The Downfall of Harvey Weinstein?

[laverte]

What is "all this" that you find strange? And what is it about the coming times that you think you're not made for? I might be being dense but I find that post uncharacteristically opaque.

[Amor de Cosmos]

It's opaque to me too. I find myself almost as disconcerted by the attitude of public sanctimony as I am by many of the acts that are being reported. I suppose it's the "He who is without sin..." thing. It just makes me queasy. Which in larger sense is insignificant but on a personal level I have to acknowledge it.

[Sam]

What I'm finding a bit surreal is how it seems to be coming out into the open in various fields at once. (British) football a few months ago, now Hollywood (and the theatre world), Parliament ... which is next? And it underlines, I think, that sexual abuse is as much - probably more - about power as it is about sex. In the same way as a child abuser might not even be, clinically speaking, a paedophile - he might not be attracted to little children, but rather to the power he has over them.

But also how this has been going on since time immemorial and will carry on happening. I'm not sure I can put any proper thoughts into words really, but it doesn't fill me with hope for the future of society when I read things like how in Italy the public reaction to the Weinstein allegations has been to say that the victims should shut up and let him do what he wants.

[Antepli Ejderha]

Dustin Hoffman is the next star to be accused.

[laverte]

Ah, OK, Amor, i follow now. It's especially nauseating to watch how our hyper-macho, bully-boy newsrooms have taken the high road with regard to allegations of sexual harassment in other workplaces.

Perhaps if we reword the bible: "she without sin" ... ?

I don't mean that women as a class are immune from abusing power when they have it. However, I do see the ripples from the #metoo campaign as encouraging something other than sanctimony. Solidarity? Affirmation? Support?

And I don't think you have to be as pure as the holy mother to object to obnoxious and sometimes criminal behaviour. Sexual harassment and abuse really are very gendered phenomena. Women might not be without sin, but they are more likely to be without these particular sins.

I guess what I want to say is that, somehow, predictably, possibly deliberately, this vast topic of bullying and harassment is now being treated as one single 'narrative', which involves steamrollering the many different experiences and motivations of those who are objecting and fighting back. The story is mutating from "who else was a victim (of Weinstein)?" to "who else will be accused of something similar enough that we can run with it?" The role of women in this narrative is slowly changing too; their voices are being heard less; their accusations have started to appear as data sets, in "reports" and on lists. In the Spacey case they are absent altogether.

If there were proper procedures in place for underlings to be listened to when they report obnoxious and inappropriate behaviour, if they were confident of obtaining what they needed (usually some kind of guarantee that they won't have to work for that person again, and a safeguard against retribution), then there'd be no space for the news/social media to step in and pretend to fight the battle on their behalf.

Also, I wrongly thought I couldn't hold Asia Argento in any higher esteem.

[Satchmo Distel]

Hoffman has apologized and that will probably be that unless someone else comes forward.

[WOM]

My gut told me the floodgates were going to open on Spacey; you don't just suspend production on such a big show after one, 30-year old accusation.
They must have asked him "Will there be more?"

[Sam]

The post I made on the previous page told me the floodgates were going to open.

Someone on an acquaintance's Facebook yesterday was expressing disappointment that everyone was piling onto him because he's 'innocent until proven guilty.' Ignoring (or more likely, to be fair, failing to appreciate) the fact that Spacey's initial statement stopped short of being a denial before veering off into LOOK OVER HERE EVERYONE I'M GAY! territory.

[WOM]

Haha...yeah, I love the 'piling on' complaint. Like it's just a bunch of people having a larf instead of victims finally unburdening just a bit of the guilt/shame/pain they've been carrying around for a quarter century or more. And anyone with half a brain knows that they'll never be 'proven guilty'. But if 300 women (James Toback) come forward with the same experience, that's proven guilty to me.

[Sam]

I got the impression the person in question was saying the general public were piling onto Spacey by talking about what a horrible man he is, rather than victim-blaming. But as I said, when the first accusation came out and Spacey didn't straight up say, 'That's a lie, it never happened,' you know that probably gives you your answer right there.

[WOM]

Ah, I see. Well, the general public probably know a sure thing when they see it. If 40 women accuse Cosby, or 300 accuse Toback, or a half-dozen tell the same story, they suss that it's probably true. My buddy Terry - a regular on the Toronto gay scene - told me about Spacey easily 12 or 15 years ago. He's pretty damn reliable on his closeted stars and politicians, so I took him at his word.

[G-Man]

I guess what I want to say is that, somehow, predictably, possibly deliberately, this vast topic of bullying and harassment is now being treated as one single 'narrative', which involves steamrollering the many different experiences and motivations of those who are objecting and fighting back. The story is mutating from "who else was a victim (of Weinstein)?" to "who else will be accused of something similar enough that we can run with it?" The role of women in this narrative is slowly changing too; their voices are being heard less; their accusations have started to appear as data sets, in "reports" and on lists. In the Spacey case they are absent altogether.

This is so important.

As I understood it, #metoo was about standing up to patriarchy and its entitlements to sex and control of women. Now the conversation has shifted to the lurid and self-righteous (and, pretty often, hypocritical). It's a distraction and deflection from the root problem.

