaces" as some sort of infringement on speech.
As another example, it has long been the policy for primary shcool teachers in the US to have to report suspicion of abuse among their students to their superiors.
This is true. If a person over 18 comes to me and asks me for help, I have to report it. If they come to confide in me, all I can do is encourage them to seek help. If somebody under 18 comes to me and says somebody has been abusing them at home, I have to call that in. If I witness somebody abusing somebody under 18, I am probably going to stop it and then call it in. If you witness abuse with your own eyes, even if the victim says not to, you better be calling that gak in. You just witnessed a crime and you are letting a criminal walk away to do it again.
As far as work goes, yeah I have to report everything somebody tells me that could be abuse immediately. Don't have to witness it, just have to hear about it.
Remember guys, your healthcare workers are looking out for you in the community as well as in the clinical setting. Remember that the next time you are a dick to one of us FOR WE ARE LEGION!
Help us, pay us more. We are so poor! They make us work for days at a time for little food and money! We don't even get regular potty breaks!
Gordon Shumway wrote: Depending on the job, one doesn't even have to witness the crime in order to be mandated to report it.
Exactly so. It's not that long since our lawmakers decided that people working as private security - in whatever function but with the same basic license - have a more comprehensive duty to report crimes than other citizens. I'm supposed to report a long series of severe crimes if I happen to see or hear something that leads me to believe such have taken place, while a regular citizen isn't obligated to report them unless the crime can still be prevented.
Gordon Shumway wrote: Depending on the job, one doesn't even have to witness the crime in order to be mandated to report it.
Exactly so. It's not that long since our lawmakers decided that people working as private security - in whatever function but with the same basic license - have a more comprehensive duty to report crimes than other citizens. I'm supposed to report a long series of severe crimes if I happen to see or hear something that leads me to believe such have taken place, while a regular citizen isn't obligated to report them unless the crime can still be prevented.
Just being nitpicky here, by the time I report something, the crime cannot be prevented, it has already happened.
Also, I believe you can still get in trouble as a normal citizen for seeing or witnessing a crime, but not reporting it. I could be wrong, may be flashing up some Law and Order stuff here on mistake or something that used to be a law I read about.
However, if I do not and they find out I did not, I am pretty boned. Way worse off than the normal citizen. This is to deter somebody from seeing abuse in the workplace and turning a blind eye. Lose licenses, huge fine. Possible jailtime. Basically, blacklisted. It is kind of like somebody having a heart attack and asking for a doctor, but the doctor keeps eating his steak and then asks for more wine. Not good. You gotta stay sharp out there.Always be watching! Because people are fething idiots.
OgreChubbs wrote: I never heard anyone say he threatened them just bribe them....
The one girl I seen said she did things for a job and money..... Doesn't that just mean she is just a prostitute.
Your opinions are consistently garbage and you should be ashamed for expressing them in a public forum.
They did an act for money and roles, whether you consider that act reasonable is upto you but ovbiously they did.
Also no shame in not following the sheep. In my book he is a pig for doing such things while married and deserves to lose everything and they are flewzies who will do anything for a moment of fame.
Looks like you're OK with him having done these things if he wasn't married, and the women he coerced are equally guilty, huh?
4 of the women involved have now accused him of flat-out rape.
I feel very, very comfortable in reiterating that the opinions you expressed here are both hot garbage, and consistent with your posting habits.
The one that got me was Andy Signore of Honest Trailers. I like his show and never would have guessed he was a sexual predator. There's still a part of me who wants it all to be a misunderstanding, so I can see how hard it can be to believe the accusations when they first start. Only once there is a substantial number of corroborating stories does it really feel true.
The one that got me was Andy Signore of Honest Trailers. I like his show and never would have guessed he was a sexual predator. There's still a part of me who wants it all to be a misunderstanding, so I can see how hard it can be to believe the accusations when they first start. Only once there is a substantial number of corroborating stories does it really feel true.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: There's still a part of me who wants it all to be a misunderstanding, so I can see how hard it can be to believe the accusations when they first start. Only once there is a substantial number of corroborating stories does it really feel true.
I know exactly how you feel, because that is how I feel about Louis CK.
The one that got me was Andy Signore of Honest Trailers. I like his show and never would have guessed he was a sexual predator. There's still a part of me who wants it all to be a misunderstanding, so I can see how hard it can be to believe the accusations when they first start. Only once there is a substantial number of corroborating stories does it really feel true.
Wow... he always struck me as that loveable teddy bear type of guy. They come in all shapes and sizes I guess.
Dreadwinter wrote: Just being nitpicky here, by the time I report something, the crime cannot be prevented, it has already happened.
Also, I believe you can still get in trouble as a normal citizen for seeing or witnessing a crime, but not reporting it. I could be wrong, may be flashing up some Law and Order stuff here on mistake or something that used to be a law I read about.
Could be different in different countries ofc, but over here a citizen isn't required to report crimes that have already happened. If they find evidence of a serious crime people will still usually report it because it's the right thing to do. They are, however, by law required to report something like a guy planning a murder, rape etc, the "can still be prevented" part. And ofc we're by law required to render aid to people in danger even if all we can do is call the emergency number and wait.
So as not to go too far off topic.... If I had worked security for the movie company here (under Finnish law) I would have been required to report any suspicions of the big boss raping prospective movie stars or employees even if the victims were unwilling to speak about it. Which would have led absolutely nowhere except for the termination of my contract and probably a libel lawsuit. I'd likely lose my job if it turned out I didn't report it too, but it would cost me less money.
OgreChubbs wrote: I never heard anyone say he threatened them just bribe them....
The one girl I seen said she did things for a job and money..... Doesn't that just mean she is just a prostitute.
Your opinions are consistently garbage and you should be ashamed for expressing them in a public forum.
They did an act for money and roles, whether you consider that act reasonable is upto you but ovbiously they did.
Also no shame in not following the sheep. In my book he is a pig for doing such things while married and deserves to lose everything and they are flewzies who will do anything for a moment of fame.
Looks like you're OK with him having done these things if he wasn't married, and the women he coerced are equally guilty, huh?
4 of the women involved have now accused him of flat-out rape.
I feel very, very comfortable in reiterating that the opinions you expressed here are both hot garbage, and consistent with your posting habits.
If you feel that way so be it but do keep it to yourself please and do not be rude. I am not one to get emotional about this stuff or instantly say someone is wrong because several others say he is. Once proof is given more so then word of mouth, then he is guilty.
Right now, we have an accused person yet to be proven guilty of any crime already being called a rapist. Word of mouth proof is as strong as the paper it is written on.
I will not jump on any band wagon until all the chips are played, then I will make an informed choice and stand by it. I am not saying they are liers or he is guilty.
This may be hard for the modern Internet era where everything is decided with in 5 seconds and that's that. What I know so far is word of mouth and a girl tried a wire tap and the cops saying not enough to show intent of rape.
Knee jerk reactions are rarely correct ones.
Damn tablet turning mispelled words into something else after I click submit.
Oh btw I always take the unfavourable opnion side over any other simply because all sides of any argument should be seen to make the best choice. I am very pro anti-abortion but when people say thing like no abortion ever and such and most agree I was on the side of abortion due to the fact that in some cases they are needed to save lives, ect. So I understand you may find me annoying and that's ok but it is who I am.
I will not jump on any band wagon until all the chips are played, then I will make an informed choice and stand by it. I am not saying they are liers or he is guilty.
This may be hard for the modern Internet era where everything is decided with in 5 seconds and that's that. What I know so far is word of mouth and a girl tried a wire tap and the cops saying not enough to show intent of rape.
Knee jerk reactions are rarely correct ones.
Weinstein has been a known rapist for decades. Everyone in Hollywood knew what he was like but couldn't do anything because he was powerful enough to destroy their careers in retaliation. This is not a knee jerk reaction, it has been brewing for thirty god damn years.
Rosebuddy wrote: Everyone in Hollywood knew what he was like but couldn't do anything because he was powerful enough to destroy their careers in retaliation.
And you don't even have to be a movie producer for that, it's enough that you're a big popular movie star. Clint Eastwood's partner Sondra Locke was pretty much blacklisted from acting/directing after they split up, for example. And like Weinstein her complaints against Clint and Warner Bros were both settled out of court.
Oh, I agree, taken on its own, the red carpet thing would normally just be seen as a simple trade of favors: "be a walking billboard for my wife's new clothing line and I'll get you a movie part." But it's when you add it in with all the rest of his acts that it becomes just one more shameful act demonstrating how he used his influence to dominate and control women.
Yeah, it doesn't make him any less of a donkeycave.
Also, for all the people saying innocent until proven guilty:
I approve of the sentiment, but didn't the guy basically already publically admit to being guilty? In which case the innocent until proven guilty is kinda not necessary here...
Oh, I agree, taken on its own, the red carpet thing would normally just be seen as a simple trade of favors: "be a walking billboard for my wife's new clothing line and I'll get you a movie part." But it's when you add it in with all the rest of his acts that it becomes just one more shameful act demonstrating how he used his influence to dominate and control women.
Yeah, it doesn't make him any less of a donkeycave.
Also, for all the people saying innocent until proven guilty:
I approve of the sentiment, but didn't the guy basically already publically admit to being guilty? In which case the innocent until proven guilty is kinda not necessary here...
Not really? He definitively claims he never raped anyone, and also denies criminal sexual harassment or sexual assault, and claims it was consensual. Or at least any sex was consensual. It sounds like weasel words to me.
The incidents he seems to admit are true involve a lot of badgering (in some cases long sessions of badgering), coercion, blackmail-ish behavior and a looming-but-vaguely-indirect threat of 'you will lose your job/film/sponsorship,' and seems to believe that constitutes consent.
Not 100% sure if he really believes that or is just saying it for legal purposes so he isn't admitting he's guilty of rape, but it is abhorrent either way.
It's a pretty cut and dry thing, really- an acting job, film funding or other backing doesn't have any reason to involve massages, groping, or watching the guy masterbate. It's LA- he can go find someone willing after the business meeting, or talk his wife into some light roleplay. There is zero excuse for any of this.
I dunno about the Louis CK thing. It is a bunch of rumours from sites like Jezebel "quoting" some other comedians, and when directly asked about it, they all directly say, "it wasn't Louis I was referring to." This Weinstein thing is a bit different as women are directly claiming he did this to them and are willing to say it out loud and on the record.
That said, it's easier to hate on Weinstein as he is just a money man producer, and not a person with the sort of talent I respect. (Granted, I guess arm twisting for recognition and money is a talent in its own right, I just don't really respect it the same way). Polanski, Cosby, Nicholson, Allen, et. al. might all be horrible humans too, but at least I can separate their art from their personal behavior in some strange way (maybe that's a weird way to look at it). Typing it sure felt weird.
Fox News, paragons of "wait and see how the investigation into this cop shooting/fraud accusation/treason allegations" is demanding that a company be shut down and sold off to alleged victims before any investigation has even concluded?
Who-da-thunk the guy that was known as "Lufa" in his own office would be a non entity in this discussion. When Bolling was on did anybody not think Gulfoyle wasn't giving him a hummer just to get on air? Bob Beckett is just sitting in the corner, saying "yeah, I'm an alike, but damn, Erik, you can do whatever you want, just let them taste that golden cock" "? Nobody? I mean the woman was married to the mayor of San Francisco, and she had some sort of life experience epiphany that told her to work at fox because she really believes that crap? Nope. Just a smart woman looking for a job.
What I find interesting is the contrast between Werdenstein and the recent story about deputy USA President Mike Pence.
Both are powerful men who have been criticised for their treatment of women. One used his power over women to get sexual favours, and the other takes quite dramatic steps to avoid finding himself in those situations.
Now I'm sure we would all like to think of ourselves as 'good people', but let's be honest, many men today and throughout history have abused power for the sexual attentions of women; it simply doesn't wash with me to dismiss them all just 'bad people'.
What is clear to me is this; if you are a man in any sort of position of power you have to be honest and say this temptation will occur and that it is one that many good men have been unable to resist through will power alone.
So to return to my original point, as a Tory I probably unreasonably 'swoon over Pence’s supposed old-school propriety' (an elegant little line from Jessica Valenti of the Guardian newspaper)
However, I think the premise that we all put a little bit more thought into how we can avoid putting ourselves (and our lady friends/ colleges) in these potentially compromising situations is a sound one :-)
Alternatively, as a human being capable of reason, one could be seen as being in control of ones actions and therefore take responsibility for ones own actions.
Compel wrote: Alternatively, as a human being capable of reason, one could be seen as being in control of ones actions and therefore take responsibility for ones own actions.
Well I don't disagree, but like any element of emotional intelligence it isn't enough to just tell someone to be something.
For example, looking at my EQi (Emotional Quotient) I can see that I am impulsive to a fault.
Now when my boss tells me in personal development meetings to 'just be a little more considered', that isn't very helpful as you can imagine!
I need to look at strategies and exercises to limit the negative effects of my impulsiveness in the workplace (and personal life!) and work on being more considered.
So we need to have a similar attitude to abuse of power imo, just saying 'oh if he was a better person he wouldn't have done this, powerful men just need to be better people' isn't helpful in the exact same way as my boss :-p
The idea that you can't be in a room with a woman who isn't your wife is weird AF, and as a professional, it's more than a bit unreasonable to exclude women from business dinners and other functions because you're afraid you can't control yourself. They're people, not objects with magical powers.
Ouze wrote: The idea that you can't be in a room with a woman who isn't your wife is weird AF, and as a professional, it's more than a bit unreasonable to exclude women from business dinners and other functions because you're afraid you can't control yourself. They're people, not objects with magical powers.
It's the idea you are in a room Alone with another female employee, and it is not in the work environs is what is problematic and should be limited.
So either most men are bad people (which I don't except) or there is something seriously wrong with the way we approach the concept of power.
My main point with the Pence thing was to highlight that this is the one instance of someone trying to change the way he interacts with his underlings (albeit in a misguided fashion) and all the papers can talk about is how old fashioned he is. Instead they should be talking about/ suggesting how this whole culture of misusing power can be challenged.
Spinner wrote: I'm pretty comfortable in saying that if you use your position of power to coerce sexual favors from someone, you lose your Good Person Card.
Pence is a whole different basket of creepy issues, but that's what happens when you want to run a fundamentalist theocracy.
a theocracy run by someone who never went to church and has been accused of harassment by multiple people?
Spinner wrote: I'm pretty comfortable in saying that if you use your position of power to coerce sexual favors from someone, you lose your Good Person Card.
Pence is a whole different basket of creepy issues, but that's what happens when you want to run a fundamentalist theocracy.
a theocracy run by someone who never went to church and has been accused of harassment by multiple people?
I'm referring to what Pence wants to run. Sounds like you're talking about what someone else is running now, although I'd note running a theocracy doesn't necessarily mean following its rules.
