October 15, 2017

"The fundamental predatory nature of Hollywood is young, attractive people — largely females — putting themselves in front of men to be judged and appraised and chosen."

"It is a dark equation. From the moment the proverbial girl gets off the bus, the odds are stacked against her. In Hollywood, unlike at other Fortune 500 companies, the one-on-one meetings take place in hotel suites and bars. It’s an exploitative and oddly personal process."

Said Janice Min, the former editor of The Hollywood Reporter (who also describes a media event that took place last April at which Barack Obama gives a speech and, immediately afterwards, "amid rapturous applause," walks "right over to Harvey Weinstein and gives Harvey a hug").

Quoted in "Harvey Weinstein, Hollywood’s Oldest Horror Story," by Maureen Dowd (NYT).

5 more things about this Dowd column:

1. She follows the now-standard script of dragging Trump into the story, but she keeps that scene short. She merely sticks a "Like Trump" onto the front end of one sentence about Weinstein:
Like Trump, that other self-professed predator, there were complaints that in business deals he stiffed people on bills (advertising and public relations payments), and he had a reputation for lying, cheating, taking advantage, acting like a thug.
2. She doesn't otherwise talk about the political world, except to pass along Min's idea that Weinstein was "a master at protecting himself... by the veneer of power he cultivated, by giving to liberal causes and cultivating friends in the media and politics." Here, another name is stuck in: "just as Hugh Hefner was."

3. There's something a little sleazy about slipping in other names — Trump and Hefner — without specifying the points of comparison. The charges against Weinstein are so awful, that this "like X" style of writing flaunts unfairness.

4. And note the unopened door: Calling Weinstein "a master at protecting himself... by giving to liberal causes and cultivating friends in the media and politics" makes it sound as though he was a genius and ignores the lameness of the journalists in allowing this obvious and simple ruse to give him cover. Shine some light on the weakness of your own profession, Ms. Dowd. You've been writing very extensively about the movie business for years. Why didn't you go after Weinstein? Were you and your colleagues bought off by his generosity to causes that you like?

5. Dowd often does clever things with language, but some of her efforts are strained, and sometimes an idea just does not work and should be abandoned:
He relished the nickname “Harvey Scissorhands,” given to him by filmmakers who did not like his domination in the editing room. But the nickname could work just as well for his octopus ways with women, which resulted in lots of hush money being paid out.
You just can't merge "octopus ways" with Scissorhands when you're talking about a man approaching a woman's body. Scissorhands cut and even if the cut is skillful, the presence of blades near vulnerable flesh is dangerous (erotically so, in the movie):



The octopus has soft suctioning parts, nothing like scissors, as most memorably depicted in the 1814 Hokusai woodcut print "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife":



These Scissorhands and octopus images are presented (by male artists) as powerfully erotic from the woman's point of view, but the eroticism is distinctly different and it doesn't helpfully connect up film editing with paying hush money. It's funny that Dowd was writing about editing when she let a stray octopus into that paragraph.

211 comments:

1 – 200 of 211   Newer›   Newest»
Rusty said...

This goes a long way in explaining the lack of talent in Hollywood.

Molly said...

Why doesn't this kind of predation happen in NYC's legitimate stage ("Broadway")? Or does it?

Unknown said...

Tim Robbins provides the liberal money shot. This isn't about his industry or one perv it's a crisis requiring for government to put a thumb on the scale in All business.

rhhardin said...

The charges against Weinstein are so awful

What charges were so awful.

Even the actual crimes, kidnapping, rape and assault, aren't awful. They happen every day.

The so awful is the mob's hysteria. The mob is what's awful.

ndspinelli said...

This Weinstein scandal gives cover to the Gay Mafia studio executives who are just as bad. That's another "open secret." When the NYT was probing Trump for sex scandal they were sitting on the Weinstein story and they are sitting on gay rape stories that they will not publish.

rhhardin said...

Take a longer look at the free market.

Without men's obsession with pussy women wouldn't have any leverage at all.

