October 18, 2017

Reese Witherspoon, why have you protected this man for a quarter century and why do you still protect him?

The 41-year-old movie star said this at ELLE's Women in Hollywood event:
I have my own experiences that have come back to me very vividly, and I found it really hard to sleep, hard to think, hard to communicate. A lot of the feelings I’ve been having about anxiety, about being honest, the guilt for not speaking up earlier or taking action. True disgust at the director who assaulted me when I was 16 years old and anger that I felt at the agents and the producers who made me feel that silence was a condition of my employment.
And I wish I could tell you that that was an isolated incident in my career, but sadly, it wasn’t. I’ve had multiple experiences of harassment and sexual assault, and I don’t speak about them very often, but after hearing all the stories these past few days and hearing these brave women speak up tonight, the things that we’re kind of told to sweep under the rug and not talk about, it’s made me want to speak up and speak up loudly because I felt less alone this week than I’ve ever felt in my entire career.
The answer to the question in my post title seems to be: I wanted the job. It sounds as though she was made to understand the conditions of employment, when she could have gone to the police, and that she decided to join a conspiracy of silence.

She was only 16 years old, which makes the crime worse and her failure to report it more forgivable, but if she was 16, she was surely represented, and there was someone there on her side, someone with much more experience and understanding of how the business works. Yes, I see the word "agents" in that first paragraph. Did the girl's own agent participate in grooming her into the Hollywood life?

You haven't been a girl for a long time, Ms. Witherspoon. I appreciate your confession to "guilt for not speaking up earlier or taking action," but you are saying this after reaping rewards for 25 years, while other girls entered the system and faced a man you could have exposed in 1991. You say you feel "less alone" now, but had the power all this time to help other women feel "less alone." What held you back? Somebody else had to go first? Some reporter (like, today, Ronan Farrow) needed to build a substantial structure around you and others to make it safe?

Why was there no Ronan Farrow in 1991?

1991 was the year that the Senate Judiciary Committee demanded that America understand sexual harrassment, as it grilled Clarence Thomas on charges of sexual harassment. There, the allegations were not about any physical assault, but pressure to go on dates and some remarks about pornography and pubic hair, and the person on the receiving end was no teenager but a Yale-Law-School-trained adult. Once those allegations were taken seriously as sexual harassment, why were there no journalists looking to break stories?

Why wouldn't someone have talked to the Women of Hollywood?

I hear my readers yelling at the computer screen: Because of politics. Sexual harassment was only taken seriously in 1991 as a means to an end, to defeat the conservative Supreme Court nominee. And the Men of Hollywood were liberals and donors to liberal causes and therefore the journalists had no motivation to go looking. Looking the other way was the means to what was the same political end. That's the obvious hypothesis. (It could also be that the knowing, sophisticated journalists understood the desire for sex and didn't want to blow up the whole game. Perhaps they themselves or their loved ones would be vulnerable if rampant exposure got going.)

This has been one hell of a conspiracy of silence. It's full of so many people — people we like, such Reese Witherspoon.

Behind the glossy, smiling faces of the Women of Hollywood, I see a crowd of women's faces. I sense the ghostly presence of all of the women who no to the conspiracy, who didn't want the job enough to go along with a system that victimized them and victimized and would continue to victimize other women.

There's a long way to go to extract yourself from the harm, Ms. Witherspoon. Feeling guilty for not speaking up earlier is a good start. Now, how about naming the man you just referred to? You were 16, and I can look at your IMDB page and see what directors you worked with in 1991. I should think you'd name the man if only to avoid casting suspicion on the 2 or 3 other names from that time.

And what about all the "multiple experiences of harassment and sexual assault"?

It's not enough to stand up at the Women in Hollywood event and spout generalities and say you feel empowered. If the truth doesn't pour out now, the conspiracy of silence will have won.

164 comments:

rehajm said...

Sexual harassment was only taken seriously in 1991 as a means to an end...

So goes 2017. I'm giving it all my own I'm skeptical tag...

rhhardin said...

It's an angry women orgy. Silence looks good.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I'm noting that names are not being named.

The coward game.

rhhardin said...

Rememeber it really, really pays well.

Jersey Fled said...

Well done, Ann.

rhhardin said...

And who knows the sex may be okay. Apparently rich men. Women like that.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Yes - well done, Ann. this this this.

gspencer said...

"Did the girl's own agent participate in grooming her into the Hollywood life?"

That's pretty much how the Hollywood Golden Rule* works.

*He who has the gold rules. Don't expect changes. And this particular GR finds application in many, many places, not merely Hollywood.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

RH - we all know you know nothing about sex.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

As long as liberals feel 'less guilty', that's all that matters.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Corey Feldman (?) is that who I'm thinking? He does the same thing. He talks about all this boy-rape, and he refuses to name names.

Coward.

rhhardin said...

Casting for the movie about the casting couch is already underway.

Ralph L said...

If she put up with it multiple times even as a star, there's a good chance someone abused her when she was younger than 16.
"Sexual assault covers such a wide range of sins--people should be more explicit, for Laslo if not for me.

IIRC, David Brock reported the Anita Hill accusation was pushed by Ted Kennedy's people!

Kate said...

I saw this Witherspoon quote at T-Lo's and also immediately tried to think back to which director she could mean. I remember seeing her first movie, "The Man in the Moon," in the theater. You're absolutely right that she condemns other directors with her silence.

T-Lo, as I'm sure you know, think her dress is ugly but her comments are brave. She gets a fashion-shaming pass for her speech. This honesty comes out now as testimonials to the religion. Before this, there was no Salvation to speaking out.

When I was 16 the manager of the steak house I worked at asked me what color my nipples were, and another manager cornered me in the restroom foyer and kissed me. Women have a million of these stories, and we never gave two thoughts to them. If the Stag and Hound had been owned by Harvey Weinstein I could now be an internet celebrity and a Blessed Saint to the feminist sisterhood.

rhhardin said...

It's not about guilt, it's about public relations. What gives the star the highest market value for the next film.

traditionalguy said...

I remember your pointing out that the goalposts were moved in 1992 to make Bubba's bullying assault over government employees into only sex between a man and woman and look like no big deal. Well now they just move them back so that any woman that Trump ever kissed can accuse him of a high crimes and misdemeanors.

CNN had a befuddled old Anita Hill on to give a 20 minute analysis of proper goal posts this AM.

Bay Area Guy said...

Sounds like the rhardin thesis at work.

The Leftist Hollywood bargain - you gotta pay (submit your body) to play.

Even worse - Witherspoon's supposed protectors accepted the ugly bargain for her 16-year old self. Sorry, those are the rules.

I feel bad for Witherspoon - she seems like one of the few genuinely good people in Hollywood. Even if she made a mistake with her silence, we shouldn't be too harsh on the victim.

I think Marilyn Monroe summed it up aptly:

"In 1955, 20th Century Fox awarded Monroe the richest per-film contract of any actress. "It means," remarked Monroe, "I'll never have to suck another cock again!" (McDougal, Dennis. The Last Mogul: Lew Wasserman, MCA, and the Hidden History of Hollywood. Crown Publishers, New York, 1998, p. 217)

Hollywood sucks.





John said...