And I'm not sure what's meant by 'look at power differently', but I'm also pretty comfortable saying that if most men use positions of authority for sexual extortion - a claim not made by the linked article - then most men are bad people.
Spinner wrote: I'm pretty comfortable in saying that if you use your position of power to coerce sexual favors from someone, you lose your Good Person Card.
Pence is a whole different basket of creepy issues, but that's what happens when you want to run a fundamentalist theocracy.
a theocracy run by someone who never went to church and has been accused of harassment by multiple people?
I'm referring to what Pence wants to run. Sounds like you're talking about what someone else is running now, although I'd note running a theocracy doesn't necessarily mean following its rules.
And I'm not sure what's meant by 'look at power differently', but I'm also pretty comfortable saying that if most men use positions of authority for sexual extortion - a claim not made by the linked article - then most men are bad people.
So you're a Mind reader now? It's that type if hyperbole that makes both left and right wingers look like idiots.
Well, no, I just listen to him when he describes his principles and his policies. You can't list yourself as your religious denomination first and foremost as a politician without being considered as someone pushing a theocratic agenda.
This is, however, not exactly on topic and veering toward US politics. Feel free to PM me if you want to talk that, though!
Spinner wrote: Well, no, I just listen to him when he describes his principles and his policies. You can't list yourself as your religious denomination first and foremost as a politician without being considered as someone pushing a theocratic agenda.
This statement is disturbing as all hell...
<-- not a very religious dude at all.
This is, however, not exactly on topic and veering toward US politics. Feel free to PM me if you want to talk that, though!
I'll tango if you want to continue this line of discussion.
This Twitter thread might be interesting for people who don't know what hotel room usually means in the movie industry (and why meetings happen there). In short: It usually refers to bigger suites with offices (or at lest separate rooms) for professional business meetings and not dome dinky little room. Those are convenient as both sides often meet somewhere on neutral ground (so to speak) as they are not always in each other's "home town" where the real offices are.
Ouze wrote: The idea that you can't be in a room with a woman who isn't your wife is weird AF, and as a professional, it's more than a bit unreasonable to exclude women from business dinners and other functions because you're afraid you can't control yourself. They're people, not objects with magical powers.
It's the idea you are in a room Alone with another female employee, and it is not in the work environs is what is problematic and should be limited.
Eh? Business dinners and lunches aren't about being alone in a room with anyone. They're done in restaurants in public. You can see dozens going on in DC and LA just walking down the street.
Professional behavior really isn't hard, neither is basic humanity, no matter what crazy people propose.
Prestor Jon wrote: That's a bunch of nonsense. If you know a serious crime, like assault or rape has occurred you have an obligation to report it to the police. It's not ok to ignore criminals committing violent crimes and we have rape shield laws to protect the anonymity of victims. When you don't stop rapists and child molesters they keep on assaulting people. Look at the Sandusky case, the Penn State administration knew Sandusky was raping kids but didn't go to the police, 10 years later a school principal discovers Sandusky is raping students there and calls the police. In the intervening decade between McQueary's witnessing Sandusky molesting a kid at Penn State and the school principal calling the police Sandusky raped multiple children. Why was that allowed to happen? Because Penn State administrators in the athletic department didn't want to deal with the negative publicity of a criminal case against Sandusky. It's inexcusable to enable sexual predators to victimize more people.
First up, you mentioned child molesters, but obviously missed the points I made earlier about how it is very different when the child is a victim. Second up, you started talking about institutional cover ups that have absolutely nothing to do with what I was talking about. In Penn State, for instance, we saw acts by multiple people to deny and deflect what had happened. Obviously none of that is okay.
What I am saying is that if a grown adult is a victim and you know what happened, you should go and talk to that person and tell them you know what happened and that you will support them with whatever action they choose to take. If they decide to not to make what happened public, then it is not your place to make that decision for them. That's it. That's the point I made, it's a simple one born directly out of a respect for grown adults to make their own choices. It says nothing about when the victim is a child, and it certainly isn't a defense of anyone who attempts to make it harder for a victim to make their case public or prevent them getting justice.
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sirlynchmob wrote: The victims are always blamed, it's the American way, it's on the bingo card for a reason. You can't have a rape trail without the obligatory "look how she is dressed" defense. Look at how the women accusing trump were treated.
Exactly.
Blaming Obama & the dems is just a cheap political attack to keep their base riled up and afraid of "those" liberals. It's what keeps them going to the polls and voting R. They believe the girls accusing Clinton, but not the ones accusing Trump nor O'reilly. I bet Weinstein won't get his job back ever, but it's amazing how fast O'reilly did. Can't let a good spin doctor go to waste it seems.
It's fething shameful that sex abuse has become a partisan issue.
Though I'd say this is actually more cynical than just getting the base to remain afraid of Democrats because they have a donor who was a sex predator. I think it's about trying to nullify the sex abuse allegations against Trump, and against multiple people at FOX News. The ploy is that if they can make a big enough deal about this then they'll manage to mud stuck to both sides and thereby negate it as an issue. It's pretty goofy to try and say the because a donor to one party was a sex predator for years, then it doesn't matter that the other side's president is a sex predator, but it does seem to be working.
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Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: As I said earlier, I don't give two hoots for Weinstein, and the sheer number of people accusing him of crimes, is probably an example of where we can apply the law of averages.
All I'm saying is that ancient, hard fought rights, the foundation of Western Civilisation, should not be sacrificed for the sake of some media circus.
And I'm explaining to you that none of those rights require members of the public to stop using their common sense and reason, and none of those rights are lost when the public speaks plainly about the facts placed in front of it. I agree that when there is genuine doubt, where the statements made by accusers appear opportunistic, or when the accused has made a full denial of the charges, then we should move forward with caution and an appreciation of the doubt in the case. But it achieves nothing to make a show of pretend doubt in cases like this.
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OgreChubbs wrote: Victim blaming is as common as accusation is proof of guilt.
What happened to innocent til proven guilty? Until convicted of a crime one should not be allowed to public accuse someone of it. I believe that's called inflamitory remarks.
This isn't some 'he said/she said' debate. Dozens of women have come forward, most with absolutely nothing to gain by making their statements. And Weinstein has denied none of it.
Dreadwinter wrote: If this is knowledge of the crime after the fact, then you are right. If I witness it, the victim has no say. As a mandated reporter, I am required by law to report all abuse that I witness, regardless of what the victim says. If not, I can face legal consequences.
Mandated reporters are designated as such because they deal with minors and dependent adults. Which as I've already said several fething times are totally different to mature, decision making adults. A point you and a bunch of others are choosing to ignore for some strange reason or another.
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NenkotaMoon wrote: I remember playing LA Noire for the first time. A mission on the Traffic Desk goes in to this and as this story comes back I can't help think about this. It only make me think of Roman Polanski, how they all stood up and applauded him as Harrison Ford stood there, no emotion on his face. Polanski having been convicted raping a young underage girl in a hot tub of a friends home, another director whom escapes my name. He then ran off to Canada and hasn't come back since, a wanted criminal. And I can only think how they, the Hollywood elite, liberal in much a sense gave this man a God damn award.
Not Canada, France. And the circumstances around the trial are pretty weird, he basically confessed when he was offered a sweetheart plea bargain, but it became known the judge was going to discard the plea deal and give Polanski 50 years. That's not cool in a lot of ways, Polanski admitted guilt to one charge believing in good faith he was being offered a deal. But the judge's reason to ignore the deal was also entirely understandable, Polanski confessed to 'only' statutory rape and was going to get time served and walk out of court a free man, which is absurd because the crime wasn't just that she was underage, he drugged her and had sex with her while unconscious. Anyway, on hearing that his slap on the wrist deal was going to be ignored and he was going to get a huge sentence, Polanski fledto France.
I completely agree that Hollywood trying to ignore what Polanski did is awful, but at the same time the girl who was raped has spent years trying to move on with her life and just wants this left alone. So in a perfect world, or as perfect as can be when someone gets away with rape, Hollywood would stop celebrating Polanski, and this woman wouldn't have to keep getting reminded about what happened to her. But this isn't a perfect world, so parts of Hollywood keep pretending he isn't a child rapist, and other people keep trying to use this girl as part of a crusade against Hollywood.
And by the way? The person who's house this took place in? Jack Nicholson. And the primary material witness was Angelica Houston. And one reason given by Polanski for doing this was grief over the murder of his girlfriend a year before, who was killed by Charlie Manson, who was only at that house because it used to be owned by a Beach Boy, who Manson really wanted to kill. This whole thing would be amazing who's who of Hollywood scandal, if the underlying event wasn't so damned sad.
sebster wrote: Though I'd say this is actually more cynical than just getting the base to remain afraid of Democrats because they have a donor who was a sex predator. I think it's about trying to nullify the sex abuse allegations against Trump, and against multiple people at FOX News. The ploy is that if they can make a big enough deal about this then they'll manage to mud stuck to both sides and thereby negate it as an issue. It's pretty goofy to try and say the because a donor to one party was a sex predator for years, then it doesn't matter that the other side's president is a sex predator, but it does seem to be working.
So what you're saying is.... both sides are equally bad
Spetulhu wrote: Could be different in different countries ofc, but over here a citizen isn't required to report crimes that have already happened. If they find evidence of a serious crime people will still usually report it because it's the right thing to do. They are, however, by law required to report something like a guy planning a murder, rape etc, the "can still be prevented" part. And ofc we're by law required to render aid to people in danger even if all we can do is call the emergency number and wait.
Actually Finland has mandated reporter requirements for several professions.
Note there requirements aren't placed on all citizens, just one people with some professional role within institutions dealing with vulnerable people (children, students, the elderly etc). Dreadwinter compared it to someone having a heart attack and noting that a nearby doctor has a legal liability to help that other bystanders don't have. Another example would be a Chief Financial Officer having a greater obligation to report indications of financial misconduct, than is expected of other people working in finance roles.
It's an attempt to try and break up the institutional cover ups we've seen revealed in the last couple of decades. The idea is that a teacher or a child care worker who hears something now has a legal liability for staying quiet, and that will hopefully stop the number of cases of people.
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OgreChubbs wrote: If you feel that way so be it but do keep it to yourself please and do not be rude. I am not one to get emotional about this stuff or instantly say someone is wrong because several others say he is. Once proof is given more so then word of mouth, then he is guilty.
Right now, we have an accused person yet to be proven guilty of any crime already being called a rapist. Word of mouth proof is as strong as the paper it is written on.
I will not jump on any band wagon until all the chips are played, then I will make an informed choice and stand by it. I am not saying they are liers or he is guilty.
Literally one post before this you were calling his accusers prostitutes. Now you switch to concern about people pre-judging Weinstein. That's an interesting double standard.
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Kroem wrote: Now I'm sure we would all like to think of ourselves as 'good people', but let's be honest, many men today and throughout history have abused power for the sexual attentions of women; it simply doesn't wash with me to dismiss them all just 'bad people'.
A man who has the willpower to never, ever be in any situation alone with a woman, also has the willpower to not rape women if he is in those situations.
Pence's position is about a showy display of public virtue, it has nothing to do with actually keeping women safe.
What is clear to me is this; if you are a man in any sort of position of power you have to be honest and say this temptation will occur and that it is one that many good men have been unable to resist through will power alone.
No, absolutely not. Good men don't sit there in private with a woman, fighting a constant battle every second to not rape that women, then threaten to destroy her career if she says anything. That's not a good man who gave in to temptation. That's a rapist who raped, who is absolutely in any way not a good man.
However, I think the premise that we all put a little bit more thought into how we can avoid putting ourselves (and our lady friends/ colleges) in these potentially compromising situations is a sound one
It's good to keep business relations formal for lots of reasons. And it is good and respectful to avoid situations like inviting women to your hotel room for business, which could be threatening to the woman and likely intimidating. I agree there. There are limits to that for lots of reasons, but as a general move its one thing many industries could do to reform.
Just moving away from Hollywood I think a lot could be done to move away from the functions that are held in hotels, where everyone books rooms in those hotels, and each night after the presentations you get those horrific free for alls at the bar where a whole bunch of people are drinking on company tabs. That's just an open door to all kinds of mistakes getting made by all kinds of people.
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Ouze wrote: So what you're saying is.... both sides are equally bad
Ouze wrote: The idea that you can't be in a room with a woman who isn't your wife is weird AF, and as a professional, it's more than a bit unreasonable to exclude women from business dinners and other functions because you're afraid you can't control yourself. They're people, not objects with magical powers.
It's the idea you are in a room Alone with another female employee, and it is not in the work environs is what is problematic and should be limited.
Eh? Business dinners and lunches aren't about being alone in a room with anyone. They're done in restaurants in public. You can see dozens going on in DC and LA just walking down the street.
Professional behavior really isn't hard, neither is basic humanity, no matter what crazy people propose.
Agreed. We're both in the same page.
I have had female and make employees. I treat them the same and act as you noted.
It's gone international now, with official accusations made in Britain by Lysette Anthony and others. Reading some of these stories of the things he did is just absolutely disgusting.
Prestor Jon wrote: That's a bunch of nonsense. If you know a serious crime, like assault or rape has occurred you have an obligation to report it to the police. It's not ok to ignore criminals committing violent crimes and we have rape shield laws to protect the anonymity of victims. When you don't stop rapists and child molesters they keep on assaulting people. Look at the Sandusky case, the Penn State administration knew Sandusky was raping kids but didn't go to the police, 10 years later a school principal discovers Sandusky is raping students there and calls the police. In the intervening decade between McQueary's witnessing Sandusky molesting a kid at Penn State and the school principal calling the police Sandusky raped multiple children. Why was that allowed to happen? Because Penn State administrators in the athletic department didn't want to deal with the negative publicity of a criminal case against Sandusky. It's inexcusable to enable sexual predators to victimize more people.
First up, you mentioned child molesters, but obviously missed the points I made earlier about how it is very different when the child is a victim. Second up, you started talking about institutional cover ups that have absolutely nothing to do with what I was talking about. In Penn State, for instance, we saw acts by multiple people to deny and deflect what had happened. Obviously none of that is okay.
What I am saying is that if a grown adult is a victim and you know what happened, you should go and talk to that person and tell them you know what happened and that you will support them with whatever action they choose to take. If they decide to not to make what happened public, then it is not your place to make that decision for them. That's it. That's the point I made, it's a simple one born directly out of a respect for grown adults to make their own choices. It says nothing about when the victim is a child, and it certainly isn't a defense of anyone who attempts to make it harder for a victim to make their case public or prevent them getting justice.
It is one hundred percent my obligation to my community, my family, my coworkers, my friends and myself to report a violent crime if I see it/hear it/know about it, regardless of the age or feelings of the victim.
If I'm walking to my car in the parking lot after work and I see what looks like a man assaulting a woman in poorly lit far corner of the parking lot and I yell and run over there and the man flees, I find the woman on the ground disheveled, bruised and dazed. I ask her if she's ok and I take out my phone and tell her not to worry because I'm going to call 911 but she tells me No, no, that's ok I'm fine, I'm fine I just want to go home. She gathers her things, gets in her car and drives off. Should I call the police and report what I saw or not?