As it is, men take feminism as the price of pussy and tolerate it, like nagging.

If you withdraw the pussy, men aren't interested.

So each side gets something from it, in the natural state. Compromises are reached, some of them compromising, but even those leave both sides better off.

Actresses are drawn to the craft by pussy. Otherwise what's the point. Presumably that's how so many wind up as porn stars, either a stepping stone or a destination.

Take the women's motivations into account.

Ann Althouse said...

It was less than a month ago that Dowd published a big article in the NYT Style section with this now-cringeworthy passage:

Ms. Dench pulled down her pants and flashed the tattoo at Mr. Weinstein at a celebrity lunch she arranged at the Four Seasons in 2002 with Mike Nichols, Nora Ephron, Carly Simon and others, and again at the BAFTA awards when Mr. Weinstein asked Ms. Dench to show his gift to a skeptical Oprah Winfrey at Royal Albert Hall.

“I walked in and I saw Harvey, and I said, ‘Hello, Harvey,’ and I dropped my pants down,” Ms. Dench recalls gleefully.

Ms. Winfrey, Mr. Weinstein recalls, “turned into a 12-year-old squealing girl” after Ms. Dench told her, “I hear you’ve been doubting my love for Harvey?” as she unzipped her pants.

Is the Weinstein tattoo real or simply drawn on by her makeup artist when she needs it, given that she once threatened to switch it to Kevin Spacey when he was the head of the Old Vic?

In her typically saucy fashion, Ms. Dench purrs, “How can I possibly tell you? Ask Harvey.”

Mr. Weinstein isn’t sure, but he does know this: “She is one of the world’s great actresses but also great personalities. She speaks in the Queen’s English so elegantly and then she’s flirting and speaking like British sailors on shore leave. Johnny Depp and I will go to our graves thinking she’s the hottest of them all.”

rhhardin said...

A man wins an Oscar and really doesn't care much.

A woman wins it and it means she's the best pussy in the world. Huge rush.

rhhardin said...

Of course the pussy roles expire, and you're a hard-hitting district attorney, and then a driving Miss Bess, as somebody put it, but it's about aging and remaining attractive to men who remember.

Ann Althouse said...

rh "Take a longer look at the free market...."

Here's my hypothetical:

A business executive is in a position to promote one person to a great position within the company. 100 employees are invited to apply and one of the qualifications for the great position is that the applicant must perform whatever action the executive demands. You don't get the job for doing it, but you are disqualified if you don't.

tim in vermont said...

Watch Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day for a treatment of legitimate theatre.

Look at the lyrics of "A Free Man in Paris" and think about the fact that it is based on the true experience of a beautiful young Joni Mitchell in Paris with an older record producer.

This is obviously commonplace.

rhhardin said...

Don't apply if you don't want the deal. Jeez, be an adult.

DavidD said...

Maybe she was trying to make a connection between Edward Scissorhands and Doctor Octopus.

rhhardin said...

There are many promotions I have not only not sought but have disapplied for.

rhhardin said...

Octopussy.

rhhardin said...

Men mostly find you get a higher payoff out of being a gentleman, to the point of completely internalizing it, but perhaps if you're in charge of hundreds of nubile women looking to offer favors the calculation changes.

Walk a mile in Weinstein's loafers, angry guys.

rehajm said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lucien said...

tim in vermont:

I thought that song was about David Geffen.

whitney said...

Everyone's trying to compare this to other Industries but you have to look at risk and reward. The wealth and fame that the successful person in Hollywood can garner (there's that word Ann) is really not comparable to working in Corporate America or anywhere else

rhhardin said...

Barthelme's Snow White

"Well chaps first I'd like to say a few vile things more or less at random, not only because it is expected of me but also because I enjoy it. One of them is that this cunt you've got here, although I've never seen her with my own eyes, is probably not worth worrying about."

Gets the truth out.

rehajm said...

Accountants could never sleep their way to the top.

rehajm said...

