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Oh my!

Another reason why Carrie Fischer is awesome:

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.”

Didn't know Princess Leia was so GANGSTA!

You should read more Carrie Fisher stories then.


I read that story a couple of days ago and yeah, it's a perfectly normal thing for her to do.

Heh... good point!

Also, Harvey's brother is getting some... ahem... attention:
http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/bob-weinstein-sexual-harassment-1202592165/

 d-usa wrote:
It’s not like he has a star there or anything...

Good point.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
How that is hypocritical I have no clue.

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.

Just announced that the head of Amazon Studios, Roy Price, has just resigned due to the accusations against him.

 sebster wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

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.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

"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.

Lena Headey, aka Sarah Connor and Queen Cersei herself has just posted about her experiences with the subject of this thread.

'Don't tell anyone about this. Not your manager. Not your agent.'

This world is just screwed up.

This is what happens when society glorifies Power without Wisdom and Courage. I feel like there could be a decent series of games based on this.

Isn't it called Monopoly?

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.

 LordofHats wrote:

 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.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 sebster wrote:

 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.

 sebster wrote:

 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?

 sebster wrote:

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