My stance is that I should absolutely report witnessing an assault 100% of the time. We, as a society, have decided to criminalize assault/sexual assault, to discourage it and punish anyone who is convicted of committing it. I don't see any compelling reason to ever not report a violent crime. When crimes go unreported it allows the criminals to continue to roam free and victimize more members of the community. That's not good for anybody.
I agree with you that it's not a good idea to "go public" with a crime, but that's because publicity isn't going to stop a criminal, law enforcement needs to do that. The reason Harvey Weinstein got to commit sexual harassment and sexual assault for decades is because nobody went to law enforcement to make him stop. Being an anonymous source for a story in Entertainment Weekly or Variety or gossiping about it to the point that it's an "open secret" isn't likely to lead to an arrest or prosecution of Weinstein. At best it tarnishes his reputation but it certainly doesn't stop him from harassing and assaulting people.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.". (Edmund Burke)
I honestly do not understand how this is a political issue.... unless it is a a very elaborate attempt at Whataboutism. If that is the only reason this is a political issue than.... WOW!
If not an elaboarate attempt at Whataboutism, then I applaud everyone's efforts to root out sexual harassment and misogynistic (sp?) power structures. What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
It is an issue by it's own virtue, that's for sure.
But it is also a political issue because we have a POTUS who has admitted to sexual assault, an establishment that was still okay with him being POTUS, a bunch of voters who were still OK with him being POTUS. This of course resulted in a bunch of Democrats blasting Trump, the GOP, and the voters for supporting a self-admitted pussy grabber.
Of course the same Democrats got a bunch of money from a person known for sexual assault, and when that became public they were super slow to the punch to speak out against him or dump his money.
There is a significant group for whom it is less about the victims, and more about "haha, the Democrats like sexual assault as well".
d-usa wrote: It is an issue by it's own virtue, that's for sure.
But it is also a political issue because we have a POTUS who has admitted to sexual assault
A disgusting lewd comment, not actual assault. jeez man, Trump is easy picking w/o you making this up.
, an establishment that was still okay with him being POTUS, a bunch of voters who were still OK with him being POTUS. This of course resulted in a bunch of Democrats blasting Trump, the GOP, and the voters for supporting a self-admitted pussy grabber.
Just read the transcript. So... having said that, a guy with this kind of disposition and character should've not been anywhere close to the WhiteHouse.
Hence why I voted for the stoner.
Of course the same Democrats got a bunch of money from a person known for sexual assault, and when that became public they were super slow to the punch to speak out against him or dump his money.
There is a significant group for whom it is less about the victims, and more about "haha, the Democrats like sexual assault as well".
What Ouze did is not whataboutism. His comments do not deflect or attempt to play down the accusations against weinstein, only point out the blatant hypocrisy of Fox.
A Town Called Malus wrote: What Ouze did is not whataboutism. His comments do not deflect or attempt to play down the accusations against weinstein, only point out the blatant hypocrisy of Fox.
Seems like that's what he did.
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d-usa wrote: There is the answer, better than I was able to give it.
NenkotaMoon wrote: All Hollywood can technically go to Hell in my opinion.
Because of a very small number of criminals in an industry with tens of thousands of people that supports millions more?
Or is this a Liberals!! thing?
probably because of the two Hollywood elites that got elected as president. two of the worst presidents with huge mental issues. both of whom were obsessed with walls and greatly increased the deficit.
I'm really hoping this does end up being a positive move and not just a political weapon... The "metoo" hashtag is looking like it's being a thing now, with both BBC staff sharing some stories as well as various people I'm following on twitter.
I've got to say, I never thought I was naive about the whole thing, but the sheer scale of it, the sheer numbers of women affected. That, I think is the real surprise.
whembly wrote: But, I think we all do a good job calling 'em out on both sides too.
Yes, that's why you've started threads on Bill O'Reilly, Eric Bolling, and Roger Ailes.
In your defense as a Fox News viewer, you might not be aware any of those things happened.
Get real. Your concern over celebrity sexual assault scandals started the second you could use it as a political attack on a wealthy democratic donor.
A) I don't watch Fox News as I don't have cable
B) When I did, I watched CNN... I'm the generation who watched the first Gulf War on CNN at school.
C) We did talk to many of that in the locked US politics thread.
D) Your last sentence couldn't be further from the truth.
Easy E wrote: Okay, like the second part of my post said, if this is NOT about Whataboutism then....
Yeah... you've been on the mark.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
So you're agreeing new laws and regulations, will actually help fix this problem? Odd, I usually see you saying the opposite.
Of course he's not the only one, 1 out of 6 women and 1 out of 33 men are victims.
I'd like to see mandatory prison time added on to anyone found guilty of sexual assaults, either from criminal court or civil cases. No more gag orders on victims, or settling without an admitting guilt. Anyone settling out of court will have to admit guilt, and then proceed to criminal charges in court. IF nothing else, then at least stop allowing rapists visitation and parental rights for any children born of their crimes.
Easy E wrote: Okay, like the second part of my post said, if this is NOT about Whataboutism then....
Yeah... you've been on the mark.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
So you're agreeing new laws and regulations, will actually help fix this problem? Odd, I usually see you saying the opposite.
Of course he's not the only one, 1 out of 6 women and 1 out of 33 men are victims.
I'd like to see mandatory prison time added on to anyone found guilty of sexual assaults, either from criminal court or civil cases. No more gag orders on victims, or settling without an admitting guilt. Anyone settling out of court will have to admit guilt, and then proceed to criminal charges in court. IF nothing else, then at least stop allowing rapists visitation and parental rights for any children born of their crimes.
actually this is a major issue. Many states allow rapists father's rights. Make the moms show up, drop off the kid and have to see her former rapist. That's a real travesty.
Easy E wrote: Okay, like the second part of my post said, if this is NOT about Whataboutism then....
Yeah... you've been on the mark.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
So you're agreeing new laws and regulations, will actually help fix this problem? Odd, I usually see you saying the opposite.
Of course he's not the only one, 1 out of 6 women and 1 out of 33 men are victims.
I'd like to see mandatory prison time added on to anyone found guilty of sexual assaults, either from criminal court or civil cases. No more gag orders on victims, or settling without an admitting guilt. Anyone settling out of court will have to admit guilt, and then proceed to criminal charges in court. IF nothing else, then at least stop allowing rapists visitation and parental rights for any children born of their crimes.
actually this is a major issue. Many states allow rapists father's rights. Make the moms show up, drop off the kid and have to see her former rapist. That's a real travesty.
Easy E wrote: Okay, like the second part of my post said, if this is NOT about Whataboutism then....
Yeah... you've been on the mark.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
So you're agreeing new laws and regulations, will actually help fix this problem? Odd, I usually see you saying the opposite.
Of course he's not the only one, 1 out of 6 women and 1 out of 33 men are victims.
I'd like to see mandatory prison time added on to anyone found guilty of sexual assaults, either from criminal court or civil cases. No more gag orders on victims, or settling without an admitting guilt. Anyone settling out of court will have to admit guilt, and then proceed to criminal charges in court. IF nothing else, then at least stop allowing rapists visitation and parental rights for any children born of their crimes.
actually this is a major issue. Many states allow rapists father's rights. Make the moms show up, drop off the kid and have to see her former rapist. That's a real travesty.
Can you list the states that do this?
There are seven states without laws preventing rapists from gaining custody of children conceived without consent. In addition to Maryland, such states include Alabama, Mississippi, Minnesota, North Dakota, Wyoming and New Mexico, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL).
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
Easy E wrote: Okay, like the second part of my post said, if this is NOT about Whataboutism then....
Yeah... you've been on the mark.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
So you're agreeing new laws and regulations, will actually help fix this problem? Odd, I usually see you saying the opposite.
Of course he's not the only one, 1 out of 6 women and 1 out of 33 men are victims.
I'd like to see mandatory prison time added on to anyone found guilty of sexual assaults, either from criminal court or civil cases. No more gag orders on victims, or settling without an admitting guilt. Anyone settling out of court will have to admit guilt, and then proceed to criminal charges in court. IF nothing else, then at least stop allowing rapists visitation and parental rights for any children born of their crimes.
actually this is a major issue. Many states allow rapists father's rights. Make the moms show up, drop off the kid and have to see her former rapist. That's a real travesty.
One of my cousins worked for Child Services in Maine for thirty years and has a trunkful of horror stories involving sexually abused kids. One of the worst he shared with me involved a father that would hang his young son on a hook and burn him with cigarettes. He would also whore him out to his male friends at $2 a go.
My cousin tried to get the man prosecuted and get the kid out of the house but was told too many prominent people were involved to make a winning court case. The boy's dad ended up having a stroke at the edge of a lake and drowning.
My cousin said that was a good end for him, face down in the frog gak, sucking it in.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
This both saddens me and angers me. I guess I gotta write to a governor.
What is the next step to hold those who have behaved badly accountable in Hollywood, D.C. and across the globe?
Is it legislation? A social media campaign? More public shaming? Encouraging people to donate money and time to certain charities? What is it?
The first step is to actually hold them accountable. The problem will always be proving these things beyond a reasonable doubt, as so many of them may be little more than "he said, she said" without material evidence or witnesses. And we don't live in a society that allows for lie detectors and truth serum to be used in these cases, so that third party proof isn't easy to come by. Weinstein is being brought down because so many have come forward telling about what happened to them. But, has there been even one witness? One person who saw it happen, or who could say "Weinstein told me he did it"?
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
This both saddens me and angers me. I guess I gotta write to a governor.
Just to clarify:
Texas, as well as 39 other states, don't have specific laws giving rapists parental rights.
The other 10 states just have specific laws allowing the termination of parental rights of rapists.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
This both saddens me and angers me. I guess I gotta write to a governor.
Just to clarify:
Texas, as well as 39 other states, don't have specific laws giving rapists parental rights.
The other 10 states just have specific laws allowing the termination of parental rights of rapists.
Men have parental rights if they father a child, with no additional laws to remove that right, they keep it even if they rape a woman. They don't need an additional law to grant rapists rights, as the men already have that right.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
This both saddens me and angers me. I guess I gotta write to a governor.
Just to clarify:
Texas, as well as 39 other states, don't have specific laws giving rapists parental rights.
The other 10 states just have specific laws allowing the termination of parental rights of rapists.
Men have parental rights if they father a child, with no additional laws to remove that right, they keep it even if they rape a woman. They don't need an additional law to grant rapists rights, as the men already have that right.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
OH I promise you our great state of Texas has no such fuckery.
Social media erupted this week after stories broke of a judge awarding joint legal custody of a young child to the man convicted of raping the child's mom to produce the kid in the first place. At the time, the mother was only a 12-year-old girl.
This both saddens me and angers me. I guess I gotta write to a governor.
Just to clarify:
Texas, as well as 39 other states, don't have specific laws giving rapists parental rights.
The other 10 states just have specific laws allowing the termination of parental rights of rapists.
Men have parental rights if they father a child, with no additional laws to remove that right, they keep it even if they rape a woman. They don't need an additional law to grant rapists rights, as the men already have that right.
The flip side of that is so does the child for child support.
I had a family member who was raped and kept the child... her dad took the father to court to have his custody rights removed. As a consequence of that, she had to give up the right to ask for child support too.
Dreadwinter wrote: Sebster, I am not ignoring your point. However, you are ignoring the fact that I treat minors and adults the same way if I witness abuse.
But there's two things wrong with applying your mandated reporter status to what I said.
1) Its a special status for you and others in similar institutional roles. It isn't a requirement for all people.
2) It gives you obligations to more people than just children, but it isn't an obligation to everyone. Sure, a 21 year old student isn't legally a minor, but they are still a student who is vulnerable to their place of higher learning and so that justifies the mandated reporter status. But take that 21 year old out of the school, put her in her own home, talking to a friend about what happened last night, and the relationship is totally different.
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Prestor Jon wrote: It is one hundred percent my obligation to my community, my family, my coworkers, my friends and myself to report a violent crime if I see it/hear it/know about it, regardless of the age or feelings of the victim.
If I'm walking to my car in the parking lot after work and I see what looks like a man assaulting a woman in poorly lit far corner of the parking lot and I yell and run over there and the man flees, I find the woman on the ground disheveled, bruised and dazed. I ask her if she's ok and I take out my phone and tell her not to worry because I'm going to call 911 but she tells me No, no, that's ok I'm fine, I'm fine I just want to go home. She gathers her things, gets in her car and drives off. Should I call the police and report what I saw or not?
My stance is that I should absolutely report witnessing an assault 100% of the time. We, as a society, have decided to criminalize assault/sexual assault, to discourage it and punish anyone who is convicted of committing it. I don't see any compelling reason to ever not report a violent crime. When crimes go unreported it allows the criminals to continue to roam free and victimize more members of the community. That's not good for anybody.
I think the example of a woman attacked in a parking lot is a strange one. It makes you a stranger to the woman, and it makes her relationship to the attacker distant, and so the description of her just wanting to ignore the crime becomes quite odd.
Lets instead consider something much more like what's being discussed in this thread. Let's call the victim Gwyneth Paltrow, the attacker Harvey Weinstein, and the third party Brad Pitt. Because this is what actually happened to them.
She was doing work for Emma, a Weinstein production. She went to Weinstein's room to go through some notes. He started to pressure her in to sex, starting with massaging her. She left. He told her if he said anything about what happened he would fire her from Emma. She told her partner at the time, Brad Pitt, and he rang Weinstein, the two got in to a screaming match. Weinstein then called Paltrow and berated her.
Weinstein and Paltrow went on to have a successful working relationship, making many films together. If you were in Brad Pitt's shoes, would you have called police?
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.". (Edmund Burke)
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive." CS Lewis.
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whembly wrote: All of the above to be honest.... Weinstein probably isn't the only one... he's just the one that got caught.
Much like the discovery of paedophilia in so many religious and state institutions, there's a grave risk that this will eventually be explained away by defining through one villain, or maybe a couple of villains. Too many people took theinking it was just a Catholic Church thing, and ignoring the huge number of Protestant and non-religious State institutions that allowed offenders within its ranks and covered up their crimes. Its possible people will do something similar and just use this to bash FOX News and Hollywood, and pretend this isn't endemic across many institutions.
We need to do the hard and necessary work of understanding how power dynamics, culture and our existing legal processes combine to let people do this kind of thing for years. And then we need to start the even harder work of changing those things to make this kind of thing stop happening.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.". (Edmund Burke)
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive." CS Lewis.
"Not impressed. I can quote stuff too." LordofHats
I think it's one thing to report an assault in progress, or that you've seen. It's another thing entirely to take it upon yourself to tell the police something that someone else told you in confidence. That's a dick move, because at the end of the day there comes a point where someone has made a completely conscious decision not to tell the police and I don't think I have the right to take it upon myself and tell the cops what Mary told me, especially if she makes it clear she doesn't want me to say anything to anyone. Now if I see a crime in progress, bets are off, but being told about something by a victim weeks or even years later is a different scenario.