There's something a little sleazy about slipping in other names — Trump and Hefner — without specifying the points of comparison. The charges against Weinstein are so awful, that this "like X" style of writing flaunts unfairness.

I don't know if crap like this has just become ritual or if this is set up of the next long con but the cynics like me who can't imagine there not existing an ulterior political motive here would expect such hackneyed comparisons.

sykes.1 said...

Dowd is pretty sleazy herself and has always lain down for the PC crowd for money and position, but that is not news.

The important point is not that Weinstein is a pig, which he is, but that he is typical of the Hollywood establishment, and that the vast majority of producers, directors and big name stars are also pigs, Ben Affleck, for example. The real question is, Who isn't a pig? I temporarily suggest Tom Hanks, pending further information.

And then there is the other related issue of rampant pedophiles, none of whom have been named. Even Feldman at this late date is afraid of them. Pedophilia seems to be the preferred perversion of the truly powerful, the one crime so horrific that you have to be truly powerful to even contemplate it. But once committed, it is the very emblem of your power and freedom from any constraint.

Google has disappeared Pizzagate, but it would be interesting to see if it can be linked back to Hollywood. Hilary's friends the Podesta brothers are somehow involved, which is probably why Google disappeared the links.

whitney said...

Also, that comment of Trumps about being able to grab women by their pussies is looking more and more like a valid observation and not something he's actually done

Sebastian said...

"You don't get the job for doing it, but you are disqualified if you don't."

OK, so you get disgusted. You feel slighted. But, being a creative, energetic, entrepreneurial woman, you go out, raise money, build a team of creative slighted women, recruit great writers and directors, and start producing your own stuff your own way, beating the guys at their own game.

Wince said...

He relished the nickname “Harvey Scissorhands,” given to him by filmmakers who did not like his domination in the editing room.

Since all the "good people" in Hollywood are now supposed to revile him, his nickname should be... hell, they really don't even have to change his name that much...

"Shout, shout-out his name!"

"WEINSTEIN! WEINSTEIN! WEINSTEIN!"

rhhardin said...

Dowd dated a Hollywood actor way back, perhaps it can be googled for resentment potential.

rhhardin said...

Michael Douglas.

Sebastian said...

"There's something a little sleazy about slipping in other names." True, but it is just one technique the Media-Political Complex now has to use to deflect blame and contain damage, a kind of institutional tu quoque. Same thing with the lameness: it is prog politics by other means, protecting and deflecting rather than confronting.

rehajm said...

But, being a creative, energetic, entrepreneurial woman, you go out, raise money, build a team of creative slighted women, recruit great writers and directors, and start producing your own stuff your own way, beating the guys at their own game.

This is the perplexing part. There is so much money controlled by women, so much human capital to do just this, yet it never seems to happen. Is it a blind spot created by risk aversion? You could apply this to women of nearly any competitive industry and make the same observation.

rcommal said...

Good Golly, Miss Molly.

***

And, also, for how long are you guys gonna keep making excruciatingly silly distinctions without significant difference, at all?

roesch/voltaire said...

One could read this as different images for the way he dominated the ending room and then women, but it is nice of Althouse to show the Japanese wood cut. In any case Hollywood earned its reputation as Babylon a long time ago.

rcommal said...

Accountants could never sleep their way to the top.

That there ^ is complete bullshit.

rehajm said...

That there ^ is complete bullshit.

How about showing your work?

rcommal said...

Is the actual point, here at Althouse, to inspire me to LMAO every other day or so?

Because if that's what it's come to, y'all are sure verging on accomplishing that goal.

Comanche Voter said...

Dowd's columns are frequently sleazy.

Paddy O said...

Shouldn't it be "the girl gets off the proverbial bus"?

I think the girl is the real fact, while very few get off an actual bus in this day, making the bus part of the folklore without expecting it to be understood literally.

rhhardin seems to peddle in proverbial girls, but I think with the HW story the girls are actual victims, not proverbial representatives.