Perhaps I am alone as I read about each outrage from the entertainment industry, but the story of Faust keeps coming up. What I have a problem deciding is who plays the title character, who is the devil and who is the innocent corrupted by Faust? Who has made the bargain at the cost of their soul?

CStanley said...

If the truth doesn't pour out now, the conspiracy of silence will have won.

Aside from shame and concern for having one's name dragged through the mud in retaliation, I think there's another factor that is keeping women from making full disclosures.

They can't handle the truth because of what it implies about the entire entertainment industry. The rampant sexualization means that they are all whores and they're really just haggling over the price. They want the right to sell the images of their bodies but they don't want the middleman taking his cut. They're also more comfortable with the distance that film puts between their sexualized acts and the men who will view them. Having a guy masturbate right in the same room with them puts cognitive dissonance into their rationalization of what they really have made themselves into.

I'm speaking more generally, though, about adult actresses- child molestation and rape belongs in a whole different category, although it's a metastasis of the same sickness.

It is funny how often we're seeing "she was only 22" and such attached to these stories...I seem to remember that Monica Lewinsky was considered plenty old enough to give consent, or to have said no to Clinton if she'd wished to.

Henry said...

One of her directors in 1991 was Diane Keaton.

Eleanor said...

If any of these man are still alive, name names and make it a great deal harder for them to continue assaulting women. Otherwise, sit down and shut up. Visit a therapist if you need one, but don't look for absolution from the public and especially not from the women that came after you. You helped those men by your silence. And made a lot of money doing it.

damikesc said...

Hollywood loves to celebrate its own "courage" and then does this.

A Congressional inquiry into this issue might be needed. Hollywood is incapable of governing itself. And on a wide array of issues. Not JUST this.

rhhardin said...

I don't' see any Witherspoon films that I remember, in my catalog. I've got 11 of them. I mean I don't remember the plots. Apparently she's a generic actress, so competition requires an edge.

CStanley said...

When I did the math it seemed more like this would have been one of her movies released in 1993. I think she was only 14 in 1991, and the movie would have been filmed about a year before that.

rhhardin said...

A movie about the evil of casting couches is going to require a lot of actresses.

Paul Snively said...

The Hollywood Left: pulling off the impressive trick of being simultaneously intellectually and morally bankrupt since at least 1947.

John Nowak said...

Why was she silent? I'm guessing because she was told this was normal since she was 16, and probably earlier.

Anonymous said...

@Ann I think you boiled the essence of why these women have done nothing into your "because I wanted the job". These "girls" - and I'll bet that's what a lot were - were willing to whore themselves out for fame and fortune. That's not an entirely new concept. Is it wrong? Absolutely! Was it brave? No! Was it smart? Well, maybe - certainly worked out for Reese.

Jumping on the train as it leaves the station is almost as damning of the women as it is of the sexual predators. It certainly underscores the deal with the devil "feminist" women made over this, the Clinton/Lewinsky affair and many other cases of sexual harassment. Makes Hillary's behavior defending Bill look even more outrageously anti-feminist.

Why is this coming out now? Because of Trump. For two reasons: Trump is showing everyone that it is okay to fight the establishment; and after blowing their tops about Trump and producing nothing (as far as they were concerned) a few decided to turn their anger onto a softer target. Credit Farrow for seizing the moment and finding the right angry women.

traditionalguy said...

Why no outrage left for the women who have to sleep with the Woman in Power to get and keep their entertainment Gigs? Inquiring minds want to know. Or maybe that is still just sex.

DrMaturin said...

The reason there was no Ronan Farrow in 1991 is because with Farrow today it's personal. He hates Harvey Weinstein for rescuing Woody Allen's career. Farrow believes Allen molested one sister when she was a child and knows that Allen seduced another sister as a teen and later married her. This broke the heart, and possibly the mind of Farrow's mother Mia Farrow. Woody Allen tore Farrow's family apart yet he continues to make movies with A-list actors and is the toast of Hollywood. All thanks to Harvey Weinstein. No one in 1991 had the kind of personal animus sufficient to overcome the natural sticking together of the Left.

Pookie Number 2 said...

Worth noting that all of these "shocked and appalled" Hollywooders know exactly how evil Trump is, but had no clue about the proclivities of people they actually know.

But then again, when an actress makes a specific accusation, she's acknowledging that her success doesn't (only) stem from her acting skills. Apparently that's too high a price to pay to protect other women, so let's shriek some more about Trump.

rhhardin said...

Hollywood has put out many entertaining films, many with great lines, and since the 70s and beyond.

The apocalypse movies with leftist lessons are destined to become cult favorites if they're not already.

Darrell said...

Brava, Althouse.

Kevin said...

Those brave women! Not naming names then, not naming names now.

Darrell said...

And don't forget women can be predators, too. Especially in Hollywood and the modeling world. And they feed on women, primarily.

Ralph L said...

Now I Know this sounds ridiculous, but we generated 4,775 comments on Harvey Weinstein tagged posts. The story has legs, and T, and A (worst use of Oxford comma ever).

rhhardin said...

Perhaps not naming names is good character, not bad character.

The hate orgy ought to consider that.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

The refusal to names names - all the perps are big known democrats.
Any bets?

rhhardin said...

I didn't name a name just the other day.

Kroger manager asked who told me something and I said I'm not going to out anybody.

Martha said...

Women have a million of these stories, and we never gave two thoughts to them.

Yes.

I was a first year medical student at Harvard in 1970 participating in a tutorial introduction to managed care. Each of the 8 medical students “enrolled” as a “patient” and underwent admission physical exams. The director of the program signaled that I, the only female in the student group, would be his “patient”. The exam was inappropriate. Did I unwittingly go along with this? Yes. But I did learn from the experience so when a year later the 24 women in the class were asked to serve as “patients” for the class to “practice” gynecological exams, I forcefully declined to participate.

Did I ever speak out about the rampant sexual harassment at Harvard Medical School?
No. It was actually a small part of the trials and tribulations of becoming a physician but it would have been so much more pleasant without it.

Bay Area Guy said...

@DrMaturin,

Nice connecting of the dots: Ronan ~ Woody ~ Weinstein.

Sounds very plausible.

Weinstein was also a big defender of convicted child rapist Roman Polanski.

The Hollywood Left is an ugly, corrupt group of people.

John Nowak said...

Serious question: Althouse, as a lawyer, would you recommend someone to make a public accusation of an individual if there were no way to prove it?

Fernandinande said...

True disgust at the director who assaulted me when I was 16 years old

Which director? Apparently she's still keeping secrets.

What kind of assault? Pinched butt or knife held to throat?

Feminists have redefined "assault" and "sexual assault" so that they can mean anything from the trivial and almost harmless to the really horrible.

If she doesn't say what it actually was, I'm going with the horrible trauma of pinched butt.

these brave women speak up tonight

Joining a mob isn't brave.

MadisonMan said...

It's a lot to ask a 16-yo to speak out. Especially when everything the kid has worked to get is being dangled in front of their face. Then after not speaking out, and hearing of things others went through, there's the guilt of silence. It works pretty well for the perpetrators who have all the money and all the power to distribute as they see fit, and there are subtle and not-so-subtle ways of massaging survivors' guilt so silence continues.

By the point that they have teen children, Don't Name Names has probably been encoded into their DNA.