As much a danger as predators are, you can't force people to come forward and trying to pressure people to do so is likely to have the opposite of the desired effect. Sexual assault and rape are about force. Throwing more force onto it just doubles the violation and isolates victims further. I think being too gung ho about reporting things after the fact may drive these things further underground and make victims less likely to ever come forward.
Man, if women marched against Trump for allegedly saying something sexual, can't wait for the even bigger marches on Hollywood.... crickets..... O' well, good ol' Hollywood.
NenkotaMoon wrote: Man, if women marched against Trump for allegedly saying something sexual, can't wait for the even bigger marches on Hollywood.... crickets..... O' well, good ol' Hollywood.
Good ol' collective guilt.
Donald Trump is responsible for what Donald Trump does. Everyone in Hollywood isn't responsible for what some people in the industry do.
NenkotaMoon wrote: Man, if women marched against Trump for allegedly saying something sexual, can't wait for the even bigger marches on Hollywood.... crickets..... O' well, good ol' Hollywood.
And here it is. Again.
They marched against Trump when he was elected President. Meanwhile Weinstein has been fired from his own company, turned in to a pariah and legal proceedings are moving ahead.
So what in god of all feths do you want this protest against Hollywood to chant?
"What do we want?"
"Exactly what is happening!"
"When do we want it?"
"Now that it's finally come to light things are moving along at a reasonable pace so I guess that's fine also!"
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LordofHats wrote: "Not impressed. I can quote stuff too." LordofHats
I think it's one thing to report an assault in progress, or that you've seen. It's another thing entirely to take it upon yourself to tell the police something that someone else told you in confidence. That's a dick move, because at the end of the day there comes a point where someone has made a completely conscious decision not to tell the police and I don't think I have the right to take it upon myself and tell the cops what Mary told me, especially if she makes it clear she doesn't want me to say anything to anyone. Now if I see a crime in progress, bets are off, but being told about something by a victim weeks or even years later is a different scenario.
As much a danger as predators are, you can't force people to come forward and trying to pressure people to do so is likely to have the opposite of the desired effect. Sexual assault and rape are about force. Throwing more force onto it just doubles the violation and isolates victims further. I think being too gung ho about reporting things after the fact may drive these things further underground and make victims less likely to ever come forward.
NenkotaMoon wrote: Man, if women marched against Trump for allegedly saying something sexual, can't wait for the even bigger marches on Hollywood.... crickets..... O' well, good ol' Hollywood.
I think you might see more people marching against Harvey Weinstein if their paychecks were currently being taxed to support his lifestyle, and if he was currently empowered to make institutional changes that greatly affect their lives.
NenkotaMoon wrote: Man, if women marched against Trump for allegedly saying something sexual, can't wait for the even bigger marches on Hollywood.... crickets..... O' well, good ol' Hollywood.
When I read stuff like this I always wonder if the writer is stupid or evil.
Either you believe taped conversation is alleged, "something sexual" equals assault, only wimmins dislike Trump and the lack of unnecessary marches means Libtards totally support an ass.
Or...
You're an ass.
They marched against Trump when he was elected President. Meanwhile Weinstein has been fired from his own company, turned in to a pariah and legal proceedings are moving ahead.
Of course, Trump isn't currently in jail and Weinstein only got hit now that other rich rapists wanted him replaced. He may well be rehabilitated and/or keep working in the business. It's too early to count this as a victory.
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
Texas I know. The law is almost irrelevant. The standard is best interest of the child, and its really dependent on the judge and local jurisdiction. I have personal experience on Texas.
Rosebuddy wrote: Of course, Trump isn't currently in jail and Weinstein only got hit now that other rich rapists wanted him replaced. He may well be rehabilitated and/or keep working in the business. It's too early to count this as a victory.
Sure, it isn't yet a complete victory, but it'd silly to moan it as a defeat when things are moving in the right direction, at least as far as Weinstein is involved.
Also, 'only got hit now that other rich rapists wanted him replaced'?! Where in the feth does that nonsense come from?
Ten states — Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin— allow courts to terminate a rapist's parental rights based on clear and convincing evidence of rape.
Texas I know. The law is almost irrelevant. The standard is best interest of the child, and its really dependent on the judge and local jurisdiction. I have personal experience on Texas.
I've been told I have a very nice ass, though I find it sad when someone has to go to name calling though
To answer another post, this kind of stuff isn't new in Hollywood and it is kind of hypocritical to a large degree for the industry to whole sale go after one man whom is now President on verbal language used, but not go after another whom literally did it for years and worse, and he's not the only one in the industry that does, and some even aide in or ignore. And they have BALLS to be such paragons of society! Hell they probably got rid of him for something he said in a back room meeting knowing the Hollywood mob and how easy it is for some to get blacklisted, of course I don't know fully on that but read some books and biographies that point possibly to it.
This isn't protecting our current POTUS, I'm not the biggest fan. To me he is pretty mediocre, but I din't want the Libertarian though he came close, Hell no to the one crazy chick, and Hillary was more akin to shooting myself.
NenkotaMoon wrote: To answer another post, this kind of stuff isn't new in Hollywood and it is kind of hypocritical to a large degree for the industry to whole sale go after one man whom is now President on verbal language used, but not go after another whom literally did it for years and worse, and he's not the only one in the industry that does, and some even aide in or ignore. And they have BALLS to be such paragons of society! Hell they probably got rid of him for something he said in a back room meeting knowing the Hollywood mob and how easy it is for some to get blacklisted, of course I don't know fully on that but read some books and biographies that point possibly to it.
This isn't protecting our current POTUS, I'm not the biggest fan. To me he is pretty mediocre, but I din't want the Libertarian though he came close, Hell no to the one crazy chick, and Hillary was more akin to shooting myself.
This is contradictory: "after one man whom is now President on verbal language used, but not go after another whom literally did it for years and worse". The tape on which Trump said he sexually harassed women is quite old. He had a reasonably successful TV career afterwards. Yet when it did finally come out and women started to come forward it was by and large dismissed (as were the women) or deemed not to be important enough not to vote for Trump. When the Weinstein thing broke and women started coming forward he has been dragged trough the mud and dumped (for now?). How that is hypocritical I have no clue. Because sexual assault happens in Hollywood they have no right to speak out about abuse elsewhere? Weinstein has probably lost his standing for good, meanwhile Trump became President. Two different results with a similar backstory.
I could give a very lengthy and damning post explaining that Trump is Hollywood as much as Weinstein is, but anyone who would get it probably can figure it out for themselves and anyone else will probably just continue to perpetuate the self-serving double standards that surround the man as is so I'll just skip all the wasted effort and point out the Trump is as much "Hollywood" insofar as when people invoke the place they're really referring to an industry cause not that much actually gets made in Hollywood anymore, but for some baffling reason Trump is treated as separate from the rest of the celebrity entertainment industry despite being most famous and successful as a celebrity entertainer.
http://www.realclearlife.com/movies/carrie-fisher-sent-cow-tongue-producer-accused-sexual-assault/
Heather Ross, a longtime friend of the late Carrie Fisher, phoned into a Tuscon radio station this week to discuss claims of sexual assault and harassment made against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. Ross spoke about her experience with a different, unnamed Oscar-winning producer who picked her up in 2000, then pulled the car over and pinned her down against the car seat.
After sharing this information with Fisher, Ross said, she took it upon herself to pay a message worthy of a Godfather spin-off.
“About two weeks later, she [Fisher] sent me a message online and she said, ‘I just saw (blank) at Sony Studios,'” Ross recalled. ”’I knew he would probably be there, so I went to his office and personally delivered a Tiffany box wrapped with a white bow.'”
She continued: “‘I asked her what was inside and she said, ‘It was a cow tongue from Jerry’s Famous Deli in Westwood with a note that said, ‘If you ever touch my darling Heather or any other woman again, the next delivery will be something of yours in a much smaller box!’'”
Ross said this was “just how” Fisher was: “I miss her dearly. She stood up for people…she put things out there and in your face.”
I could give a very lengthy and damning post explaining that Trump is Hollywood as much as Weinstein is, but anyone who would get it probably can figure it out for themselves and anyone else will probably just continue to perpetuate the self-serving double standards that surround the man as is so I'll just skip all the wasted effort and point out the Trump is as much "Hollywood" insofar as when people invoke the place they're really referring to an industry cause not that much actually gets made in Hollywood anymore, but for some baffling reason Trump is treated as separate from the rest of the celebrity entertainment industry despite being most famous and successful as a celebrity entertainer.
Rich, influential and both heading/having headed organisations with plenty of access to young women. Both donated to the Democratic party. The only difference is one switched and became President. But one has no fight and the other fights for what others want, something something the end justifying the means.
Prestor Jon wrote: It is one hundred percent my obligation to my community, my family, my coworkers, my friends and myself to report a violent crime if I see it/hear it/know about it, regardless of the age or feelings of the victim.
If I'm walking to my car in the parking lot after work and I see what looks like a man assaulting a woman in poorly lit far corner of the parking lot and I yell and run over there and the man flees, I find the woman on the ground disheveled, bruised and dazed. I ask her if she's ok and I take out my phone and tell her not to worry because I'm going to call 911 but she tells me No, no, that's ok I'm fine, I'm fine I just want to go home. She gathers her things, gets in her car and drives off. Should I call the police and report what I saw or not?
My stance is that I should absolutely report witnessing an assault 100% of the time. We, as a society, have decided to criminalize assault/sexual assault, to discourage it and punish anyone who is convicted of committing it. I don't see any compelling reason to ever not report a violent crime. When crimes go unreported it allows the criminals to continue to roam free and victimize more members of the community. That's not good for anybody.
I think the example of a woman attacked in a parking lot is a strange one. It makes you a stranger to the woman, and it makes her relationship to the attacker distant, and so the description of her just wanting to ignore the crime becomes quite odd.
Lets instead consider something much more like what's being discussed in this thread. Let's call the victim Gwyneth Paltrow, the attacker Harvey Weinstein, and the third party Brad Pitt. Because this is what actually happened to them.
She was doing work for Emma, a Weinstein production. She went to Weinstein's room to go through some notes. He started to pressure her in to sex, starting with massaging her. She left. He told her if he said anything about what happened he would fire her from Emma. She told her partner at the time, Brad Pitt, and he rang Weinstein, the two got in to a screaming match. Weinstein then called Paltrow and berated her.
Weinstein and Paltrow went on to have a successful working relationship, making many films together. If you were in Brad Pitt's shoes, would you have called police?
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.". (Edmund Burke)
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive." CS Lewis.
I would call the police 100% of the time, no debate no question. The only sure way to stop a rapist/sexual predator from victimizing people is to remove that person from society, so that leaves incarceration or death as the two surest ways of stopping the predator. If I was Brad Pitt would I have gone after Harvey Weinstein for some vigilante justice? Maybe, but if I didn't run off to Harvey's house in a murderous rage I would have called the police, not Harvey. Yelling at somebody over the phone? What's the point in that? Harsh language is better than doing absolutely nothing I guess but it certainly won't stop sexual assault from happening.
What did Brad Pitt accomplish? He contributed to getting Weinstein to not rape Gwyneth Paltrow. Gwyneth's willingness to tell somebody about the incident probably also played a factor in Weinstein deciding to leave Paltrow alone and still give her good roles. Pitt helped protect his girlfriend from Weinstein but he did nothing to protect anyone else's girlfriend from Harvey Weinstein so Weinstein kept on harassing and assaulting other people's girlfriends for decades.
Do we seriously want to stop sexual assault from happening or not? Because what the Pitt/Paltrow example shows us is that we don't tolerate sexual assault when it happens to people we care about but we're ok with letting it happen to other people because actually fighting sexual predators is hard work and not worthwhile. Did Pitt and Paltrow not know about the rumors and open secret of Weinstein assaulting other women? Did they think that Harvey never tried to coerce other actresses into sexual acts? Or did they just myopic enough to not care about other victims as long as they were safe and prosperous?
How could Harvey Weinstein keep doing this for decades? Because the people who knew about it didn't care enough to stop it.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.". (Edmund Burke)
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive." CS Lewis.
"Not impressed. I can quote stuff too." LordofHats
I think it's one thing to report an assault in progress, or that you've seen. It's another thing entirely to take it upon yourself to tell the police something that someone else told you in confidence. That's a dick move, because at the end of the day there comes a point where someone has made a completely conscious decision not to tell the police and I don't think I have the right to take it upon myself and tell the cops what Mary told me, especially if she makes it clear she doesn't want me to say anything to anyone. Now if I see a crime in progress, bets are off, but being told about something by a victim weeks or even years later is a different scenario.
As much a danger as predators are, you can't force people to come forward and trying to pressure people to do so is likely to have the opposite of the desired effect. Sexual assault and rape are about force. Throwing more force onto it just doubles the violation and isolates victims further. I think being too gung ho about reporting things after the fact may drive these things further underground and make victims less likely to ever come forward.
If somebody I care about tells me that somebody assaulted them then I am going to do something about it. I mean, this is somebody I care about right? So how am I going to be able to make peace with 1) letting the person who hurt her/him get away with it 2) letting the person who hurt her/him go hurt somebody else? Any half measure I take is only gong to hurt myself, threatening the person who did it, harassing the person who did it, puts me in the wrong and can get me arrested. Hurting the person who did it puts me in the wrong and can get me arrested. So my options are down to ignoring it/passively accepting it or trying to plan the perfect murder or reporting it to the police and hoping it leads to a successful prosecution. I'm not going to concede that our society is one that lets people rape/assault others with impunity because holding people accountable for their actions is too difficult/traumatizing. I'm sensitive to the feelings of the victims but not reporting the crime can also traumatize the victim. If the criminal eventually gets caught and there is a string of victims that were attacked after the person I know was attacked then my friend/relative now has to live with the fact that however many people suffered the same violation and pain that he/she suffered at the hands of the predator and my friend/relative did nothing to stop it when he/she could have done something. Now he/she has to live with that and that's not going to be easy either.
I would strongly suggest that anybody victimized by a crime to report that crime and I would offer any and all the support I can to that person while they go through that process because there is a price to be paid for not reporting crimes. One commonality between all the people being accused of sexual predation lately is multiple victims. Anybody could be the next victim, it could happen to me, a member of my family, a friend a coworker, you, anybody. Why shouldn't we all do all that we can to protect people from being a victim? What is gained from just accepting it and letting it happen? I think we can have a better stance on rape than Bobby Knight.
Prestor Jon wrote: If somebody I care about tells me that somebody assaulted them then I am going to do something about it.
You can respect them (which their attackers did not do) instead of dragging them through the doors of the nearest station just to parade your own self-righteousness.