A proverbial girl, I suppose, could stand in for male and female hopefuls, making proverbial fit both. But do we need the term proverbial at all in that case with such a well-worn phrase?

gg6 said...

Dowd is a once very talented journalist who morphed into a very predictable snarky hack. Also, as you say, a dazzle-eyed Hollywood groupie and party-girl, so what did she herself know and when did she know it while saying nothing? At this point she is simply another unreadable NYT pensioner.

Pookie Number 2 said...

There's something a little sleazy about slipping in other names.

That's more than "a little sleazy" - the main takeaway of this episode is not that Harvey Weinstein is a sociopathic pervert, it's the eager enabling of evil by so very many of the people shaping our culture.

Hagar said...

Give it a rest rh.
Weinstein's behavior was not just "sleeping around." Compare with Jack Kennedy. Also reprehensible, but the "victims" thought JFK was just out of this world, and they still do.

rhhardin said...

If the mob is angry at Weinstein's perversion, what's protecting gays from being next.

rehajm said...

Dowd is a once very talented journalist who morphed into a very predictable snarky hack

With the invention of the internet her flighty stream of consciousness ramblings look awkward in print media.

rcommal said...

rehajm:

How about showing your work?

You go first, sir.



Seriously,

reader_iam

Fernandinande said...

Ann Althouse said...
Here's my hypothetical:


LOL.

You don't get the job for doing it, but you are disqualified if you don't.

Like move to Kansas City? Deal with the company's worst customer? Take a class to meet a qualification? Live in a trailer in Wyoming until the pipeline is finished?

Oh, the horror. It's outrageous to think that people would be required to do something just to get paid, or paid more.

Darrell said...

Harvey Weinstein at the Arizona sex clinic. Casting by Harvey Weistein.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0D4fHieW8o

rhhardin said...

The Weinstein jokes told by victims depend on the women's motivation being pussy offering. There's even a joke about its supposedly being traumatic.

"Look, I get it. I know how former lovers can have a hold of you long after they're gone. In some ways, I'm still pinned under a passed-out Harvey Weinstein and it's Thanksgiving."

That does not, as the paper says, foreshadow the revelations. It celebrates the deal.

Unknown said...

Thanks, Ann. You read Maureen Dowd so I don’t have to.

AllenS said...

From Wiki --

Personal life[edit]
Dowd formerly dated Aaron Sorkin, the creator and producer of The West Wing. She has also been briefly connected with the actor Michael Douglas[53] and is an ex-companion of her fellow Times columnist John Tierney.[54] Dowd is a practicing Catholic.[55][not in citation given]

Unknown said...

Every man is a monster, ugly like Harvey.

All that is needed is a little workplace power for the thought crimes to reify.

Today its piddling in the plants tomorrow its denying paid leave and day care. Violence all.

We must ceede the workplace to women to stop the horror.


http://thefederalist.com/2017/10/11/signs-liberalisms-slow-suicide-finally-complete

William said...

Doctors, by and large, have a better reputation than Hollywood producers. Nonetheless, during certain types of examinations a chaperone is required to be in the room wth the physician and the patient.. If there were a will, standards and practices would have long ago insisted that third parties be required at all auditions and interviews. This would not undermine market forces but rather reinforce them......Hollywood has a problem, and the only solution they offer is the condemnation of Harvey Weinstein.

rcommal said...

If the mob is angry at Weinstein's perversion, what's protecting gays from being next.


Not a thing, my dear rhhardin, not a thing.

AllenS said...

Hey, what's in that closet?

rcommal said...

Every man is a monster, ugly like Harvey.

Complete, utter bullshit.

----

Shut up, you stupid troll. Quit shit-stirring.

rcocean said...

I think you're going easy on Dowd.

Weinstein just didn't lie or harass women, he's been accused of attempted rape, grabbing women, exposure and other forms of Sexual Assault.

By all rights, he should be in jail, not just fired.

There's no valid evidence that Trump has done anything criminal to any women. Bringing in Trump and talking about "Men" is just a way to derail the conversation and avoid talking about the MSM cover-up and the Democrats desire to protect one of their own.

rhhardin said...