I agree she should name Names. I doubt anyone will. As Barbara Walters rather infamously told Corey Feldman (or Hart -- I can't keep those two straight) -- don't hurt the industry. Too many people are making money off of it.

Oso Negro said...

I am waiting for JUST ONE BRAVE WOMAN on the Hollywood "A" actress list to come forward and list the names of all the men whose cocks she sucked to get to her station in life. Anything short of that won't reveal the full extent of the game.

Larry J said...

Sexual harassment was only taken seriously in 1991 as a means to an end...

That's true. They tried to destroy Clarence Thomas with sexual harassment claims but failed. They were successful at destroying other Republicans. We were lectured endlessly about unwelcome advances, especially by men in positions of power. Then came Bill Clinton. Because of their politics, NOW not only looked the other way about Bill Clinton, they seldom criticized the efforts (led by Hillary) to destroy any woman who dared to publicly criticize Bill's behavior. They even went so far as to claim Bill was entitled to one free grope.

Sexual harassment remained as a useful tool to destroy men in the workplace, especially conservative men. As we've seen, liberals were given a pass, especially if they were major donors to the Democrats.

Fernandinande said...

Henry said...
One of her directors in 1991 was Diane Keaton.


Ah ha! I always though Keaton looked like a butt-pincher.

rhhardin said...

You know, before the 70s sexual abuse didn't exist. It wasn't a thing. People lived along in their lives and the concept didn't come up for them.

It happens to generate ratings so now it does.

One of the curious effects of its not being a thing was that its victims didn't know they were victims of anything and just went along in life, as it were unaffected.

Some therapists have pointed that out, saying that perhaps the hysteria is the problem, not the abuse.

The hysteria has a payoff though, and here we are.

In this case the victims aren't apparently suffering but are being shamed for some other purpose. Not suffering first because of the big payoff and second because it was normal, sort of in the non-hysterical mode.

Lance said...

I wonder if Handmaid's Tale will be quite as popular going forward.

Laslo Spatula said...

Dickin'Bimbos@Home said...
"Corey Feldman (?) is that who I'm thinking? He does the same thing. He talks about all this boy-rape, and he refuses to name names.

Coward."

When Corey Feldman told Barbara Walters about Hollywood pedophilia, her response:“You’re damaging an entire industry!”

You can find the clips on YouTube.

"Feldman has also written about Corey Haim’s time with Hollywood child-actor manager Martin Weiss, an agent primarily for children who appeared on Nickelodeon and the Disney Channel – who enjoyed sleepovers and road trips with his clients. Weiss was arrested in 2011 and plead no contest to eight felony counts of molesting young actors – sentenced to a year in jail but released for time served.
Weiss raped a child actor 30 to 40 times until the age of 15, according to the police report. In an affidavit obtained by the Los Angeles Times, the victim told police that Weiss said what they were doing was ‘common practice in the entertainment industry.’"

Eight felony counts of molestation adding up to a one year sentence.

Hard to speak when no one is taking it seriously.

I am Laslo.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Kimmel and the Golden Dude. Symbols of Hate.

Robert Cook said...

"Corey Feldman (?) is that who I'm thinking? He does the same thing. He talks about all this boy-rape, and he refuses to name names.

"Coward."


He has said that he does not name names as he would be subject to legal action. The events he mentions happened years ago and he does not have physical evidence. His stance seems reasonable. Until he can get enough other victims together to bring forth their experiences as collectively, he would have scant hope of effecting change or bringing down the guilty parties, while facing possibly crushing consequences in the attempt. Yes, a "brave" person would press on, "damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!," but real life is more complicated and self-preservation remains the prime directive.

By bringing up the subject at all, at least he is helping make others coming into the business--and their families--aware of what they may face. This might be enough for some to prepare themselves so they can fend off such advances when they occur.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Laslo -thanks.
I guess he did name a name. Good.

Barabara Walters - eee yuck.

Ralph L said...

rhhardin, Les Miserable?

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

Trump’s Monstrous Insensitivity To The Families Of Fallen Soldiers: Two Related Anecdotes

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

ARM cannot be bothered with the topic. Progressive democrats in Hollywood, and their crimes of rape.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

"Weiss was arrested in 2011 and plead no contest to eight felony counts of molesting young actors – sentenced to a year in jail but released for time served."

Hillarywood justice.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Robert Cook -
I get it. Still, if your career is over anyway, - be brave and spill the beans.

We are lectured by leftists that College Rape Culture is a big deal, and there should be no tolerance, and no rights given to the accused. Hollywood is a cesspool of sexual degenerates, and yet no lectures from Joe Biden or Jared Polis.

Bay Area Guy said...

"Some therapists have pointed that out, saying that perhaps the hysteria is the problem, not the abuse"

This is a partial truth. Yes, some abuse claims can be false. Yes, overreacting even to true abuse claims can be counterproductive.

But lets, first, look at the claim, with clear vision. If Harvey type behavior is the rule, not the exception. you have a lot of injured parties - almost all young actresses, some like Reese Witherspoon, who made it, and many who were chewed up, spit out and never made it.

To me, without overreacting, it seems like a rotten social system.

Pookie Number 2 said...

ARM cannot be bothered with the topic. Progressive democrats in Hollywood, and their crimes of rape.

Like all knee-jerk partisans, he's okay with actual human suffering - he just can't stand that his side is out of power.

Robert Cook said...

"You know, before the 70s sexual abuse didn't exist. It wasn't a thing. People lived along in their lives and the concept didn't come up for them.

"It happens to generate ratings so now it does.

"One of the curious effects of its not being a thing was that its victims didn't know they were victims of anything and just went along in life, as it were unaffected."


RH Hardin: You're certainly speaking ironically, here...right? I mean, no one could be so staggeringly obtuse as to believe that sexual abuse and harassment did not exist before the 70s, or that people subject to the "nonexistent" sexual abuse therefore went on with their lives with no problems, everything hunky dory!

RNB said...

Saw a Facebook posting yesterday from a very self-consciously ‘woke’ FB acquaintance buying into the #metoo initiative. It was so cringing, self-abnegating and hypersensitive that it read like a schoolteacher’s ‘self-criticism’ confession in front of a mob of Red Guards. This from a male who has never, to my knowledge, said or done anything of a sexual nature offensive to any woman at any time in his life.

I had to laugh.

But #metoo is accomplishing its intent: To deflect attention from sex-abusers who are also prominent Democrats.

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

It's not hard to google what Witherspoon was working on in 1992.

Michael K said...

Sexual harassment was only taken seriously in 1991 as a means to an end, to defeat the conservative Supreme Court nominee. And the Men of Hollywood were liberals

Th best explanation of Anita Hill I have read is that she was convinced, as a loyal Democrat, to make an anonymous accusation. She did not expect to be exposed as the accuser. Her name was leaked as was always intended by Biden and Kennedy.

There was no other accuser and women who were prepared to testify about years of working with Thomas and no incidents of impropriety, were not allowed to testify. Thomas had a bunch of witnesses waiting to testify and they were ignored. Mission accomplished but it wasn't enough.

ARM is eager to slur Trump but the circumstances about that call are suspicious.

Fernandinande said...

Laslo Spatula said...
Eight felony counts of molestation adding up to a one year sentence.