Serial predators are generally not known to be such to their victims. It's not like being sexually assaulted links you to the hive mind and makes you immediately aware of everyone else who has been victimized. Even if you know you're not the only one, you likely lack the knowledge to know who is and you can't go to the police with "there have to be more."
price to be paid for not reporting crimes.
There's a price to be paid for forcing people to do things they don't want to do to, like having them shut down and never get help or say anything to anyone for fear that they will again have control of their lives taken away from them. You're also horribly overlooking that reporting a crime doesn't put predators behind bars. Courts do. If a victim doesn't even want to go to the police, its even less likely they want to sit in a court and have their experience and life scrutinized by strangers.
Why shouldn't we all do all that we can to protect people from being a victim?
Making someone a victim all over again in the name of justice isn't justice.
NenkotaMoon wrote: To answer another post, this kind of stuff isn't new in Hollywood and it is kind of hypocritical to a large degree for the industry to whole sale go after one man whom is now President on verbal language used, but not go after another whom literally did it for years and worse, and he's not the only one in the industry that does, and some even aide in or ignore.
Uh, thinking the complaint against Trump is just about some things he said on a tape is totally wrong. More than 20 women have made accusations against Trump, going back to the 1980s. He didn't just say some stuff, he also did those things.
What is really telling is that these accusations are very similar in their particulars. Just as the accusations against Weinstein frequently cited showers, bathrobes and massages as his method to slowly up the pressure on the women, so too do the accusations against Trump show a clear pattern of aggressive, unsolicited groping, and another pattern of entering changing rooms at just the time he knew girls would be undressed. These just happen to be the exact things Trump has bragged about doing, in both the Hollywood Access tapes and in his interviews with Howard Stern.
Sorry but have any of you guys who are saying "respect the woman's rights" and keep it quiet to respect them ever actually reported anything? The cops don't immediately look to the nearest camera and say "hey, look at sally, she was raped". It is initially hush hush to avoid looking bad (I guess they take it personally they didn't catch the perp themselves or something), then it's brushed to the side as if they have more important things to do, and then, if they have time they might turn it over to the DA. And he (or she) is such a blabbermoutn. They might, after looking into it and seeing how it might impact their career, actually take the case. What in gods name is stopping you from reporting something you find indefensible? Report it. Tell the world. Put it on the snap chats and the facebook. You do not have to give the victims name there. Don't. But hells, bells tell people about it. Proclaim it to the world. And actually, in this one instance, for this one thing, screw victims rights. Tell people. Save people. Sally got her tit touched? Horrible. Saves Persepolis from getting her gakker touched. Sally might agree someday.
I reported something where the victim refused to come forward. The police more or less told me they couldn't do a thing without the victim's participation.
And fhey really can't if the victim refuses to press charges. See my point above. There are (sadly?) higher powers than the authorities these days (see the entire thread). Put it on Facebook, telling us here helps no one. Tag the offender. Let him/her know you know.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Rich, influential and both heading/having headed organisations with plenty of access to young women. Both donated to the Democratic party. The only difference is one switched and became President. But one has no fight and the other fights for what others want, something something the end justifying the means.
The difference is Weinstein lost his position of power, because he stopped delivering hits and Oscars. His power faded, and he was no longer able to use it to shut down the accusations.
Whereas when the Access Hollywood tape broke and confirmed what women had been accusing him of for years, Trump was a presidential candidate for a major party, and his party was really afraid of losing to the Democratic candidate. So they pretended there was nothing to see.
Similarly, Ailes sex crimes were widelt known but suppressed because the guy was enourmously powerful. But with failing health, a reducing contribution to FOX News and the younger Murdoch's not as loyal to Ailes as their Dad, he became vulnerable and so finally he was recognised for what he was. And when Ailes was gone, O'Reilly lost his protection so he got revealed as well.
Point is, if Trump's Access Hollywood tape had come out before he announced his candidacy, or perhaps during the primary, condemnation would have been universal. But it came out at time when Republicans needed to pretend it wasn't true, so they invented some really weak nonsense to pretend Trump isn't who he is, and voted him in to office.
In a similar way, it's interesting to note that now, years after the accusations against Bill Clinton were first aired, we're starting to see some recognition that maybe Clinton didn't just compulsively have sex with only consenting women, that maybe a guy with that kind of compulsion didn't always do everything to make sure consent was clearly and freely given. I think that is happening finally because after Obama's presidency, Democrats have a more recent president to lionise, and so they can be a bit more honest about Clinton's issues.
Gordon Shumway wrote: Sorry but have any of you guys who are saying "respect the woman's rights" and keep it quiet to respect them ever actually reported anything?
Have the people who are saying "report it always" ever reported anything? I have and I can tell you exactly what the cops told me.
"There's not much we can do."
Unless you saw the crime, in which case why didn't you do something then, you don't actually know anything. You think you know something. The police can't make a case on your telling them cryptically that someone is a rapist or molests the nurses in their practice (or whatever). They need victims to make cases, and if a victim really doesn't want to report, taking it upon yourself to report for them isn't going to help them along. Going behind someone's back after they trusted you can be disastrous. These kinds of crimes can't be prosecuted without cooperating witnesses, and getting someone to cooperate with an investigation they never wanted is not only extremely difficult it can cause the victim to withdraw from counseling, friendships, or ever cooperating because the one time they tried trusting someone else they got stabbed in the back. Worse a victim may recant to maintain control of their situation, and recantations can be death blows not just to their own case but future cases because now their attacker can hold them up as a liar who accused them of something they didn't do.
Again, you can't force people to do something they don't want to do and trying to do so can backfire horribly. Going behind someone's back not only betrays their confidence and trust, it can ruin any chance of them ever coming forward, getting counseling, or a practical case against their attacker ever occurring. As awesome as it might seem to say "I will step forward and do the right thing" it's not actually helping. It's just a self-serving fantasy.
Prestor Jon wrote: I would call the police 100% of the time, no debate no question. The only sure way to stop a rapist/sexual predator from victimizing people is to remove that person from society, so that leaves incarceration or death as the two surest ways of stopping the predator.
So your opinion is that if the victim doesn't want to pursue that course of action, you don't care and will override her and betray what she told you in confidence?
If I was Brad Pitt would I have gone after Harvey Weinstein for some vigilante justice? Maybe, but if I didn't run off to Harvey's house in a murderous rage I would have called the police, not Harvey. Yelling at somebody over the phone? What's the point in that? Harsh language is better than doing absolutely nothing I guess but it certainly won't stop sexual assault from happening.
What did Brad Pitt accomplish? He contributed to getting Weinstein to not rape Gwyneth Paltrow. Gwyneth's willingness to tell somebody about the incident probably also played a factor in Weinstein deciding to leave Paltrow alone and still give her good roles. Pitt helped protect his girlfriend from Weinstein but he did nothing to protect anyone else's girlfriend from Harvey Weinstein so Weinstein kept on harassing and assaulting other people's girlfriends for decades.
I didn't ask about vigilante justice, not sure why you went there. Nor did Pitt's action stop any rape - he was told after the event.
As to what Pitt's actions achieved, they achieved nothing. The guy was in an impossible place, a predator had attempted to manipulate his girlfriend in to sex, so he wanted to protect her, but he also had to respect her wishes. "Achieving something" is a really flawed way of assessing the outcome of his actions.
Do we seriously want to stop sexual assault from happening or not?
Yes, but we also seriously need to let adult women make their own decisions. Finding the balance isn't easy in lots of places, but in this case it shouldn't be too hard.
Because what the Pitt/Paltrow example shows us is that we don't tolerate sexual assault when it happens to people we care about but we're ok with letting it happen to other people because actually fighting sexual predators is hard work and not worthwhile.
What it shows us is that when women come forward with these stories we should believe them, and not judge them or dismiss them. Do that, and most of the problems with women not wanting to report these things will disappear.
But if instead we decide that part of the solution involves making the decision to press charges, ie make a formal, public accusation, well then I think we're probably just reinforcing the culture that's produced a lot of this problem.
Gordon Shumway wrote: And fhey really can't if the victim refuses to press charges. See my point above. There are (sadly?) higher powers than the authorities these days (see the entire thread). Put it on Facebook, telling us here helps no one. Tag the offender. Let him/her know you know.
"I'm sorry your honor but I don't think my client can get a fair trial in this jurisdiction. So and so has put his face all over town calling him a rapist. Is harassing him on social media, his wife, his children. These baseless accusations are all that exists, and we intend to sue for damages immediately."
Seriously. That is even more counter productive. Your just loading a predator, who you don't even really know is a predator, with ammunition to sue you (or worse their accusers), supply them with any number of appeals and defenses in court, and you again risk pushing victims underground to avoid their situation from spiraling out of their control.
Sometimes the best way to help someone is to be their friend, not their knight in shining armor.
Gordon Shumway wrote: Sorry but have any of you guys who are saying "respect the woman's rights" and keep it quiet to respect them ever actually reported anything? The cops don't immediately look to the nearest camera and say "hey, look at sally, she was raped". It is initially hush hush to avoid looking bad (I guess they take it personally they didn't catch the perp themselves or something), then it's brushed to the side as if they have more important things to do, and then, if they have time they might turn it over to the DA. And he (or she) is such a blabbermoutn. They might, after looking into it and seeing how it might impact their career, actually take the case. What in gods name is stopping you from reporting something you find indefensible? Report it. Tell the world. Put it on the snap chats and the facebook.
Effectively the argument is that betraying her confidence is okay, because it'll probably be an entirely ineffectual gesture. Not sure how that's an argument to make the complaint, to be honest.
You do not have to give the victims name there. Don't. But hells, bells tell people about it. Proclaim it to the world. And actually, in this one instance, for this one thing, screw victims rights. Tell people. Save people. Sally got her tit touched? Horrible. Saves Persepolis from getting her gakker touched. Sally might agree someday.
Yeah, because if my partner is working on a film with a Hollywood producer, and then I accuse that Hollywood producer of groping an anonymous girl, absolutely no-one will figure out who I'm talking about.
Gordon Shumway wrote: And fhey really can't if the victim refuses to press charges. See my point above. There are (sadly?) higher powers than the authorities these days (see the entire thread). Put it on Facebook, telling us here helps no one. Tag the offender. Let him/her know you know.
"I'm sorry your honor but I don't think my client can get a fair trial in this jurisdiction. So and so has put his face all over town calling him a rapist. Is harassing him on social media, his wife, his children. These baseless accusations are all that exists, and we intend to sue for damages immediately."
Seriously. That is even more counter productive. Your just loading a predator, who you don't even really know is a predator, with ammunition to sue you (or worse their accusers), supply them with any number of appeals and defenses in court, and you again risk pushing victims underground to avoid their situation from spiraling out of their control.
Sometimes the best way to help someone is to be their friend, not their knight in shining armor.
If they have no compulsion to report the crime committed, anyway, how exactly it it tainting the jury pool (which obviously wouldn't exist?) at least they might not get hired? Nah, that's too much to ask as well.
Gordon Shumway wrote: Sorry but have any of you guys who are saying "respect the woman's rights" and keep it quiet to respect them ever actually reported anything? The cops don't immediately look to the nearest camera and say "hey, look at sally, she was raped". It is initially hush hush to avoid looking bad (I guess they take it personally they didn't catch the perp themselves or something), then it's brushed to the side as if they have more important things to do, and then, if they have time they might turn it over to the DA. And he (or she) is such a blabbermoutn. They might, after looking into it and seeing how it might impact their career, actually take the case. What in gods name is stopping you from reporting something you find indefensible? Report it. Tell the world. Put it on the snap chats and the facebook.
Effectively the argument is that betraying her confidence is okay, because it'll probably be an entirely ineffectual gesture. Not sure how that's an argument to make the complaint, to be honest.
You do not have to give the victims name there. Don't. But hells, bells tell people about it. Proclaim it to the world. And actually, in this one instance, for this one thing, screw victims rights. Tell people. Save people. Sally got her tit touched? Horrible. Saves Persepolis from getting her gakker touched. Sally might agree someday.
Yeah, because if my partner is working on a film with a Hollywood producer, and then I accuse that Hollywood producer of groping an anonymous girl, absolutely no-one will figure out who I'm talking about.
So the result is to do nothing because it didn't happen to you? Seems even more ineffectual. Considering the number of people Weinstein is accused of molesting, I don't think hiding behind the cloud of anonnominity is all that far fetched.
Gordon Shumway wrote: If they have no compulsion to report the crime committed, anyway, how exactly it it tainting the jury pool (which obviously wouldn't exist?)
Because someone else might make a report and want to cooperate with the police on the case. You're hurting their chances by taking matters into your own hands.
Not to mention that;
at least they might not get hired?
Again, you're just giving them grounds to sue you for harassment, or use that harassment to defend themselves.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Rich, influential and both heading/having headed organisations with plenty of access to young women. Both donated to the Democratic party. The only difference is one switched and became President. But one has no fight and the other fights for what others want, something something the end justifying the means.
The difference is Weinstein lost his position of power, because he stopped delivering hits and Oscars. His power faded, and he was no longer able to use it to shut down the accusations.
Whereas when the Access Hollywood tape broke and confirmed what women had been accusing him of for years, Trump was a presidential candidate for a major party, and his party was really afraid of losing to the Democratic candidate. So they pretended there was nothing to see.
Similarly, Ailes sex crimes were widelt known but suppressed because the guy was enourmously powerful. But with failing health, a reducing contribution to FOX News and the younger Murdoch's not as loyal to Ailes as their Dad, he became vulnerable and so finally he was recognised for what he was. And when Ailes was gone, O'Reilly lost his protection so he got revealed as well.
Point is, if Trump's Access Hollywood tape had come out before he announced his candidacy, or perhaps during the primary, condemnation would have been universal. But it came out at time when Republicans needed to pretend it wasn't true, so they invented some really weak nonsense to pretend Trump isn't who he is, and voted him in to office.
In a similar way, it's interesting to note that now, years after the accusations against Bill Clinton were first aired, we're starting to see some recognition that maybe Clinton didn't just compulsively have sex with only consenting women, that maybe a guy with that kind of compulsion didn't always do everything to make sure consent was clearly and freely given. I think that is happening finally because after Obama's presidency, Democrats have a more recent president to lionise, and so they can be a bit more honest about Clinton's issues.
Well put, I was perhaps a bit short, but the similarities really seem obvious. Its brought up that Democrats as beneficiaries of his donations have been slow to condemn Weinstein. If Trump had not been President/a candidate and still donating to the Democrats the same line would be brought up. But not only was Trump halfheartedly condemned for 'Billy Bush Weekend', he didn't even suffer from it in the end like Weinstein will likely. Like I said to NenkotaMoon when he again brought up the protests against Trump: "Two different results with a similar backstory." Trumps get protested against because when his issue exploded he managed to avoid most of the fallout, as you have eloquently described. The worst part is that in the Weinstein case the victims will receive mostly sympathy (which is good), while in Trump's case those women have become the 'enemy' to certain parts of society.