"Behavior in Private Places - Sustaining Definitions of Reality in Gynecological Examinations" by Joan P. Emerson looks at the steps taken to define it as medical and not sexual.

The opposite "Precarious Situations - Exotic Dancers and the Problem of Reality Maintenance" by Kari Lerum is about defining as sexual what is in reality a business.

These are both called "precarious situations."

Oso Negro said...

rhhardin keeps reminding us, fairly, that there was a presumed quid for each of the pro quos in these deals, and there is nothing new there. I find the whole thing irresistible to read about for three main reasons:

1) Why now? Why is 2017 the year to get Harvey Weinstein, when the essential facts about him have been known for years.
2) The fundamental hypocrisy of Hollywood is laid as bare as anything since Bill Clinton and the feminists or Jimmy Swaggart and the prostitutes. We have a long list of the actresses who claim their quids weren't freely given and we can all surmise there is an even longer list of willing participants in the Harvey bargain. Will Hollywood now kindly stop moralizing to the rest of us? Probably not.
3) This is all boy on girl action in the news so far. There is a big, fat homosexual version of this story just waiting. But leftist culture and Hollywood in particular is all about exalting homosexuality. Will they come clean on the man on boy action? I am guessing no.

rcocean said...

Dowd has been past her "Sell by date" for some time now. That the NYT hangs on to her along with Krugman - instead of bringing in new blood, shows a lot about them.

Of course, I can remember when the WaPo kept 100 y/o unfunny Art Buchwald on the paper forever.

Bob Boyd said...

"Like move to Kansas City?...."


Weinstein's "requirements" are not necessary for, nor do they benefit the business, the project, the investors or the applicant. In fact it's the opposite, as evidenced by all the money the company was paying out to protect Weinstein from the consequences of his purely self-indulgent actions.

rcocean said...

I suppose the thread will now turn into the RH and friends show.

William said...

Is there a distinctly female version of hubris. I've known some attractive women who have a knack of getting what they want from men. They take pride in this skill, and perhaps some of them overestimate their ability. Harvey apparently was a stone bully and borderline rapist. You don't charm and manipulate such a man.

rcommal said...

I don't put up with women, much less female trolls, saying "every woman is a cunt, like *xxx*" in order to make cheap, powerful swipes at men." I sure as hell am not going to up with their male counterparts doing the mirrored same.

NO. NO. NO.

Rusty said...

Blogger rhhardin said...
Men mostly find you get a higher payoff out of being a gentleman, to the point of completely internalizing it, but perhaps if you're in charge of hundreds of nubile women looking to offer favors the calculation changes.

Walk a mile in Weinstein's loafers, angry guys.

Not angry just disappointed at how this skews the market for talent. Obviously the women get parts based on if they perform sexual acts for the person in charge of hiring actors/actresses. It's not based on talent. Unless you include a really good fuck as a talent.
It was what was so disappointing about Bill Clinton. His total lack of self control.
Harvey would fuck anybody. You'd at least think he'd have the good business acumen to fuck women with talent.

Dave Begley said...

A little sleazy?? Try guilt by false association when she drags in Trump. Giant difference between stiffing unsecured creditors and alleged rape.

For Dowd. Trump is Hitler but worse.

rcommal said...

I suppose the thread will now turn into the RH and friends show.

LMAO, rcocean.

You should know. participator, you should know.


rhhardin said...

Weinstein's "requirements" are not necessary for, nor do they benefit the business, the project, the investors or the applicant. In fact it's the opposite, as evidenced by all the money the company was paying out to protect Weinstein from the consequences of his purely self-indulgent actions.

They were part of his salary, but he was expected to pay his own settlements and pay the company back for the trouble.

I have no idea if Weinstein was any good, but they thought they needed him. The man is the company.

They did not anticipate the mob, but I don't understand the mob even after it happened.

Probably if you can control when there's a mob, you can make a lot of money.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"I temporarily suggest Tom Hanks, pending further information."