My girlfriend's son was murdered and the guy got a year in a mental hospital, not even a jail.

Darrell said...

Lefties and NeverTrumpers sitting in a tree
S-U-C-K-I-N-G

Michael K said...

I mean, no one could be so staggeringly obtuse as to believe that sexual abuse and harassment did not exist before the 70s, or that people subject to the "nonexistent" sexual abuse therefore went on with their lives with no problems, everything hunky dory!

No, rape was prosecuted. Most of what we hear about now was understood to be normal.

Plus, of course, women were "ladies" and men were polite.

Ann Althouse said...

"I saw this Witherspoon quote at T-Lo's and also immediately tried to think back to which director she could mean... T-Lo, as I'm sure you know, think her dress is ugly but her comments are brave."

Yes, that is where I started.

This is the tab I'd left open from last night: "Reese Witherspoon’s Dress at the Women in Hollywood Celebration May be Fussy, But Her Speech Sure Wasn’t" (Tom + Lorenzo).

Ann Althouse said...

"The reason there was no Ronan Farrow in 1991 is because with Farrow today it's personal. He hates Harvey Weinstein for rescuing Woody Allen's career. Farrow believes Allen molested one sister when she was a child and knows that Allen seduced another sister as a teen and later married her. This broke the heart, and possibly the mind of Farrow's mother Mia Farrow. Woody Allen tore Farrow's family apart yet he continues to make movies with A-list actors and is the toast of Hollywood. All thanks to Harvey Weinstein. No one in 1991 had the kind of personal animus sufficient to overcome the natural sticking together of the Left."

I agree that Ronan Farrow is a truly unique character. What a story he is, this man who is getting the story.

Michael K said...

U.S. President Donald Trump told U.S. Army Sgt. La David Johnson’s widow Tuesday that “he knew what he signed up for …but when it happens it hurts anyway,” when he died serving in northwestern Africa, according to Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami Gardens.

That's ARM's big scoop.

From Red State NeverTrump Central.

William said...

W play Rashomon with our own histories. Yesterday there was a post about Hair. In that play, everyone took off their clothes at the end. It was supposed to be some kind of liberating moment. My guess is that the actors felt more peer pressure than liberation when they took off their clothes on stage in front of an audience. The moment has passed, and it is no longer customary for actors to get naked at the end of a performance.

Sebastian said...

"1991 was the year that the Senate Judiciary Committee demanded that America understand sexual harrassment, as it grilled Clarence Thomas" 1991 was the year the committee exposed sexual harassment charges as a phony partisan tool, particularly useful in high-tech-lynching uppity blacks, showing America that progs are full of it and not to believe anything they say, amply confirmed when they defended Bill in the 90s.

So let's stipulate that thousands of women have been complicit in the conspiracy of silence for decades. What does it show? That women like using sex to move up in the world, that prog women are happy to protect prog men, that women lack the moral courage to stand up and be counted when it counts?

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"I didn't name a name just the other day.

Kroger manager asked who told me something and I said I'm not going to out anybody."

Pictured rhhardin as the blue-suited boy in the Yeames painting, being grilled by the Kroger produce manager. First laugh of the day.

Those who are expecting the floodgates to burst in Hollywood are sure to be disappointed. Billions of dollars aren't flushed in the service of aspirational bimbos, however grievously wronged they may be. Weinstein may be the anthem, the starlets may be NFL lineman, but heaps of cash always insists on it's preeminence.

Kevin said...

Perhaps not naming names is good character, not bad character.

The hate orgy ought to consider that.


Perhaps not naming names leaves the perpetrator in power and feeling they did nothing wrong. Perhaps not naming names is why the next 16 year old girl cast by the director will be even more certain to be molested.

Perhaps not naming names makes you not only a victim, but also complicit in the next act. Don't say anything but hold the door open for the next person, who looks up to you and wants to be like you, to walk right through.

Anyone with a brain ought to consider that.

Unknown said...

Didn't she once portray a character who stood up to this kind of harassment?

Rick said...

It's bizarre they won't name names 30 years later when their own careers are established (or over) but they demand others act anyway.

William said...

We like narratives with heroes and villains and victims and pretty women in distress. Ronan can credibly play the part of a hero, but Weinstein seems more like a sleaze than an arch villain and many of his victims were, in fact, accomplices. This will not be a narrative of moral uplift, but maybe they'll succeed in forcing that template upon it, Hollywood is good at doing this, Rob Reiner just made an uplifting movie about LBJ.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Name some names! What could possibly be stopping her from naming him/them now?

Name your agent & agency, too! If those kinds of people are a big part of this problem then that's something that should be addressed as well.

rhhardin said...

Ian Hacking is the go-to guy on the history of sexual abuse. I got it from a Critical Inquiry article in 1991 The Making and Molding of Child Abuse, which is sometimes but not today online. Jstor will give you the first page but that's not enough.

He seems to have following books and papers which i have not followed, but his key idea always seems to be that we make up new categories all the time and then put people into them.

Known Unknown said...

Who knew Diane Keaton was a sexual harrasser?

Darrell said...

I met a former model who was working as an escort in Vancouver who told me about her time at one of the biggest modeling agencies in NYC. The female managing director chose some of the models as her "pets" and reserved the top jobs for them. She also got them using cocaine--to help keep their weight in check. In the morning, her pets would come into her office one-by-one and she would wet her index finger and coat it with the cocaine. They had to approach her as she had her hand with upraised finger on her thigh and impale themselves on her extended finger. What happened next depended on her mood. Talking business or more play. She'd get a vial of cocaine for the day on the way out. Besides from telling her that I was sorry that happened to her, I expressed concern knowing that some heavy cocaine users had their septums dissolved over time. I wondered what would happen in the vagina.

Fritz said...

rhhardin said...
I don't' see any Witherspoon films that I remember, in my catalog. I've got 11 of them. I mean I don't remember the plots. Apparently she's a generic actress, so competition requires an edge.

She plays the stereotypical dumb blonde with a good heart. Everything turns out good in the end. That's basically it.

Caligula said...

"If the truth doesn't pour out now, the conspiracy of silence will have won."

Surely to imagine one can obtain "the truth" decades after the events is to assume far too much?

For those who paid the price to play, there's perhaps some upside in doing a tell-all now, yet this upside might be balanced against questions of whether you would have gotten the same breaks in an ideal world in which only talent mattered.

And for those who didn't, there's going to be justified anger toward those who did as well as toward those who made the demands.

As for the rest of us, we could and should bring some skepticism to the table, as even in a world of perfect honesty decades-old memories remain notoriously unreliable. And, really, we don't live in a world of perfect honesty but one in which people sometimes exaggerate or even fabricate "memories" to suit their purposes.

This is not a denial of this evil, just a plea that observers bring reasonable skepticism to the table, and that everyone remember that rules of evidence exist because we know that memory is fallible and, even when it is reliable, people always have many motivations to tell less than "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth."

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Oh, a stray thought (prompted, I think, by somoene's twitter post): is it possible that being overly sensitive to charges of anti-Semitism and/or racism played a part in Media reluctance to break some of these stories? A disproportionate number of Hollywood producers seem to be jewish and leftwing, and "rich jews taking advantage of innocent non-jewish women" is a pretty well-known anti-Semitic trope, so is it possible that some people in the Media were afraid that if they ran stories that in some ways fit that stereotypical anti-Semitic slur they'd face accusations of anti-Semitism (a likely career ender)?

rhhardin said...