Gordon Shumway wrote: So the result is to do nothing because it didn't happen to you?
Putting someone else's needs before your own is generally considered to be pretty noble. Being a good friend (or family member) and supporting someone through a hard time isn't doing nothing. Get them counseling. A support group. Be on call if they need you. Not to mention your in a much better position to encourage them to cooperate with the police when they actually trust you, and they're the ones actually capable to doing something about what happened to them. Unless you saw it go down, you are not.
I get sued for harressassment on the internet, yeah, that will fly. Even Weinstein couldn't make that stick. But it might have caused a hashtag #'movement to avoid him. Maybe? I'm not really sure what the point of hashtags are.
Gordon Shumway wrote: So the result is to do nothing because it didn't happen to you? Seems even more ineffectual.
In many times in your life you will be ineffectual. You are not here to solve everybody's lives for them.
What you can do is believe and support the person telling you what happened. Tell them you will have their back no matter what they decide. If they ask you can give advice about what they should do, but when they decide you should respect that decision even if you don't agree with it. If that means you don't get to be a big hero and make the report and stand up to power, then oh well.
Considering the number of people Weinstein is accused of molesting, I don't think hiding behind the cloud of anonnominity is all that far fetched.
The number of people Weinstein abused doesn't make it any harder to figure out which anonymous victim you are talking about. Unless the person who told you is a stranger, people will know who you are close to, who happens to work with Weinstein. To return to the Brad Pitt example, if he'd gone public saying Weinstein had abused someone, well Weinstein worked with many girls and so any one of them could be the victim, but Pitt was only dating one such girl, Paltrow. So people would know exactly who Pitt was talking about.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Well put, I was perhaps a bit short, but the similarities really seem obvious. Its brought up that Democrats as beneficiaries of his donations have been slow to condemn Weinstein. If Trump had not been President/a candidate and still donating to the Democrats the same line would be brought up. But not only was Trump halfheartedly condemned for 'Billy Bush Weekend', he didn't even suffer from it in the end like Weinstein will likely. Like I said to NenkotaMoon when he again brought up the protests against Trump: "Two different results with a similar backstory." Trumps get protested against because when his issue exploded he managed to avoid most of the fallout, as you have eloquently described. The worst part is that in the Weinstein case the victims will receive mostly sympathy (which is good), while in Trump's case those women have become the 'enemy' to certain parts of society.
No, I thought your post was fine, and raised a good point. I was looking to expand on it. You're absolutely right that it was two different results despite very similar backstories, and the big question is why. And the answer to that isn't flattering to humans, and what we are willing to ignore if we have the right motive.
The revelations about Bill Cosby, Jimmy Saville and all those other aging creeps is another example of how this works. It was telling that they were all revealed decades after the prime of their careers. They were no longer money makers, and so powerful people no longer had money motivations to dismiss or quash accusations against them.
Nor is it just about those interests. Imagine if the accusations against Cosby came out during the peak popularity of The Cosby Show. People would not have believed them because they didn't want to believe them, because people loved Bill Cosby. People have expressed similar sentiments about the accusations against Louis CK in this very thread, and I happen to have felt the same instinct when I first heard the rumours - I didn't want to believe them because I like Louis CK's work.
I'm not trying to be any sort of hero, just saying, nope, the person who I know molested somebody I know doesn't get to pretend like it didn't happen and do it to someone else. That's not heroism, that's humanism. My friend confided in me and told me about it. She/he trusted me to do what I thought was the right thing to do. That is what I think is the right thing to do. To me, doing otherwise would be going against that agreement. Sort of the Casablanca quandary. I'm not sure what you were saying I that last quote Seb. I think it got screwed up?
No, I thought your post was fine, and raised a good point. I was looking to expand on it. You're absolutely right that it was two different results despite very similar backstories, and the big question is why. And the answer to that isn't flattering to humans, and what we are willing to ignore if we have the right motive.
The revelations about Bill Cosby, Jimmy Saville and all those other aging creeps is another example of how this works. It was telling that they were all revealed decades after the prime of their careers. They were no longer money makers, and so powerful people no longer had money motivations to dismiss or quash accusations against them.
Nor is it just about those interests. Imagine if the accusations against Cosby came out during the peak popularity of The Cosby Show. People would not have believed them because they didn't want to believe them, because people loved Bill Cosby. People have expressed similar sentiments about the accusations against Louis CK in this very thread, and I happen to have felt the same instinct when I first heard the rumours - I didn't want to believe them because I like Louis CK's work.
Thanks, I appreciate the expansion on it.
Yes, its very hard to comprehend when these accusations come out, mostly because if you do some digging a lot of famous men have certain allegations against them. Its just lack of awareness. Another big one for example is Jared Leto, there has been all kinds of smoke around him. But his popularity did really well around Suicide Squad and it was hard for many people to imagine he might have done some bad things, it still is. But when there is so much smoke.. I get the Louis CK part, he seems like a decent guy, has some funny material. I hadn't heard, but it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if it eventually turns out true, most allegations aren't made just because. It can be almost anyone.
What usually gets brought up against celebrities and people in power is that the accusers due it for money or attention. Of course this ties in with the beliefs (on other parts of the internet) of a decent chunk of younger men and women, who are more active online, that women make false rape accusations to slander men. Even though the percentage of false reports is under 2%. Acknowledgement of the widespread nature of sexual assault is really lacking in good parts of society, sometimes just out of ignorance and in other cases vindictiveness.
Just to add to the reporting part. I personally know someone very close to me that was a victim. I would probably know the guy who did it by name and even face if I ever got a name. Yet she never told me and asked me not to tell anyone. It was not my place to go to the authorities.
Gordon Shumway wrote: I'm not trying to be any sort of hero, just saying, nope, the person who I know know molested somebody I know doesn't get to pretend like it didn't happen and do it to someone else. That's not heroism, that's humanism. My friend confided in me and told me about it. She/he trusted me to do what I thought was the right thing to do. That is what I think is the right thing to do. To me, doing otherwise would be going against that agreement.
I understand the desire to stop this happening again. And yeah, if the victim says they are happy for me to make my own decision about whether to make any kind of statement, then damn straight I'll make a statement. But I don't know how common that example is. Typically when people tell you something in private, they normally do so expecting that they will be the one who will choose to make that public or not.
So it becomes an issue of wanting to stop a predator, vs honouring the wishes of someone who told you something in private.
I'm not sure what you were saying I that last quote Seb. I think it got screwed up?
Yeah, that was some real word salad on my part. Fixed now.
Gordon Shumway wrote: I get sued for harressassment on the internet, yeah, that will fly.
The general issue in cyberbullying/stalking is identifying perpetrators under the veil of anonymity. EDIT: And it is worth pointing out that if enough effort is put into it, anyone can really find anyone on the internet. Given that you, the accuser, and the accused are in close enough proximity to know one another by a direct line, that isn't going to be very hard to figure out if you really go out of your way to try them in the court of social media. Especially if there's a clear intent to ruin someone's life you're running afoul of defamation and libel laws as well which can include visits from the cops if someone is dedicated enough to making you stop. Heaven forbid jurisdictions with specific laws against online harassment are involved.
Though realistically the most likely outcome is you get blocked or banned and no one ever cares, in which case you really have achieved nothing but given the accused a fallback if anyone ever accuses them of anything. "This is all because KnowsTheTruth93 accused me of assaulting her friend on Twitter! She got banned because it was a lie, and this person is lying too!"
Even Weinstein couldn't make that stick.
Weinstein isn't contending with statements from people who heard about his actions from someone else (those have existed for ages). "He did x to me" is unsurprisingly much more effective at achieving results than "I heard from a friend that he did x to them."
I'm not really sure what the point of hashtags are.
I think they're a conspiracy to get hip references into movies
Disciple of Fate wrote: Yes, its very hard to comprehend when these accusations come out, mostly because if you do some digging a lot of famous men have certain allegations against them. Its just lack of awareness. Another big one for example is Jared Leto, there has been all kinds of smoke around him. But his popularity did really well around Suicide Squad and it was hard for many people to imagine he might have done some bad things, it still is. But when there is so much smoke.. I get the Louis CK part, he seems like a decent guy, has some funny material. I hadn't heard, but it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if it eventually turns out true, most allegations aren't made just because. It can be almost anyone.
Huh, I hadn't heard anything about Jared Leto. I'm not really inclined to believe or disbelieve that, and maybe his really awful performance as the Joker influences me in regards to that. That's a pretty horrible thing to think.
What usually gets brought up against celebrities and people in power is that the accusers due it for money or attention. Of course this ties in with the beliefs (on other parts of the internet) of a decent chunk of younger men and women, who are more active online, that women make false rape accusations to slander men. Even though the percentage of false reports is under 2%. Acknowledgement of the widespread nature of sexual assault is really lacking in good parts of society, sometimes just out of ignorance and in other cases vindictiveness.
Yeah, I think that is the first big step that we as a society have to make - believe the victim.
That gets tricky because we need to be careful about the rights of the accused, especially if the accusation is just a whisper campaign, like what there currently is about Louis CK and apparently also Jared Leto. But when there is an actual, formal accusation we should believe just as we'd believe any other person who goes to the police and says they are the victim of a crime.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Yes, its very hard to comprehend when these accusations come out, mostly because if you do some digging a lot of famous men have certain allegations against them. Its just lack of awareness. Another big one for example is Jared Leto, there has been all kinds of smoke around him. But his popularity did really well around Suicide Squad and it was hard for many people to imagine he might have done some bad things, it still is. But when there is so much smoke.. I get the Louis CK part, he seems like a decent guy, has some funny material. I hadn't heard, but it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if it eventually turns out true, most allegations aren't made just because. It can be almost anyone.
Huh, I hadn't heard anything about Jared Leto. I'm not really inclined to believe or disbelieve that, and maybe his really awful performance as the Joker influences me in regards to that. That's a pretty horrible thing to think.
Yes things like that are troublesome to deal with. You don't want to jump the gun, but you also don't want to be too closed off to the possibility its true. Eventually the truth will come out either way. Its one of those things you hear about, unsure of what to do with.
Disciple of Fate wrote: What usually gets brought up against celebrities and people in power is that the accusers due it for money or attention. Of course this ties in with the beliefs (on other parts of the internet) of a decent chunk of younger men and women, who are more active online, that women make false rape accusations to slander men. Even though the percentage of false reports is under 2%. Acknowledgement of the widespread nature of sexual assault is really lacking in good parts of society, sometimes just out of ignorance and in other cases vindictiveness.
Yeah, I think that is the first big step that we as a society have to make - believe the victim.
That gets tricky because we need to be careful about the rights of the accused, especially if the accusation is just a whisper campaign, like what there currently is about Louis CK and apparently also Jared Leto. But when there is an actual, formal accusation we should believe just as we'd believe any other person who goes to the police and says they are the victim of a crime.
Yes, although I'm not counting on the Weinstein case to provide the first step, hopefully I will be surprised.
Sadly most sexual assaults and rape go unreported, around 80% I believe. Most of the times these whisper campaigns are all that occur. Until as you mentioned whatever it is that protects the perpetrator is lost. Although by then evidence becomes an issue. Its a hard issue to tackle, society needs to go through the change of believing the victim first as you say (plus police resources are often lacking). Then victims might come forward faster and cases might still be made.
@sebster: I don't even know if "believe" is the right word here because it seems to assume a default of guilt, which sort of runs counter to the system (the legal system, not the big boys system, though that is the problem). I can't think of a word that would be better. "Take serously" sounds too legalese and implies that there is a default of non seriousness. "Consider" doesn't sound serious enough. "Ponder" seems either distracted or British (not that there's anything wrong with that). Maybe "evaluate"? The best word would be "criticize" but it carries too much of a negative connotation in daily parlance.
Gordon Shumway wrote: @sebster: I don't even know if "believe" is the right word here because it seems to assume a default of guilt, which sort of runs counter to the system (the legal system, not the big boys system, though that is the problem). I can't think of a word that would be better. "Take serously" sounds too legalese and implies that there is a default of non seriousness. "Consider" doesn't sound serious enough. "Ponder" seems either distracted or British (not that there's anything wrong with that). Maybe "evaluate"? The best word would be "criticize" but it carries too much of a negative connotation in daily parlance.
I think just treating it like other crime is sufficient. When someone reports a robbery, police don't assume it is reasonably likely to be a false accusation made out of spite. But that assumption is shockingly common with rape.
I get what you're saying that we can't just assume guilt based on an accusation, and courts still need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. But there should be a middle ground where we can manage to not immediately question the woman's motives and question all her life choices, but also make sure the accused receives a fair day in court.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Even though the percentage of false reports is under 2%. Acknowledgement of the widespread nature of sexual assault is really lacking in good parts of society, sometimes just out of ignorance and in other cases vindictiveness.
If I remember correctly that 2% figure (or rather 2% to 10% according to Wikipedia) is cases where the accusation got proven false in court or in investigation, which I would think is a rather rare scenario. Most false accusation are probably dropped before things get that far.
ulgurstasta wrote: If I remember correctly that 2% figure (or rather 2% to 10% according to Wikipedia) is cases where the accusation got proven false in court or in investigation, which I would think is a rather rare scenario. Most false accusation are probably dropped before things get that far.
I agree that the info on this is inconsistent and subjective, and some of the 2% studies are limited to cases that went to court and were proven false. But other studies have produced figures at 2% or lower with different methods that don't have that attrition problem.
And on the the other side there are issues with a lot of the studies showing higher rates, for instance many used police case tags saying things like 'no crime' or things like that. But those studies are problematic because many cases are reported as 'no crime' or something similar when the case was withdrawn or it was deemed there was insufficient evidence to proceed, which does not in any way indicate a fraudulent claim. However, like the above, there are studies that don't have that problem and still result rates at 8% or thereabouts, so we can't discount the higher rates entirely.
Like pretty much everything with this issue, the actual rates of false claims is a hopeless, subjective mess.
Yes, that's one of the problems with rape, both real and falsely accused. If enough time passes (and it isn't that much time, either) and there's no recording, it's almost impossible to prove one way or the other.
ulgurstasta wrote: If I remember correctly that 2% figure (or rather 2% to 10% according to Wikipedia) is cases where the accusation got proven false in court or in investigation, which I would think is a rather rare scenario. Most false accusation are probably dropped before things get that far.
I agree that the info on this is inconsistent and subjective, and some of the 2% studies are limited to cases that went to court and were proven false. But other studies have produced figures at 2% or lower with different methods that don't have that attrition problem.
And on the the other side there are issues with a lot of the studies showing higher rates, for instance many used police case tags saying things like 'no crime' or things like that. But those studies are problematic because many cases are reported as 'no crime' or something similar when the case was withdrawn or it was deemed there was insufficient evidence to proceed, which does not in any way indicate a fraudulent claim. However, like the above, there are studies that don't have that problem and still result rates at 8% or thereabouts, so we can't discount the higher rates entirely.