[Nefertiti2]

This is so important.

As I understood it, #metoo was about standing up to patriarchy and its entitlements to sex and control of women. Now the conversation has shifted to the lurid and self-righteous (and, pretty often, hypocritical). It's a distraction and deflection from the root problem.

So a powerful male in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/assaulting a young male is a distraction from with powerful males in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/ assaulting young women. Don't be ridiculous.

[laverte]

So a powerful male in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/assaulting a young male is a distraction from with powerful males in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/ assaulting young women. Don't be ridiculous.

It's more that the focus is becoming: How do corporations in the entertainment industry (and theatre companies, and political parties, and universities, and the church, and doubtless other institutions) manage the accusations now being (re-)raised against their senior employees and figureheads? Who, in those organisations, was informed about the reports of harassment and abuse at the time they were taking place, and what did they (not) do in response? Who knew, or had heard rumours, yet hired these men and put them in positions of power?

As this narrative takes over, it becomes a sort of governance issue, which with better management could be resolved. Extreme cases take precedence, victims' voices get lost, and with them the wider point about capitalism and the state colluding with patriarchy/the kyriarchy to produce systematic harassment and abuse of power which require a much more profound transformation, ie, ejecting shitloads of white men from positions of power and rethinking organisational policies not in terms of 'diversity' but in terms of guaranteeing safety in workplaces (and elsewhere) for all of the people employed in them.

[Satchmo Distel]

100% agree. It has turned into a shaming ritual of individuals rather than a discussion of how capitalism objectifies people, which then blends with the objectification of bodies, so that a body is just there to be groped, played with, bantered.

And yes, 'diversity' as some kind of middle-class conscience salve is worthless in the face of women workers being systematically objectified.

We are actually going backwards because when I was a student in the 80s, Marxist-feminist positions on objectification were widely understood by anyone on the Left, but now it's like we have to teach it again from scratch. Depressing.

[Nefertiti2]

Surely a Marxist feminist analysis which looks at how bodies are objectified in an industry where youth and looks are currency should be able to incorporate the exploitation of young men by older men rather than considering it a distraction or complaining that it's a case where women are "absent altogether"

Of course sexual exploitation is not confined to the Entertainment industry (Warning sun Link and disgraceful language) but it's there that bodies are most commodified.

[G-Man]

So a powerful male in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/assaulting a young male is a distraction from with powerful males in the entertainment industry sexually harrassing/ assaulting young women. Don't be ridiculous.

Read what I actually wrote and what I responded to. Context is important, you know.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

It's more that the focus is becoming: How do corporations in the entertainment industry (and theatre companies, and political parties, and universities, and the church, and doubtless other institutions) manage the accusations now being (re-)raised against their senior employees and figureheads? Who, in those organisations, was informed about the reports of harassment and abuse at the time they were taking place, and what did they (not) do in response? Who knew, or had heard rumours, yet hired these men and put them in positions of power?

As this narrative takes over, it becomes a sort of governance issue, which with better management could be resolved. Extreme cases take precedence, victims' voices get lost, and with them the wider point about capitalism and the state colluding with patriarchy/the kyriarchy to produce systematic harassment and abuse of power which require a much more profound transformation, ie, ejecting shitloads of white men from positions of power and rethinking organisational policies not in terms of 'diversity' but in terms of guaranteeing safety in workplaces (and elsewhere) for all of the people employed in them.

This is kind of how it mapped out in Ireland as a result of the Church child abuse scandals. But I think to a large degree, that this isn't really a competition, but actually two separate things. There was room for people to talk about what happened to them if they wanted to, (and most didn't) but it allowed a lot of people to admit terrible things that happened to them to their families (often unrelated to the church) This can happen separately, and is more about how people feel freer to talk about things amongst themselves. The media and the news cycle are kind of independent of this. but the major issue that it highlighted was that Ireland had been running for profit rape and labour camps for the children of the poor, and the "illegitimate" and that it was a systematic thing, that had a design to it. It completely vapourized the catholic church as an institution, and ripped the lid off all sorts of organizations. It also set the bar for organizations, in that doing something to defend your institution was no longer a remotely valid excuse. It made it abundantly clear to anyone involved in any sort of organization that a) this will eventually come out and b) be prepared for a very hostile public to look at your actions from the point of view of the victim.

Also it has the salutary effect of making it clear to people that the price of acting the bollocks with people under you is that there is a good chance that you will be dragged out in public and metaphorically set on fire. You don't have to torch too many powerful people in the public square to put the shits up everyone. While it may not protect any victims who have already suffered, it will have a chilling effect on people who might try and do this sort of thing in the future, and make the workplace and society in general a much safer place. The other thing is that by revealing this sort of carry on to be endemic in the structures and the powerful institutions of society, it makes utter shit of victim blaming. There is nothing that a child could do to protect themselves against a priest, particularly in an industrial school. There is nothing that you can do to protect yourself from a powerful predator. that whole line of bollocks suddenly gets flipped on its head.