Drunk Driving didn't exist before the 60s. It happened but it was a personal moral failing, not a public problem. Something between you and your pastor.

tcrosse said...

Who knew Diane Keaton was a sexual harrasser?

Woody Allen.

JAORE said...

"the guilt for not speaking up earlier or taking action. "

And yet, by not naming all those other names you are still not "speaking up".

False bravory.

rhhardin said...

Loose dogs weren't a public problem before the 80s. Dogs were just dogs. They roamed around the neighborhood and played with the kids.

There were kids outside then too.

LilyBart said...


Do you ask this of Gretchen Carlson? What happened to Carlson was wrong, and I'm sorry she had to endure it. But it bothers me that she's called a 'hero' for her 'courage'. She didn't speak out until she had exhausted her options at Fox News, until she had more to gain than lose by speaking out millions apparently. So, she was silent while others were harassed because she had much to lose. So, she and most of the people speaking out now are victims, but not heros. I don't mind that she got a big settlement, seems appropriate - but it bothers me that she's making a new career out of her 'courage'

William said...

In every office I've ever worked in, there has been a certain amount of hanky panky going on. Girls may have a million stories, but they don't involve the kind of crap that Harvey pulled. Someone like Harvey could only exist in Hollywood. If Bernie Madoff tried bath robing one of the girls in accounting, he would have ended up in prison PDQ.......Also the girls in accounting do not look like Reese Witherspoon.

rhhardin said...

You could say Gretchen Carlson was trading on the hysteria when it suited her.

Fernandinande said...

Diane Keaton pinched my butt when I was a teenager, but that sexual assault was so traumatic that I repressed the horrible memories of it until just a few minutes ago when I was triggered.

Butt now I'm speaking out, and naming names. Well, one name.

rhhardin said...

When did drug dealers (as a category of person) show up, in history. I don't happen to know. DeQuincy and Coleridge were both enthusiastic users, so the 1800s were dealer-free.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

There is a scene in The Godfather were Tom Hagen goes to a Hollywood producer's house to talk to him about casting someone in a movie. As Hagen enters the house you briefly see a young actress that was shown earlier being filmed for a movie. The actress is barely pubescent and is dressed in revealing night clothes. She is ushered into her room and someone whispers something about her being told to stay in her room.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

I don't' see any Witherspoon films that I remember, in my catalog. I've got 11 of them.

Everytime we discuss these actors,actresses, directors and their movies, I am struck by how FEW of their 'products' I have ever watched or have ever desired to watch. I've seen Legally Blonde (the first one)...that's it.

These people really mean nothing to me.

Bill, Republic of Texas said...

#metoo

I worked with a woman whose claim to fame was she liked to goose people. I thought it was kinda funny. Then one day she goosed me and OH MY! Her thumb went up my butt. I felt really violated but I remained silent all these years.

No more! All these women have given me courage to speak out. But not to name names.

Ralph L said...

Something between you and your pastor.

Or between you and your mortician.

rhhardin said...

Or between you and your mortician.

Drunk driving isn't as fatal as it's made out to be.

If everybody's drunk, all the accidents involve drunks; but it's not fair to conclude from that that being drunk causes accidents.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

rhhardin said...Rememeber it really, really pays well.

See, that was my thought when I read Jennifer Lawrence's comment that she was humiliated by having to pose for casting directors and stand in a naked line up or something like that--that level of exposure and/or humiliation seems like the price one pays for the opportunity to trade unusually good looks for millions of dollars. I'm certain there's a lot of sleaziness involved, but that by itself doesn't seem like sexual harassment or abuse, to me.

There's a hell of a risk that unpleasant but non-criminal/non-harassment things will get conflated with reports of actual abuse here. That's ok to an extent, but if the goal is to bring about an actual change (in attitudes, treatment, rules/laws, etc) maintaining a bright line will be important. If the goal is performative therapy I guess that's less important.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

When I was 16 the manager of the steak house I worked at asked me what color my nipples were, and another manager cornered me in the restroom foyer and kissed me. Women have a million of these stories, and we never gave two thoughts to them. If the Stag and Hound had been owned by Harvey Weinstein I could now be an internet celebrity and a Blessed Saint to the feminist sisterhood.

10/18/17, 8:01 AM

I have stories like that from my days as a waitress as well. What waitress doesn't? If some drunken customer wasn't getting grabby it was a chef or the manager. I pushed them away, told them to keep their hands to themselves, and just got on with my job. I was disgusted by that behavior and certainly would have preferred if those incidents didn't occur, but they were not traumatizing debacles that scarred me for life. What HW did was far worse and he could end careers if women did not comply. Being raped or threatened with the loss of ones job or the possibility of earning a livelihood in one's field is very serious - which is why I hate to see what he did conflated with "He grabbed my ass/asked me out on a date/looked at my boobs/made a dirty joke and I was offended."

As I said yesterday, if women are too fragile to deal with such behavior, what is the solution? You can create "safe spaces" only by either confining the women to home and all female workplaces or by neutering men.

William said...

Gwyneth Paltrow was the granddaughter of a famous and distinguished rabbi. It's a base slander to say that Harvey only abused goys. He was open minded and diverse in his casting choices. Zoe Saldana and Hale Berry have not yet weighed in, but I'm convinced that Harvey would have bath robed them given half a chance. It's grossly unfair to accuse Harvey of being prejudiced. That kind of rumor could ruin his career.

rhhardin said...

On the drunk driving transition, see The Culture of Public Problems: Drinking-Driving and the Symbolic Order, but Joseph R. Gusfield.

A colleague at work, Fred Grampp, had the remark on MADD that if it weren't for the drunks, a lot of them wouldn't be mothers.

Gordon Scott said...

Since we're connecting dots, let's remember how Mia Farrow became really famous (other than by marrying Frank Sinatra when she was 21 and he was 51). She starred in a little movie called Rosemary's Baby. The movie was about a paranoid mother-to-be who believed all of the people she knew were part of an evil conspiracy.

Who directed this movie? Oh, some guy named Roman Polanski.

So, we have Polanski directing young Mia, who seems to have carried on a lifelong affair with Sinatra, who possibly fathered Ronan Farrow. Mia later carries on for 12 years with director Woody Allen, then after Allen dumps her for her adopted daughter (who was about the same age as Farrow when she married Sinatra) Mia accuses Woody of molesting another adopted daughter.

Mia's son Ronan (who Mia admits might be Sinatra's kid, vice Woody) is pissed off that Harvey Weinstein helped rehab Woody's directing career, thus he goes after Harvey, who is also buds with Roman Polanski.

It does get a bit convoluted.

Oh, Woody's other fling? Diane Keaton, who could be the director that pinched Reese Witherspoon.

tcrosse said...

There's nothing new under that warm California sun.

The Bad and the Beautiful (1952)

William said...

Theodora became Empress of Byzantium based on some shrewd casting couch moves. Not every woman is a loser in the casting couch game, but the overwhelming majority are. The mere existence of a casting couch career ladder is a form of abuse whether a woman participates or not.

Kevin said...

I think I see where rhharden is going.