Hanks had a women fucking a coked-up donkey in his "Bachelor Party." Since she was Mexican I guess the libs just don't care about her dignity nor even humanity.

Shameful.

John Turturro is probably a decent guy I would guessumtimate. I guarantee the Minnesota raised Coen's aren't shaming their name nor race (what Justice Thomas' Grandfather told him not to do) by Weinsteining all around the city at all hours of the night.

rhhardin said...

Not angry just disappointed at how this skews the market for talent.

I think they're all competent at a level where it doesn't matter who you choose.

If I watch a random DVD the actresses are interchangeable to me but that doesn't mean they're not good actresses. Indeed if there were differences I could tell them apart.

Sarah Rolph said...

Apparently Dowd took a swipe at Clarence Thomas in the same column. Here's the antidote to that: http://thefederalist.com/2016/10/18/maureen-dowd-sounds-like-idiot-smears-clarence-thomas/#.WeJtCH_97fQ.facebook

Bob Boyd said...

"They were part of his salary"

Since when does a job applicant pay the boss's salary? Especially if the applicant hasn't explicitly understood the terms in advance to applying.

Just because there's a lynch mob doesn't mean the son of a bitch isn't a horse thief.

rhhardin said...

Since when does a job applicant pay the boss's salary? Especially if the applicant hasn't explicitly understood the terms in advance to applying.

It's part of the deal she's making. Something for him to get something for her that's worth more to her.

Guildofcannonballs said...

Rcommal is actually able to see sarcasm at amazing levels, hence uses double-shielded pseudo-faux sarcasm like claiming unknown was being serious and not sarcastic.

Bravo rcommal!

Gusty Winds said...

Sounds like Ms. Dench banged Mr. Weinstein.

Bob Boyd said...

"It's part of the deal she's making."

If that's all it is and it's all up front, that's one thing. But what about these instances where the applicant said, Sorry, no deal?
It sounds like, at that point, Weinstein somehow felt entitled to collect his "salary" anyway, as though it was a debt. Sexual assault? Or was he just a closer?

rhhardin said...

If that's all it is and it's all up front, that's one thing. But what about these instances where the applicant said, Sorry, no deal?
It sounds like, at that point, Weinstein somehow felt entitled to collect his "salary" anyway, as though it was a debt. Sexual assault? Or was he just a closer?


Right, that would be a crime. Kidnapping, rape or assault.

If it ends at no deal, that's how it works.

I'm gathering that the mob is angry at the deals, though.

Robert Cook said...

"Why doesn't this kind of predation happen in NYC's legitimate stage ('Broadway')? Or does it?"

Perhaps it does, but America doesn't care about "Broadway" anymore, and hasn't for years. Most Broadway performers are not widely known to the public in the way successful film actors are, so reports of such behavior would attract less public attention or interest.

Also, the stakes aren't as great as in the film business, so perhaps there is a lower incidence of such behavior because the producers have less powerful means to initiate or sustain the sort of decades-long harassment and abuses claimed for Weinstein.

It is amazing the "shock" that is claimed by so many in and around the film business about Weinstein...after all, the "casting couch" is a cliche long-known even to people not involved in Hollywood.

Guildofcannonballs said...

Hardin what would the author of "The Fatal Conceit" label your assumptions regarding the entertainment business?

30,000' views are nice but even with a super-faluting telescope without being in the many millions of sundry rooms, not vicariously via a camera operated by someone else whom in turn is paid to operate it certain way--outcome-orientated--by yet groups of others, you can't be so certain without straining beliefs.

Knowing men and women are different how can you deign determinative each and all of their individual feelings at any given moment?

Stick with the "nickel for a dime is fraud" type stuff if you want to persuade, is what I think anyways.

rhhardin said...

Actresses self-select for the traits.

rhhardin said...

There's the claim that all women are actresses, that has some validity too, but they don't show up professionally.

Guildofcannonballs said...