Like pretty much everything with this issue, the actual rates of false claims is a hopeless, subjective mess.
Nevertheless, the idea that false accusations are a widespread problem like some corners of the internet would have people believe is wrong. Which is what I was more or less addressing cause I have seen it floating around outside Dakka once again. Even if we take the highest percentage of 10% (which is very high) into account, that is still over a minority of sexual assault that gets reported. In a perfect world in which every case would be reported, even a 10% number would be driven down significantly.
The true percentage is less important than the idea that it is a much more widespread 'problem'. Its attitudes like that compound to the stigma that many already feel to be associated with sexual assault.
Gordon Shumway wrote: I get sued for harressassment on the internet, yeah, that will fly. Even Weinstein couldn't make that stick. But it might have caused a hashtag #'movement to avoid him. Maybe? I'm not really sure what the point of hashtags are.
Prestor Jon wrote: I would call the police 100% of the time, no debate no question. The only sure way to stop a rapist/sexual predator from victimizing people is to remove that person from society, so that leaves incarceration or death as the two surest ways of stopping the predator.
So your opinion is that if the victim doesn't want to pursue that course of action, you don't care and will override her and betray what she told you in confidence?
If I was Brad Pitt would I have gone after Harvey Weinstein for some vigilante justice? Maybe, but if I didn't run off to Harvey's house in a murderous rage I would have called the police, not Harvey. Yelling at somebody over the phone? What's the point in that? Harsh language is better than doing absolutely nothing I guess but it certainly won't stop sexual assault from happening.
What did Brad Pitt accomplish? He contributed to getting Weinstein to not rape Gwyneth Paltrow. Gwyneth's willingness to tell somebody about the incident probably also played a factor in Weinstein deciding to leave Paltrow alone and still give her good roles. Pitt helped protect his girlfriend from Weinstein but he did nothing to protect anyone else's girlfriend from Harvey Weinstein so Weinstein kept on harassing and assaulting other people's girlfriends for decades.
I didn't ask about vigilante justice, not sure why you went there. Nor did Pitt's action stop any rape - he was told after the event.
As to what Pitt's actions achieved, they achieved nothing. The guy was in an impossible place, a predator had attempted to manipulate his girlfriend in to sex, so he wanted to protect her, but he also had to respect her wishes. "Achieving something" is a really flawed way of assessing the outcome of his actions.
Do we seriously want to stop sexual assault from happening or not?
Yes, but we also seriously need to let adult women make their own decisions. Finding the balance isn't easy in lots of places, but in this case it shouldn't be too hard.
Because what the Pitt/Paltrow example shows us is that we don't tolerate sexual assault when it happens to people we care about but we're ok with letting it happen to other people because actually fighting sexual predators is hard work and not worthwhile.
What it shows us is that when women come forward with these stories we should believe them, and not judge them or dismiss them. Do that, and most of the problems with women not wanting to report these things will disappear.
But if instead we decide that part of the solution involves making the decision to press charges, ie make a formal, public accusation, well then I think we're probably just reinforcing the culture that's produced a lot of this problem.
So we want to stop sexual assault but it's fine if Harvey Weinstein keeps assaulting women as long as those women don't choose to go to the police and file a complaint against him? So if Weinstein can get his victims to stay quiet, be it through trauma, intimidation, bribery, extortion or just the unappealing facets of rape trials we as a society should just accept it, grant it our tacit approval and let it go? The objective action of coercing someone else into sexual acts is only a problem worth societal intervention if the victim wants to come forward? Forcing other people into sexual acts is always wrong, right? It's not something society should accept as tolerable just because the victim doesn't want to press charges, right? Everyone has an obligation to fight back against sexual predation, right? Or is stopping a sexual predator solely the responsibility of their victims and if those victims don't press charges then the rest of us should accept it and leave it alone. If nobody takes any action then nothing changes and people keep getting hurt because nobody is trying to stop it. That's an objectively bad thing/situation so we should we ever tolerate it?
I don't understand your reasoning that we need to believe women when they come forward but shouldn't require that they come forward and file complaints. We need victims to go to the police, the authorities are the ones with the power to intervene, prosecute the accused and lock up convicted rapists/predators to prevent them from continuing to prey on society. If we want to apprehend and punish people who commit crimes then we have to involve the police.
That's how Weinstein was able to abuse so many women for decades, because people stayed quiet, never went to the authorities, they just looked the other way and shrugged it off.
I am not insensitive to the feelings and rights of victims but we can't just decide that criminal acts are only crimes when the victim consents to pressing charges.
Is spousal abuse ok as long as the abused doesn't file charges? If your wife doesn't want to go through the publicity and hassle of a trial that would tear the family apart, inflict financial hardship and be embarrassing then it's ok to beat the gak out of her because she's an adult and if she doesn't want to go to the police it's nobody else's place to get involved. If she confides in a friend then that friend should keep her/his mouth shut and leave it alone because beating the gak out of your spouse isn't a problem as long as the abused spouse isn't willing to press charges.
d-usa wrote: Are we pretending that the only binary options are “tell women to shut up” and “report their abuse against their wishes”?
No, we're claiming that reporting abuse to the police is a yes/no binary decision and that not reporting abuse to the police isn't an effective way to stop abuse from happening. If we want to stop the abuse the authorities need to get involved and stopping the abuse is a worthwhile goal we all want to achieve, right? We've had compelling arguments regarding circumstances in which reporting abuse can be harmful to the victims but none of those arguments address how we get abusers to stop hurting people without victims reporting them to the authorities.
Prestor Jon wrote: but none of those arguments address how we get abusers to stop hurting people without victims reporting them to the authorities.
None of the alternative arguments have addressed how reporting to the police stops abusers from hurting people when the police can't do anything without a cooperating victim.
So lets not pretend there's some grand high road here where the greater good is being served. There isn't.
To be honest, I don't know what I would do. And I hope I am never in the position to choose between keeping silent to protect the victim I know, or speaking up to protect the victims-to-be. And I truly hope none of you will have to make that choice, either.
Prestor Jon wrote:So we want to stop sexual assault but it's fine if Harvey Weinstein keeps assaulting women as long as those women don't choose to go to the police and file a complaint against him? So if Weinstein can get his victims to stay quiet, be it through trauma, intimidation, bribery, extortion or just the unappealing facets of rape trials we as a society should just accept it, grant it our tacit approval and let it go? The objective action of coercing someone else into sexual acts is only a problem worth societal intervention if the victim wants to come forward? Forcing other people into sexual acts is always wrong, right? It's not something society should accept as tolerable just because the victim doesn't want to press charges, right? Everyone has an obligation to fight back against sexual predation, right? Or is stopping a sexual predator solely the responsibility of their victims and if those victims don't press charges then the rest of us should accept it and leave it alone. If nobody takes any action then nothing changes and people keep getting hurt because nobody is trying to stop it. That's an objectively bad thing/situation so we should we ever tolerate it?
If you really want to take action then you can do that by changing our culture. That means speaking out when somebody says some sexist bs instead of ignoring it or acting like you didn't hear it. It means saying something when you see friends being creepy and not just brushing it off because they are drunk (or whatever excuse people find). We need to show people that this type of abuse/harassment won't be tolerated because that encourages and enables the creeps who do this. It means sometimes being a killjoy when your friend are too rowdy or being called the PC police. That's something you can do all the time and it doesn't put the victims in a uncomfortable situation but it's also not something that will make everything better over night.
If you only want to act after somebody was already harassed or attacked then you won't change this culture that enables people in power to abuse others and you are putting all the pressure on the victim. You are essentially saying "victims need to do this" (after the fact) instead of finding ways to discourage wannabe rapists. Weinstein only lost his protection because he wasn't useful anymore (he lost the power that protected him). We have to take apart the foundation of our culture that enables that and not just react after it has already happened.
I don't understand your reasoning that we need to believe women when they come forward but shouldn't require that they come forward and file complaints. We need victims to go to the police, the authorities are the ones with the power to intervene, prosecute the accused and lock up convicted rapists/predators to prevent them from continuing to prey on society. If we want to apprehend and punish people who commit crimes then we have to involve the police.
That's how Weinstein was able to abuse so many women for decades, because people stayed quiet, never went to the authorities, they just looked the other way and shrugged it off.
I am not insensitive to the feelings and rights of victims but we can't just decide that criminal acts are only crimes when the victim consents to pressing charges.
Is spousal abuse ok as long as the abused doesn't file charges? If your wife doesn't want to go through the publicity and hassle of a trial that would tear the family apart, inflict financial hardship and be embarrassing then it's ok to beat the gak out of her because she's an adult and if she doesn't want to go to the police it's nobody else's place to get involved. If she confides in a friend then that friend should keep her/his mouth shut and leave it alone because beating the gak out of your spouse isn't a problem as long as the abused spouse isn't willing to press charges.
You are correct that people need to act after the abuse to stop that instance but in all these cases it's our culture that makes it hard for people to go to the police in cases of abuse. They are often not believed, brushed aside, just ignored, or even humiliated (by the police). Women are called sluts and when it's against somebody with the slightest bit of status they are seen as gold-diggers who are betting on a big payday. The same people who say it's done for attentions and hurl abuse at the victims at the same time somehow don't realise that being called a whore and getting threatened is not really the good kind of attention. Then rape victims are also often seen as in some way broken by some parts of the population (in addition to basic behavioural changes from their families and friends around them who start walking of eggshells). Often the assaulter is family, relative, or friend and they might not want to hurt their own families by going to the police (how would grandma react if she knew that a certain uncle is a rapist?).
Here's some short blog posts about why it's not often reported:
It would be simple if going to the police were actually useful but apparently it's often not helpful at all and just leads to more trauma. For more just google why don't rape victims reports assaults and click through a few posts.
Tannhauser42 wrote: To be honest, I don't know what I would do. And I hope I am never in the position to choose between keeping silent to protect the victim I know, or speaking up to protect the victims-to-be. And I truly hope none of you will have to make that choice, either.
It gets really bad with child abuse. Many parents want to hush things up and not pursue the matter which has allowed the abusers to continue victimizing children. I'm all for throwing a spotlight on these people and hauling them into court.
I think there's a very clear demarcation line between adult victims and minor victims and how we regard them. No one has anywhere advocated keeping silent about the abuse of children, and unlike adults children aren't expected to make any sort of decision on that matter themselves.
Disciple of Fate wrote: Nevertheless, the idea that false accusations are a widespread problem like some corners of the internet would have people believe is wrong. Which is what I was more or less addressing cause I have seen it floating around outside Dakka once again. Even if we take the highest percentage of 10% (which is very high) into account, that is still over a minority of sexual assault that gets reported. In a perfect world in which every case would be reported, even a 10% number would be driven down significantly.
That's a really good point. Whatever figure we use for false rape claims, that number is dwarfed by the number of rapes that go unreported.
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Prestor Jon wrote: So we want to stop sexual assault but it's fine if Harvey Weinstein keeps assaulting women as long as those women don't choose to go to the police and file a complaint against him? So if Weinstein can get his victims to stay quiet, be it through trauma, intimidation, bribery, extortion or just the unappealing facets of rape trials we as a society should just accept it, grant it our tacit approval and let it go?
That was never the argument made by anyone. What you just posted is hopelessly dishonest.
I don't understand your reasoning that we need to believe women when they come forward but shouldn't require that they come forward and file complaints. We need victims to go to the police, the authorities are the ones with the power to intervene, prosecute the accused and lock up convicted rapists/predators to prevent them from continuing to prey on society. If we want to apprehend and punish people who commit crimes then we have to involve the police.
If we are more willing to believe women and more supportive when they come forward, more women will choose to come forward if it happens to them. That is the ideal.
But we do not live in that ideal world, and in this world women are shamed and challenged when they tell these stories, and not just in terms of the evidence of their case, but also challenges to their moral character. As such it remains a huge ask for any woman to choose to come forward with her story. No other person, no matter how noble their intentions, can make that choice for that woman.
Is spousal abuse ok as long as the abused doesn't file charges? If your wife doesn't want to go through the publicity and hassle of a trial that would tear the family apart, inflict financial hardship and be embarrassing then it's ok to beat the gak out of her because she's an adult and if she doesn't want to go to the police it's nobody else's place to get involved.
I think you've gotten really confused about what is being discussed. No-one is suggesting that if the woman doesn't want to come forward, then it wasn't a crime and it was okay. Honestly I can't even guess where you got that from.
What is being discussed is that the decision to move forward with a complaint is the decision of the woman alone, because she is the one who will have to face the ugly reality of how we treat and label someone who makes that accusation, even when it is proven in court. The rest of us should support that woman no matter her choice, and do what we can improve how society handles rape accusations, but we don't get to make her decision for her.
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d-usa wrote: That doctor isn’t news from last year or so, did people already forget?
The doctor's crime is an old story, but I think Maroney's accusation is new.
Since the news of this case broke, reports keep piling up about coercion and sexual harassment also in other places than Hollywood - maybe the good thing coming from this is really that it gives courage to people everywhere to finally speak up.
German newspapers are now reporting about similar cases in the (much smaller, naturally) German film industry, and I'm pretty sure we'll hear similar things from all around the world, from the UK to Bollywood.
sebster wrote: If we are more willing to believe women and more supportive when they come forward, more women will choose to come forward if it happens to them. That is the ideal.
But we do not live in that ideal world, and in this world women are shamed and challenged when they tell these stories, and not just in terms of the evidence of their case, but also challenges to their moral character. As such it remains a huge ask for any woman to choose to come forward with her story. No other person, no matter how noble their intentions, can make that choice for that woman.
The problem with that is that it goes against the very foundation of our justice system: Innocent until proven guilty.
Having said that, attacking anyone who claims to be a victim because of what he/she says happened is also going way too far.
Best case scenario, I think, is that every reported rape is taken seriously, and if the proof for that particular allegation is not enough to prosecute, the perpetrator gets put under surveillance to have a much better case if/when he repeats.
And, IMO, company cultures need to change as well. As it currently stands in most companies, the HR department or "trustee" or whoever one is supposed to report harassment/assault in the workplace to, work for the company - which means their interests do not coincide with the victim's.
Bran Dawri wrote: The problem with that is that it goes against the very foundation of our justice system: Innocent until proven guilty.
I think it's possible to take for granted that someone making an accusation isn't lying without automatically assuming that they are telling the truth. We can go through these ordeals as a society without calling the earnestness of claims into question. He says x. She say y. They say z. Just assume everyone is protecting themselves and trying to do what's best for them and let the court system work it out.
Its the only pragmatic way to do things anyway.