Back on the plantations, Massah used to have young slave girls dance around as entertainment and act out various roles in little stories he'd make up. Then he'd invite them behind the tree beside the big house for a little "reward" afterward.

Wasn't much of a thing back then. Probably not even something you'd mention to your Pastor.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Before the 1970s nobody wore seatbelts. Its all just a conspiracy by the seatbelt manufacturers. Before the 1970s everyone was ejected from their cars through the windshield and nobody died. They all knew how to roll to dissipate their momentum and avoid traffic. They taught that in driving school. Damn those seatbelt manufacturers!

William said...

Rashomon. When I was younger, I had some guys make homosexual passes at me. I told them off in the bluntest possible terms. In retrospect, I see that the politically correct way of refusing their advances would have been to be more polite and good natured about the whole thing. It's important not to give offense in such situations.

rhhardin said...

If you want to talk car safety, look up the Peltzman effect.

People react to safety equipment by doing more dangerous things.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Windshields were made of the same stuff they use in Hollywood in action movies, so going through one was no big deal. But now? Damn safety glass manufacturers!

Ron Winkleheimer said...

People react to safety equipment by doing more dangerous things.

And don't even get me talking about safety glasses! Or ear plugs! Damn safety glass and ear plug manufacturers!

rhhardin said...

What makes sociology interesting (Goffman, Gusfield for example) is how much stuff is counterintuitive.

_Asylums_ by Erving Goffman is a good first read to try, to see if you like the stuff. It's a big field if you do.

Gordon Scott said...

Oh, and celeb chef Anthony Bourdain, who has been prominent in flinging around accusations lately, is with much younger Asia Argento, an Italian actress who has an actress mother and a director/producer father. Asia is one of the early public accusers of Harvey, and despite having grown up in the industry, didn't know that producers hit on actresses.

Bourdain himself tells of a time when he was a young cook and an older, senior chef would walk by and grab his ass and make crude comments. Unlike Asia Argento, who is a delicate flower, Bourdain solved the problem by anticipating the daily butt grab, holding a sharp cooking fork in the right place so that the offending chef skewered his own hand.

There is no word on whether Bourdain was the catering chef for Woody and Soon-Yi's wedding.

Michael K said...

The female managing director chose some of the models as her "pets" and reserved the top jobs for them.

Years ago, when I was a surgery resident at LA County Hospital, the OR Director was a lesbian. She had pets, too. Her pets got day shift and the ones who were not got night shift.

I wonder what the day shift women did for her.

Tari said...

That was great, Professor.

My question on all these things that happened to actresses when they were underage - Witherspoon and Jennifer Lawrence, to name two - is simply: WHERE WERE THE PARENTS? What responsible parent lets their child (male or female) go off to meetings alone with Hollywood types? Did they knowingly pimp their kids out? I read somewhere that one of Mayam Bialik's parents were always present and in view of her, even when she was in front of the camera. That's parenting.

Saint Croix said...

This is not the first time Reese has accused men of harassment.

MikeR said...

"I’ve had multiple experiences of harassment and sexual assault, and I don’t speak about them very often..." Even now I won't speak about them, in the sense of actually naming anyone you don't know about already?
What is with these people?

Michael K said...

"They all knew how to roll to dissipate their momentum and avoid traffic."

Not the ones I saw.

Darrell said...

Darryl F. Zanuck had a casting of his erect penis, plated in 24k gold as a paperweight on his desk. Legend has it that it was cast by the same company that produces the Oscars. He harassed every woman that came into his office. “Don’t forget, darling, tomorrow you’re going to be a star.”

Greg said...

If Hillary was president, every man in the US would be forced to take hours of training so that you will now stop saying good morning to your female coworkers, because that's rape

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Throughout most of human history as far back as it was recorded, in pretty much every civilization we know of, slavery was considered completely normal. Unless you were a slave you generally didn't have any qualms about it. Its just the way things were. Many societies also practiced infanticide. The father had the right to expose an infant to the elements where it would die, probably by being attacked and eaten by wild animals. Human sacrifice was also fairly common and an accepted practice which all right thinking people supported.

Arguing that because people didn't use to think something was a problem means it isn't really a problem is less than convincing.

rhhardin said...

OR physicians have very biased views of odds. Their cases self-select.

rhhardin said...

Arguing that because people didn't use to think something was a problem means it isn't really a problem is less than convincing.

The discovery and taking ownership of public problems is the route to political power.

There's a good reason to understand the process and to notice it when it happens, instead of taking it always as a moral discovery.

It has a cost, one being regimented interpretations of everything. Nothing to work out personally.

rhhardin said...

Slavery in fact is a good economic system. It's better all around to enslave the enemy than to kill him. Even the enemy thinks so.

The free market and property laws made the underlying "hit the guy on the head and take his stuff" economic system inefficient. Too much spent on defense, not enough on production. In a free market system, a slave contributes more working in his own interest than as a slave.

So that's why slavery went away. It wasn't a moral discovery but a matter of a more efficient economic system.

jwl said...

Ms. Witherspoon is choosing to remain a victim, she should confront her abusers in court, it would be good for her mental health and it would be start to cleaning up Hollywood.

I also wonder where's her family and what did they do to help their daughter?

I am de facto father of my sis' two teenage children and we both have noticed males leering at my niece since she eleven - I called a couple of them perverts when it is really blatant. So I wonder about witherspoon's father and/or mother and what kind of parent thinks it good idea to introduce your teenager to entertainment industry.

ALso have to look at justice system, perhaps more women have gone to police than we realize and the victims have been sent away with a flea in their ear.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

BTW, I just remembered that scene from "Schlindler's List" where Schlindler is interviewing women who want to become his secretary. We see a number of pretty girls with mediocre typing skills who bat their eyelashes and smile seductively as Schlindler gazes at them like a St. Bernard looking at a lamb chop. Then we see him with a bored expression, turned away from a heavy older woman who is all business and a speed demon on the typewriter. The scene is played for laughs - but it does mirror reality because Schlindler was in fact a Lothario who blatantly screwed around with his female employees right under the nose of his long-suffering wife. (The movie makes it look as though he stopped philandering when his wife came back to work with him, but according to the book, he did not.)

That movie came out during in the Clinton years. The Clintons attended the DC premiere of "Schlindler's List" and I imagine that Billy Jeff, in his narcissism, related to Schlindler's character - a heroic, larger- than-life man with an outsized appetite for the ladies. Except of course, for the small detail that Clinton never risked his neck saving anybody else's life.

rhhardin said...

The trouble with regimented interpretations is that they're at risk of being bad readings. It's a form of stupidity.

Hysteria is to overcome that feeling.

Ironic.

rhhardin said...

Personal readings can be bad readings but at least they don't infect everything.

Robert Cook said...

"When I was younger, I had some guys make homosexual passes at me. I told them off in the bluntest possible terms. In retrospect, I see that the politically correct way of refusing their advances would have been to be more polite and good natured about the whole thing. It's important not to give offense in such situations."

Well...the way one responds has to do with several things: how aggressive, offensive, or persistent are the passes? How hyper-sensitive is the person being hit on to being hit on, particularly by a person of the gender? What is the relationship between the person(s) making the passes and the person being hit on?

Why do you say "politically correct?" What about simple courtesy? Not all passes are made with intent to harass or offend.

