Weinstein: Who Is Really To Blame?

[sp1814]

The perpetrator or the victims?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-4979554/Harvey-Weinstein-scandal-shames-actresses-kept-quiet.html

[Gromit]

Blaming the victims is easy.
It seems to have been an open secret that he was predatory. And everyboby went along with that (including the victims)because he waspowerful and people wanted a career in the film industry.
So your eith or blame game does not work. Everyone was to blame.

[Islay]

You can't blame the victims! The perpetrator is to blame here!

[-Talbot-]

Everyone was to blame.


Bizarre conclusion.

[jim360]

I don't like the idea of "blaming" his victims for what happened to future victims. In the first place, apparently a few people did try to speak out over the years against him, but they either weren't listened to or weren't taken seriously or the allegations in some other way went nowhere (Rose McGowan being one such, apparently: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-rose-mcgowan-harvey-weinstein-20171013-story.html ); and then their careers suffered as a result with little to show for it. It's quite risky reporting any crime, especially one that makes you look and feel so vulnerable, and if at the end there might not be anything to show for it *and* you've ruined your career for that lack of result, why would you want to take that risk? Isn't it more reasonable not to bother, and just to get on with things?

Now that it's all out in the open, there's probably also a "herd immunity" too -- people who wouldn't have alone felt able or willing to accuse a powerful man of such crimes or misdeeds can seek solace in the fact that Weinstein can't take *all* of his accusers down.

So no. Blame is absolutely the wrong word to assign to his victims. I regret -- I am sure they regret this even more -- that they didn't come out sooner, and Hollywood as a whole has a lot to answer for that it tolerated something so openly; but I don't blame them for a second for making what may have been the more pragmatic decision to keep silent about their experiences in the interests of furthering their careers.

[Peter Pedant]

it is turning into a bit of a wein-fest innit ?

starlets queuing up to give the performance of their lives
some even offering thoughts on what they WOULD have done if they had.. turned up for that interview, booking, shower etc
and musing how awful it would have been


having been the subject of allegations myself ( always ex tenants who left in arrears ) I must say I was pretty ungrateful to be given the opportunity of refuting them
( hold it don't THEY have to prove them and I neednt do anything at all? )

[Cloverjo]

Julia Hartley-Brewer posted a rather nasty tweet earlier.
Of course the victims weren't to blame.

Julia Hartley-Brewer @JuliaHB1
If I were a Hollywood starlet & I didn't have my own sordid story to tell about Harvey Weinstein, I'd probably make one up now. #whynotme

[naomi24]

Obviously Weinstein is to blame - but the women who kept quiet in order to further their careers only have themselves to blame for not putting a stop to it.

[-Talbot-]

Wich ones kept quiet to further their careers though?
Not them all surely?

A bizarre article from the http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/harvey-weinstein-islam-sexual-assault-rape-womens-rights-a8001521.html

[anneasquith]

We are I see assuming victims of sexual abuse only have one excuse for not divulging information at the time. Shameful way to treat victims .

[MallyJ]

Whomever developed his sense of entitlement to whatever he wants....his employees?his parents? Most of us don't believe for one moment that we can have what we want from anyone at anytime...he got that from someone or some people.

[ummmm]

Or he got it from his power!!

[dannyk13]

It must have been difficult for the victims knowing that Weinstein was virtually in control of whether they had a future or not in the film industry.

[naomi24]

Talbot, clearly silence reigned in order to further careers and also to mitigate damage to careers. I can see no other reason to keep such abuse quiet. Bizarre is a good word for that article.

[mikey4444]

Naomi is right here...... (!)

[pjgriffo]

A bit cynical obviously and in no way a comment on the real victims , but Julia Hartley-Brewer has a point. Over the last week it appears there is hardly a woman in the media or showbiz who hasn't been assaulted by a man . I find that hard to believe.

[ummmm]

I think you'd be surprised how many women have. Not just ones in the media.

[vetuste_ennemi]

I'm enjoying the irony and hypocrisy of it all. Jolie and Paltrow "victims" of the predator, but silent then, and silent still - until ten minutes ago, that is. Long time since either of these actresses was a poor young ingenue trying to make her way in Hollywood, though. In fact neither of them was ever a poor ingenue.

And then there's Streep calling Weinstein "God the punisher" when giving another thank you to Hollywood's most thanked sperm donor. And Damon and Crowe getting a journalist to back off another embarrassing story. And so on.
A vile cocktail of deceit, hypocrisy and cover-up. Let's call it the Harvey Wallbanger (OK, you make up a name).

Are these the same people who were universally reviling Trump for misogyny and sexual predation? Weren't they supporters of "women's rights" Hillary Clinton to a mensch? And aren't all of the people I've mentioned now rich and (in Hollywood terms) powerful in their own right? Yes, that's them.

Saw a news interview with Hillary. Condemned Weinstein, but quaintly compared him with Trump rather than the more obvious Bill. Another opportunity to deploy "close, but no cigar" lost.

[TWR]

The man that could not keep it in his pants.

[vetuste_ennemi]

Oh, while I think about it: any chance of US liberals stopping talking about "a culture of rape" on college campuses (where it doesn't exist) and start talking about the culture of rape in Tinsel Town where it does?

[anneasquith]

Same old attitude, stop concentrating on the ? Victims ,concentrate on the perpetrators .