Of course I think the bigger issue is that that's all kind of wishful thinking. Give me two conflicting stories and I'm going to draw an opinion on which I think is true. I think the difference is I'm not going to walk onto the set of CNN or Foxnews and make a big deal of out it, talking about how men are pigs, or women or sluts or whatever. I think the issue isn't that people form opinions but that for some baffling reason we make a spectacle out of people expressing really basic opinions. I think Weinstein is guilty, now what the feth is going to compel someone to pay some guest time and attention telling me he agrees/disagrees? it's a really bizarre thing to spend air time on but for some reason networks do it and viewers eat it up. I suspect that the borrowed words from MTV "you watch that gak to feel superior" are very true in these situations.
Bran Dawri wrote: The problem with that is that it goes against the very foundation of our justice system: Innocent until proven guilty.
It doesn't though. I mean, if I say that some guy mugged me, people will believe I'm not a vindictive liar just looking to hurt the accused, without having to automatically convict the guy I've accused without a fair hearing.
There is a lot of scope for a middle ground, where we believe accusations but accept that legal punishment will only happen if that accusation is sufficiently supported by the evidence.
And, IMO, company cultures need to change as well. As it currently stands in most companies, the HR department or "trustee" or whoever one is supposed to report harassment/assault in the workplace to, work for the company - which means their interests do not coincide with the victim's.
By no irony whatsoever I feel the same way about Campus Police. Campus Cops ime are more interested in covering up dirt than investigating it, and they work for the administration more than anything. Unless you make a big fuss you're unlikely to get any help if you accuse another student of doing something to you. Certainly its a criticism of college and university campuses echoed by a lot of victim support groups catering to sufferers of sexual assault and harassment.
The day I started work my dad said to me: "Never trust HR. They're there to protect the business, not you. They only care about you if doing so protects the business."
When they find no use for you, they wont care for what you've done. No more shall they care for only your vices, so terrible, and quickly cull you. They'll replace you with someone more to their liking and to their views, maybe with the same vices. They'll still throw you to the dogs.
And then they'll say it all in bravery while continuing their goings.
James Toback, director of a whole bunch of movies that I've never seen, and also an Academy award nominee for writing Bugsy (which I've seen but cannot remember), has had action taken against him by more than 30 women. In 1989 an article in Spy magazine reported how Toback would creep about LA, telling women he was in movies, and luring them back to his apartment. So that was known about for 30 years, not just in Hollywood but in nationally publicised magazines, and no-one seemed to give a gak. He still got his films financed and people went along to see them.
Meanwhile right now actors like Casey Affleck career continue their careers despite multiple, strong public allegations against them. And Bill O'Reilly is being welcomed back in to the fold at FOX News.
When I first thought about this I admit I bought in to the idea that there was at some level a cover up, that Weinstein's power was sufficient to get Hollywood and therefore national media to remain quiet about this. But the more I look at the complaints against Weinstein and how many of them were public, and I look at the number of other people who had multiple public accusations against them, it seems the bigger issue is that on some level we as a society just didn't care that much about what these men did.
Compel wrote: The day I started work my dad said to me: "Never trust HR. They're there to protect the business, not you. They only care about you if doing so protects the business."
One of the ways FOX News is trying to minimise the impact of revelations that they paid out $100m to victims of sex abuse by FOX News employees, including $45m to victims of Bill O'Reilly alone, is by claiming that not one complaint was made by employees to the HR complaints line about sexual abuse. Of course they didn't call that line. The network's stance is to close ranks around their powerful, high profile abusers and work to make the case go away. No-one in that organisation is going to begin a complaint to HR, which would operate as nothing more than a headstart to FOX corp to begin cover up proceedings.
This reminds me if the Saville revelations, though not quite as icky.
Many people knew about Jimmy Savilles predations, but few people said anything. Johnny Rotten did, at the time, but it was Johnny Rotten so nothing happened.
Since the stories emerged after his death there has been an explosion of memories, some of victims long suppressing a hidden victims guilt, others chancers looking for easy cash with wild bogus stories.
That dynamic has not reached its peak yet with the Weinstock revelations, but it will in time. I don't envy the job of sifting between the genuine grievances and the liars, and the ever broadening search for abusers.
Most of all I hope that this last dynamic is not imported to Hollywood. In the UK post Saville some people were raked through the coals publically before being eventually exonerated. Sir Cliff Richard comes to mind here, yet it has been speculated publically that the open investigation of famous names on often spurious evidence is handled in full media glare to draw attention away from the lack of investigation of officials in the media who knew of but did nothing about abuse. Despite many victims of Saville claiming they were hushed by the BBC no current or former BBC official has been charged.
Weinstock cannot be abusing at that scale in isolation, others would know, others who by knowing and aiding in silencing victims are accomplices, but powerful accomplices at the heart of a major media industry.
Hence my statement that it is corporate culture, not society at large that needs to change.
I do not assume that most men I meet are sexual predators - I know I'm not. Pretty much everyone I know thinks that this is despiccable, and yet another proof of why no one should ever trust upper management of, well, anything.
The problem isn't Joe Schmoe in the street, the problem is corporate culture.
Communism taught us that abolish privilege, is to get privilege under a different demographic, and the transition from one unfair society to another is a bitch.
Communism taught us that abolish privilege, is to get privilege under a different demographic, and the transition from one unfair society to another is a bitch.
I'd dispute the claim that this is just corporate culture. There's plenty of testimonies from people in all manners of contexts about similar behaviour, wether it's a head chef being a creep towards staff in a kitchen, a landlord abusing a position of power over a tenant, or any of a myriad other people with authority abusing that authority. Sexual harassment and rape is intimately intertwined with power, there's little reason to believe it is only prevalent in a corporate culture. Just sample any decently-sized club on a Friday evening and see what you find. We'd be doing ourselves a huge disservice to pretend this kind of behaviour is largely limited to a certain kind of people.
Everyone hates sexual harassment the same way 80% of people are better drivers than average; being a bad driver or harassing others is something other people do.
It is a widespread male culture in western countries, e.g. bum-pinching, builders wolf-whistling at passing women, inappropriate touching on the tube in London, Metro in Paris or trains in Tokyo, or in discos and so on.
These are the low-level manifestations of a spectrum of behaviour that at the extreme end becomes sexual predation and exploitation.
Of course all men don't do these things, and things seem to have been moving away from the situation -- for instance, builders generally have a "no whistling" policy nowadays.
This story is really growing. The consolation for what happened with Harvey Weinstein is that a lot of sunlight is being cast on some pretty odious stuff.
Ouze wrote: This story is really growing. The consolation for what happened with Harvey Weinstein is that a lot of sunlight is being cast on some pretty odious stuff.
Today Bill O’Reilly released the full text of an affidavit by former Fox News legal analyst Lis Wiehl.
O’Reilly claims on his website that this affidavit repudiates “all allegations” against him.
It does no such thing.
Before we analyze and translate the short text of the document, keep in mind that statements like this aren’t uncommon after settlements — especially when those settlements involve prominent people or prominent institutions. Part of the “purchase price” of the settlement often includes a statement that defendants use to try to claim that the litigation was nonsense from the beginning. Plaintiffs will accept the payout and do their best to negotiate language that’s as meaningless as possible. They want the settlement amount to do the talking. Negotiations over statements or affidavits can sometimes be more complex and contentious than negotiations over even seven-figure payouts. The wording is careful, and the statements are notable mainly for what they don’t say.
So, let’s look at Wiehl’s affidavit:
Let’s translate the key statements:
1. I have known Bill O’Reilly for over 18 years. We have worked together, we have socialized, and on occasion I gave him legal advice. Translation: I used to work with Bill O’Reilly.
2. At the end of 2016, I hired counsel who prepared a draft complaint asserting claims against Bill O’Reilly. We have since resolved all of our issues. I would no longer make the allegations contained in the draft complaint. Translation: I sued O’Reilly, he paid me $32 million, and I agreed to drop the suit. I “would no longer make the allegations” because every settlement agreement ever created in the entire history of the universe bars the plaintiff from ever again raising her original claims.
3. Additionally, over the years while I was acting as Bill O’Reilly’s counsel, he forwarded to me certain explicit emails that were sent to him, and any advice sought or rendered is attorney-client privileged, confidential, and private. I have no claims against Bill O’Reilly concerning any of those emails or any of the allegations in the draft complaint. Translation: My lawyers are very, very good. Admire their handiwork. If you read closely, all I said is that he sent me explicit emails, I can’t talk about them, and I have (note the verb tense) no claims. Of course I currently have no claims; I settled them for $32 million.
4. Also, I have reached an accommodation with Fox News regarding the termination of my employment. I have no claims against Fox News. Translation: Same verb tense as the previous paragraph, y’all. I have no claims because I settled those claims.
In other words, when O’Reilly published this affidavit, he was banking on the fact that his supporters may not be familiar with legalese or that some of them will grasp at any straw they can to rationalize their continued support for a longtime television hero. But no one should be impressed with this document. It repudiates nothing.
$32 million! That's a payment to prevent Wiehl from going to the police!
Ahtman wrote: I guess O'reilly said no one ever complained but Megyn Kelly said that was bull and produced an email showing she reported his behavior.
Too bad she sat on that revelation until her career was in dire straights and she needed a publicity boost. It might have helped out a lot of other women at the time if she had said "this happened to me, too". If she wasn't comfortable doing that, and I would understand that, she at least could have said "I believe these women". She was in a very powerful position at the time, "the time" being when the network was attacking women she worked with.
I don't understand how non disclosure agreement relating to criminal activity are legally enforceable contracts. Usually they relate to personal or professional information, or are used in something that would at most be a civil case, or to not go public after some other legal dispute. That's go public, go to the newspapers, not go to the police.
Non-disclosure contracts used to bung people money to stop them reporting a criminal offence to the authorities just doesn't sound legal to me. Failure to report an offence is tantamount to helping cover it up, it's a bit of a grey area. Frankly she shouldn't have signed it in he first place. But the idea she should have to be remotely concerned about having to pay the money back, because she breached the contract by reporting criminal activity, should be thrown out. Contracts telling people they cannot report criminal activity to the authorities should be void.
Rado 4 covered this point yesterday with a couple of top barristers.
A contract cannot shield someone from criminal prosecution, however the victims involved in these NDA deals were not thought to be in a position to know this legal point or have the confidence to make use of it, owing to the strong imbalance of pwoer in the relationship.
Howard A Treesong wrote: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/harvey-weinstein-allegations-latest-zelda-perkins-former-pa-broke-confidential-non-disclosure-a8016716.html
I don't understand how non disclosure agreement relating to criminal activity are legally enforceable contracts. Usually they relate to personal or professional information, or are used in something that would at most be a civil case, or to not go public after some other legal dispute. That's go public, go to the newspapers, not go to the police.
Non-disclosure contracts used to bung people money to stop them reporting a criminal offence to the authorities just doesn't sound legal to me. Failure to report an offence is tantamount to helping cover it up, it's a bit of a grey area. Frankly she shouldn't have signed it in he first place. But the idea she should have to be remotely concerned about having to pay the money back, because she breached the contract by reporting criminal activity, should be thrown out. Contracts telling people they cannot report criminal activity to the authorities should be void.
As I understand it (and I could be wrong cause I mean I'm not a lawyer), NDA's cannot legally cover illegal activity, but it is legally enforceable in that not reporting a crime to the police is generally not a crime itself. IE, if an NDA says "you will not report being groped by Employee X to the police in exchange for ________" that is legally enforceable because it is not a crime to not tell the police you were groped.
It can get messy in some ways, like if the police come to question you about something that is covered by the NDA, the NDA is unlikely to be sufficient protection from a subpoena or court order. Whether or not complying with the court is a violation of an NDA varies by state. One of the women in the Cosby case had an NDA not to talk about what happened between her and Cosby but she was ordered by a judge to testify and under the laws of the relevant jurisdiction she is not in violation of her NDA by lawfully abiding to the orders of the court.
I'm just dubious about the idea that if someone signs an NDA to not report a crime, and then does report it, that such an NDA is legally sound enough that you could sue and get your hush money back. I understand the validity of an NDA to to gossip about private life, but trying to gag people going to the police is not what they should be for.
Ahtman wrote: I guess O'reilly said no one ever complained but Megyn Kelly said that was bull and produced an email showing she reported his behavior.
Too bad she sat on that revelation until her career was in dire straights and she needed a publicity boost. It might have helped out a lot of other women at the time if she had said "this happened to me, too". If she wasn't comfortable doing that, and I would understand that, she at least could have said "I believe these women". She was in a very powerful position at the time, "the time" being when the network was attacking women she worked with.
Indeed. I felt similarly when Quentin Tarantino said his girlfriend of the time told him Weinstien assaulted her and even heard it from another woman but didn't do anything. He said he thought that it was just an older guy being the type to chase his secretary around her desk but that doesn't really seem to be much better. In the end he knew but didn't do or say anything but now that he has enough power, fame, and money of his own, thanks in large part to Weinstien, he is willing to say he feels bad.
Howard A Treesong wrote: I'm just dubious about the idea that if someone signs an NDA to not report a crime, and then does report it, that such an NDA is legally sound enough that you could sue and get your hush money back. I understand the validity of an NDA to to gossip about private life, but trying to gag people going to the police is not what they should be for.
I am guessing they do not (Also not a lawyer) but most people don;t have the time, resources, or legal expertise to even want to get involved with an NDA dispute. That would be a very difficult path to proceed down, with very little pay off for the person under the NDA.
It really isn;t about enforcability, but another way the powerful can frighten and intimidate the less powerful with a paperwork storm that the less powerful do not hav ethe time, money, or connections to fight.
Wouldn't the enforceability of a NDA come down to the basic idea of "If you break it, you have to give the money back"? If I've already blown through half the payoff money, and I can't pay it all back if I talk, then that's even more incentive to keep quiet.
Tannhauser42 wrote: Wouldn't the enforceability of a NDA come down to the basic idea of "If you break it, you have to give the money back"? If I've already blown through half the payoff money, and I can't pay it all back if I talk, then that's even more incentive to keep quiet.
An NDA is a contract and can only be enforced through the civil courts.
If someone criminally assaults me, and pays me "hush money" tied up with an NDA, I can still go to the police, the alleged crime will be investigated and if possible it will be criminally prosecuted.
The assaulter would be able to pursue me for breach of contract, and it would be interesting to see what the judge or jury made of such a claim.
The assaulter would be able to pursue me for breach of contract, and it would be interesting to see what the judge or jury made of such a claim.
It comes down to this as I understand it, but most of the people who end up in these situations can't compete with the other party financially, so it's not even about actually getting your money back when someone breaks the NDA. The NDA in itself enables you to bury them in legal work they can't possibly afford, which is likely a sufficient deterrent considering that I'm highly doubtful most juries/judges would reward damages to someone whose NDA was "don't tell the cops I assaulted you."
He’s at least more mentally with it than the current POTUS!
Ladies and gentlemen, zirs and ze's,
May I bid you welcome to twenty seventeen
Two minutes of hate for Emmanuel Goldstein?
Much worse for trump! All hate all the time!
is pretty clearly guilty and treat him as such.
Soft on Crime 
both sides are equally bad 