I think a polite rebuff is the appropriate first response, (unless the pass was aggressive or offensive). If the polite rebuff is ignored, then a more forceful rebuff is called for, as--but no more--forceful as needed.

If the person is in a position of power over you life such that your job, career, finances, reputation, etc. may suffer, then it becomes a very tricky problem to deal with, again, depending on your need to keep your job, career, income, reputation, etc., or your willingness to say "Fuck it!"

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

Tari said...
That was great, Professor.

My question on all these things that happened to actresses when they were underage - Witherspoon and Jennifer Lawrence, to name two - is simply: WHERE WERE THE PARENTS? What responsible parent lets their child (male or female) go off to meetings alone with Hollywood types? Did they knowingly pimp their kids out? I read somewhere that one of Mayam Bialik's parents were always present and in view of her, even when she was in front of the camera."

Yep. Shirley Temple's mother kept a close eye on her too. One day, when mom was not around, a director made a pass at Temple.

Darrell said...

Shirley Temple was protected by the studio head and a promise that any offender would have his dick and balls cut off and be found dead in a sewer. Temple was America's Sweetheart. And Hollywood would have been burned to the ground if any stories came out.

Robert Cook said...

"The free market and property laws made the underlying 'hit the guy on the head and take his stuff' economic system inefficient. Too much spent on defense, not enough on production. In a free market system, a slave contributes more working in his own interest than as a slave.

"So that's why slavery went away. It wasn't a moral discovery but a matter of a more efficient economic system."


Ridiculous. Look at the trillions we squander on "defense" (sic) as it is! Of course, it makes people rich, so it goes on, always growing, never shrinking. What do you think most of our military activity historically and currently is but "hit the other guy and take his stuff?"

If the captains of industry, the intrepid free-booters of the "free market system" had legal freedom to do so, they would fire their employees and retain them as slaves. The drive to keep wages down is an expression of their desire to enslave their employees to the extent possible within legal parameters.

Amexpat said...

I can look at your IMDB page and see what directors you worked with in 1991. I should think you'd name the man if only to avoid casting suspicion on the 2 or 3 other names from that time.

I did the same thing at her Wikipedia page and thought it was not only cowardly to not name the director but grossly unfair to the two other possible directors who fell within the time frame. What can she possible fear by naming the director at this point? She's got the money and clout to stand up against him now.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Before the advent and wide spread adoption of the internal combustion engine, city streets were covered with horse shit and often dead horses, nobody thought that was a problem. It was just the way things were.

Before public health officials learned that the practice of spitting chewing tobacco juice onto the street was a vector for tuberculosis, nobody thought it as a problem. It was just the way things were.

Robert Cook said...

"No, rape was prosecuted. Most of what we hear about now was understood to be normal.

"Plus, of course, women were 'ladies' and men were polite."


Hahahaha!

Now you're being funny, Michael K.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

My stereotypical understanding of Hollywood is that the big movers are mostly jewish or Scientologists. I wonder how the insularity of those groups plays into the ability to keep this kind of apparently-widespread abuse out of the papers for so long.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

There is a scene in The Big Sleep where Bogart's character goes into a book store and, after a few seconds of conversation, ends up hooking up (off camera) with an attractive sales woman.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=humprhey+bogart+movie+scene+book+store&&view=detail&mid=820C2451DB34FFA69F62820C2451DB34FFA69F62&FORM=VRDGAR

Believe it or not, sex was not invented in 1967 by Abbie Hoffman and Jane Fonda at an anti-war rally.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Robert Cook said...Ridiculous. Look at the trillions we squander on "defense" (sic) as it is! Of course, it makes people rich, so it goes on, always growing, never shrinking. What do you think most of our military activity historically and currently is but "hit the other guy and take his stuff?"

No, not ridiculous. You're underestimating the former spending on defense, Robert, and concluding that it's "always growing" without taking a proper baseline.
How many slave/hostage raids have you been on so far this year? How many attacks by rival band or tribes have you fought off this month? If you were a pre-industrial person your answer to that would certainly have been higher than it is today! For most of human history everyone had to sleep with one eye open and devote large amounts of their time & energy to prevent being wiped out or having all their stuff stolen. The equivalent GPD "spent" on defense was huge.
Roll the clock forward however you like. Romans, Greeks, Native American tribes...straight through Medieval times it's much the same. In the middle ages you might only be called up for village defense and/or to campaign for your Baron for 6 or 7 months out of the year every few years or so, but you'd still have to worry about local brigands, highwaymen, etc and participate in constant town watches and the like.

We in the modern world are enormously wealthy compared to prior times and one of the reasons is precisely because we no longer have to spend so much time and effort on our own defense--we have that time now to spend on generating wealth. If our yearly defense spending grows from 3.5% to 3.7% of our GDP in a given year that increase of billions of dollars is worth noting, but it doesn't mean you can distort the fact that in historical terms that spending is remarkably very low. Thankfully!

Big Mike said...

Behind the glossy, smiling faces of the Women of Hollywood, I see a crowd of women's faces. I sense the ghostly presence of all of the women who no to the conspiracy, who didn't want the job enough to go along with a system that victimized them and victimized and would continue to victimize other women.

I saw "Man in the Moon" and liked it. A well-written, well-cast, and very well-acted coming of age story. I had assumed that the girl playing Dani (I learned later it was Reese Witherspoon) was 18 when the movie was made, because she has a brief nude scene -- one sees her from behind as she jumps into a creek for some skinny dipping, but she clearly had to be nude in front of the director and crew to shoot the scene.

Yes, somewhere out there are women who have more talent in their eyebrows than Meryl Streep has ever dreamed of having, but who refused to put out. So in the end we have movies that no one wants to watch with actresses that no one wants to see.

Left Bank of the Charles said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ron Winkleheimer said...

Slavery in fact is a good economic system. It's better all around to enslave the enemy than to kill him. Even the enemy thinks so.

You could say that infanticide was a good economic policy. After all it was the unwanted and physically deformed that were being disposed of. They would have been useless eaters and society couldn't afford them. Probably would have been better to have eaten them though. Total waste of protein.

Seeing Red said...

The Oscar was more important.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

Reese Witherspoon was born on March 22, 1976 so the relevant IMDB timeframe for her being 16 is March 22, 1992 to March 21, 1993 (not 1991). The TV movie Wildflower directed by Diane Keaton was broadcast on December 3, 1991 so that puts the unified Woody Allen conspiracy theory just out of range. Keeping in mind the lag time between production and release, that leaves:

Desperate Choices: To Save My Child, directed by Andy Tenant and broadcast on October 5, 1992.

A Far Off Place, directed by Mikael Salomon and released on March 12, 1993.

Jack the Bear, directed by Marshall Herskovitz and released on April 2, 1993.

Return to Lonesome Dove, directed by Mike Robe and broadcast on November 14, 1993.

S.F.W., directed by Jefery Levy and released on September 15, 1994.

Those are the nominees. And the Harvey goes to ...

Note: The nominations are still open. It could be that Reese Witherspoon was referring to a director for whom she auditioned but did not get the part or for a movie that was not made.

wildswan said...