This westminster thing is very likely to get out of hand. A hell of a lot of people are going to get swept away, and it's not just the predators that did all of the preying. It's also going to fuck those who knew but did nothing. It's going to be extraordinarily fucking messy, and very unpredictable, and it is going to completely wipe out the current govt. Not because this is a party specific thing, but its going to wipe out big chunks of their party and mess up the current power dynamics, and when things like that change quickly, then civil war breaks out as the survivors clamber for power.

[Satchmo Distel]

Surely a Marxist feminist analysis which looks at how bodies are objectified in an industry where youth and looks are currency should be able to incorporate the exploitation of young men by older men rather than considering it a distraction or complaining that it's a case where women are "absent altogether"

Of course sexual exploitation is not confined to the Entertainment industry (Warning sun Link and disgraceful language) but it's there that bodies are most commodified.

I don't think we are disagreeing on that. Our culture objectifies all bodies of all biological sexes and cultural genders. Any feminist who calls it a women's only issue is misunderstanding what feminism is about, namely that patriarchy and capitalism trap men and women, albeit usually unequally.

Similarly, racism traps people of all skin colours in their designated boxes, albeit usually unequally.

[laverte]

Surely a Marxist feminist analysis which looks at how bodies are objectified in an industry where youth and looks are currency should be able to incorporate the exploitation of young men by older men rather than considering it a distraction or complaining that it's a case where women are "absent altogether"

As mentioned, sensitively, in MsD's thread about MeToo, some male victims felt unsure whether MeToo was the right environment for them to put forward their names and stories of harassment and abuse. This was not because those experiences do not matter as much, but because men's relation to patriarchy is more ambivalent it might end up complicating or even obscuring the purpose of the hashtag, which was essentially an awareness campaign, thereby making it less likely that any beneficial, structural change would result. Remember, MeToo is a (social) media campaign, not a piece of academic analysis; and its intent was partly to raise awareness of the impact on women's lives of the accumulation of incidents, ranging from the inappropriate and bothersome to the criminal and traumatising, which are the product of a culture of entitlement and impunity.

This bringing together of all the different levels of harassment, which is the strength of MeToo, has turned into a major problem now that the story has become about the public interest and what should be done with regard to individual cases.

Somehow we now have a situation where Nick Robinson can be asking Matthew Parris about the locker room culture in parliament, while another male journalist grills a spokeswoman put up by some university association to waffle about the measures institutions are taking to yadda yadda, and an arts correspondent asks what the Old Vic could have known and done about Kevin Spacey and why didn't it. As abuse of power becomes a matter of public interest, victims' voices have vanished from the story. What do they want to happen?

I don't believe I have described the focus on Spacey as a distraction; his behaviour is plainly right at the centre of the problem, and is recognisable to many young women as well as men.

[Satchmo Distel]

Nobody in this thread has suggested that the informed discussion about Spacey has been a distraction. G-Man simply stated that "lurid and self-righteous (and, pretty often, hypocritical)" coverage is a distraction, not that talking about male-on-male abuse is in principle a distraction. Spacey tried to turn it into a distraction by deflecting on to sexual orientation, and the mainstream media colluded in that (in order to exclude women's voices and to deflect from issues of patriarchy and power), but nobody with a functioning brain and/or empathy has fallen for it, and definitely nobody on OTF has done so.

[WOM]

Hoffman has apologized and that will probably be that unless someone else comes forward.

And with that...

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/du...nt-1202604822/

[Nefertiti2]

On the previous page Laverte wrote

The role of women in this narrative is slowly changing too; their voices are being heard less; their accusations have started to appear as data sets, in "reports" and on lists. In the Spacey case they are absent altogether.

That seemed to me not to be saying that it's important to listen to & focus on the abused and call to account the powerful and the systems that sustain them, but to be objecting that hearing a victim's account of his abuse by Spacey was erasing women from the story.

I'm sorry if I somehow misread it.

[Pérou Flaquettes]

I've read this sentence several times and I'm not grasping its logic. Is "public interest" an anglicism that I'm not picking up on?

My interpretation of As abuse of power becomes a matter of public interest, victims' voices have vanished from the story= as the extent of the abuse of power is laid bare publicly in all its baseness, less space is given by the media to the victims and this is bound to be detrimental to the outcome.

In other words, the media and the public seem now far keener to gorge on the lurid and graphic details of the allegations, rather than listen to, and try to empathise with, the victims who are becoming less visible and therefore less likely to feel empowered, less likely to continue to come forward etc. (In keeping with the role thus far that the various people, institutions or systems in the dock here – Weinstein/Hollywood/movieland, Westminster, political parties, patriarchy etc. –, and by extension society, have assigned to them: to put up and shut up, to not "rock the boat" for the sake of their career/family etc. The danger ultimately being that as we go into voyeuristic overdrive, the victims become far less central to the situation, almost peripheral to the story for many, and consequently more likely to remain in a state of anxiety/guilt/etc.)

[ursus arctos]

laverte provided a series of examples directly above the sentence you quoted which provide ample evidence for her view.