Bad tends to get worse and I think Hollywood has gotten worse over the years in terms of how much sexual assault is "allowed". I'm sure there was an unspoken norm and that the norm allowed increasingly brutal, disgusting behavior. I say that because the movies themselves over those same years became filled with increasing brutal disgusting behavior. But in those same years it also became the norm to pretend that Hollywood loved strong women, supported feminism, favored outspoken celebrities. Now we see that everyone of them who worked for Harvey Weinstein was abused and degraded and silent about it; and their boyfriends and husbands were silent; and then they all were silent together as a new round of abuse and degradation for a new group of young women started as Harvey started a new picture.

And then these celebrities took to going out and lecturing regular Americans about sexism and misogyny. So hypocritical.

But the surprise ending seems to be that Hollywood suddenly believed and acted upon its own words and turned on the horrible abuses in its own system. Maybe next the NFL will speak up about the terrible damage Thursday night football is doing to the players in that there is no time for their bodies to heal.

Now Trump is causing great things to happen as well as doing great things. So much winning.

William said...

Re homosexual passes: They're not like hetero passes. They make an unwarranted assumption about the other person. The heterosexual equivalent to a gay pass is like a guy offering a girl a hundred bucks for a blow job on the first date.......One of the many nice things about old age is that you no longer have to field gay advances. When I was much younger, I had a friend make a pass at me. If I could take a mulligan, I would say no in a gentler way. He was a decent guy struggling with a problem that neither he nor I understood. But all the others were sleazeballs.

MayBee said...

Let's remember this next time someone pooh-poohs a conspiracy based on how hard it is to keep everyone quiet.

Gahrie said...

If the captains of industry, the intrepid free-booters of the "free market system" had legal freedom to do so, they would fire their employees and retain them as slaves. The drive to keep wages down is an expression of their desire to enslave their employees to the extent possible within legal parameters.

And yet capitalism has still produced the modern world in which the world's population is at an all time high, while world hunger and poverty are at all time lows.

Except of course for the few remaining communist and socialist "paradises".

Seeing Red said...

in like Flynn.

Rick said...

The drive to keep wages down is an expression of their desire to enslave their employees to the extent possible within legal parameters.

How did I know without looking this idiocy was Cook's? So the same person who claims using a different definition of Socialism than is most advantageous to his arguments invalidates the criticism feels free to define slavery as whatever he doesn't like.

People give Cook credit for honesty but really he's only dishonest in different places.

Seeing Red said...

Wasn't Mia Farrow's mother Margaret Sullivan?

I thought she was Jane in the Tarzan movies with Johnny Weismuller.

Bay Area Guy said...

The Hollywood dam is breaking. Not unlike the Berlin Wall coming down.

The next time some Hollywood twit -- like Ashley Judd -- tries to lecture us on morality or public policy, we will be respectful to whatever misdeed happened to her, but we will remind her that she remained silent when ACTUAL SEXUAL ABUSERS were running Hollywood and preying on actresses.

And, they are mostly all leftwing Democrat spokesmen or major donors.

Yancey Ward said...

Age 16 puts her in 1992-1993, not 1991. I also did what Ms. Althouse did and went to IMBD to check out the movies she might have been acting in during 1992- things that were aired in the range of late 92 to early 94.

FIDO said...

The only question every reporter, blogger, journalist and editor should be asking all of these women should be 'who else'.

Reese was not speaking about a single person. So...if we are doing this, if Trump grabbing them by the pussy is so bad, then let's get the OTHER bad actors.

Unless these ladies name new names, they want victim status without cost or courage, which is reprehensible.

So either name new names or shut your mouths, ladies. You've certainly mastered silence for 25 years or more.

Rick said...

Did they knowingly pimp their kids out?

The allure of fame and wealth is stronger than any drug.

Darrell said...

Elizabeth Taylor was only 11 when she auditioned for the role of Velvet Brown in National Velvet. When the producers told her she was too flat-chested to play an adolescent, Taylor defiantly replied: ‘Don’t worry. You’ll have your breasts’ Three months later she returned and, lifting up her jumper, showed off a newly acquired set of B-cup bare breasts which she believed she had achieved by using ‘fast-grow’ creams, a special high-fat diet and rigorous chest development exercises. Others said her pushy stage mother took her to a Hollywood doctor that gave her hormone injections, that may have accelerated her already precocious behavior.

Darrell said...

Maureen O'Sullivan was Mia's mother. And yes, she played Jane.

Yancey Ward said...

Ronan Farrow is in the Hollywood tribe, so to speak- the son of Mia Farrow, one of the most famous actresses of all time, and likely the son of Frank Sinatra. He was in a unique position to get people in that tribe to open up in a way than no other journalist was likely to.

Yancey Ward said...

I would hope that these celebrities are comparing notes which each other, and are preparing to name names once they have a quorum of at least two. However, I am also not holding my breath. I can certainly understand not naming a name without any evidence to back it up.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

Believe it or not, sex was not invented in 1967 by Abbie Hoffman and Jane Fonda at an anti-war rally.

10/18/17, 10:33 AM

Boomers thought that because they saw that Desi and Luci slept in twin beds.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

Slavery in fact is a good economic system. It's better all around to enslave the enemy than to kill him. Even the enemy thinks so.

You could say that infanticide was a good economic policy. After all it was the unwanted and physically deformed that were being disposed of. They would have been useless eaters and society couldn't afford them. Probably would have been better to have eaten them though. Total waste of protein.

You CAN say that because it has been true. In times past where the survival of the tribe/the group/society depended on keeping the strong and productive alive, infanticide was a good technique. Not "good" in a moral sense, but good in that it worked for goal of surviving.

With our technology, extreme wealth as a society and the safety we have experienced for generations....hopefully, we will not have to face this policy again. However.....never say never.

walter said...


Blogger Tari said...
WHERE WERE THE PARENTS?
--
Yep

Anthony said...

Fernandinande said...
Feminists have redefined "assault" and "sexual assault" so that they can mean anything from the trivial and almost harmless to the really horrible.


This. Nowadays, some dork badgering a woman for a date is called "horrific" (if the dork is not a Liberal In Good Standing, of course). And the "victims" call themselves "survivors".

And yet. . . .dozens of Christians beheaded on a beach just for being Christian. . . ."We need to ensure against backlash against Muslims."

n.n said...

Next: transgender transgressions.

Martin said...

Hollywood does not just contain monsters, at the financial and talent end (producers, directors, actors,and their entourages and assistants; as opposed to the tradesmen--carpenters, electricians, seamstresses, location managers, gaffers, grips, etc.) it is ALL monsters. Some committed crimes (using the term morally, not legalistically) of commission, some crimes of omission, but all were complicit and all were accomplices and facilitators.

EVERY. SINGLE. DAMN. ONE. OF. THEM.

In WW2, many Germans, Czechs, Poles, French, etc. got apartments and possessions that had been taken from their Jewish neighbors who were sent to the gas chambers. And when the Allies came, they all denied knowing ANYTHING about the Holocaust.

The scale of the crime is far different, but not the basic moral lesson. Reese Witherspoon has a lot to answer for--the fact that she wasn't as bad as Harvey Weinstein does NOT make it alright. The victim who lets the perpetrator go on is also an accomplice after the fact.

That does not mean Witherspoon belongs in jail, far from it. But Althouse is quite right to point out her share of culpability for anything this unnamed director did after 1991.