If mob mentality, as you like, has been successful evolutionary thus far so as to be repeatedly noticed today, who are we to be in a position, sans what Buckley labeled epistemological optimism (the notion that some things are better than others and we are in a position to distinguish between them cf. Heaven and Hell) to cheerlead for the mob's demise? Why not bemusedly encourage the mob as abstract Darwinian non-homo sapien force? Buckley used Catholicism but that's right out the window for most of us, so as contrarian logic has taught these mobs must be named, assumed massively powerful, and a government task force of millions of people created, like with drugs (but not opioids or nothing) and the Government-Drug-Kingpin-Industrial-Complex.

For our protection from ourselves.

MayBee said...

Like Trump, that other self-professed predator,

I like the wording here, as if Trump is the one other self-professed predator.

Bad Lieutenant said...

Hagar said...
Give it a rest rh.
Weinstein's behavior was not just "sleeping around." Compare with Jack Kennedy. Also reprehensible, but the "victims" thought JFK was just out of this world, and they still do.


I'd like to know if Weinstein ever told one of his female employees to blow one of his male employees. If not, Kennedy is still at least one up on him.

Rh, I really don't see why you have this propensity to defend scumbags. Except to make the point that women are scumbags too. I guess you don't want HW stripped of his career unless all the women he made a deal with are also stripped? Is that it? Why should he pay and they not?

As I see it, you don't get to take down scumbags every day. J'ai pris mon bien là où je l'ai trouvé.

rhhardin said...

Rh, I really don't see why you have this propensity to defend scumbags.

Let normal, local human relations work it out.

It's the mob I'm against. A weird and dangerous phenomenon, and they're all virtue-signalling to each other.

JAORE said...

"If the mob is angry at Weinstein's perversion, what's protecting gays from being next.

Not a thing, my dear rhhardin, not a thing."

Sorry, can't agree. Those other predators are still in power.

That's why I don't buy most of the "how courageous" statements. If the actors were really courageous they'd be saying, "Yeah, HW did this, but so did X, Y and Z".

There are already, e.g. Andrea Mitchell, examples of the mob anger morphing into self-congratulatory preening about how Hollywood has drained its own swamp.

rhhardin said...

So Hollywood was brought down by a mistake in feminism.

Big Mike said...

@Oso Negro, I can answer your first question with two questions. When was Weinstein's last hit, i.e., is he still making big money? Secondly, is there any way for the Democrats to pound a stake through the heart of the Clinton machine other than letting potential donors know that they could be next in line after Harvey?

Oso Negro said...

@Big Mike - Agree that Weinstein's game was in decline. I have wondered about the political angle. But don't you think that burning such a big donor would prove a poor strategy? If it proves to be Dem on Dem action, then wouldn't that tend to discourage future Hollywood support when it inevitably becomes known? And once you set the forest on fire, there is no telling what damage is done before it all burns out.

Sebastian said...

"wouldn't that tend to discourage future Hollywood support." Possibly. But from their point of view, There Is No Alternative, and the left will come out of this purified. But the real money men know that all protection is temporary and that safety is a full-time job, so they have no illusions to lose. As do corporations trying to stay out of the clutches of prog politicians and prosecutors.

Mary Beth said...

rhhardin said...

Don't apply if you don't want the deal. Jeez, be an adult.

10/15/17, 7:46 AM


Then he should have been upfront about "the deal". Instead of inviting actresses to come discuss a role, with other people around who would be sent away shortly after she arrived, he should have told them they would be required to perform sexually.

rhhardin said...

Well, consider the offer and make your decision.

rhhardin said...

Maybe a negotiating class for women is needed, since the art seems to have been lost.

Business negotiating 101: Get the most for your pussy.

stevew said...

The more I learn about these folks, all of the them, the more pathetic, self-conscious, petty, and lacking in confidence they are revealed to be. Near as I can tell is that I wouldn't be friends with any of them. In many cases, wise to maintain a safe distance - they're toxic.

-sw

Jupiter said...

Bad Lieutenant said...

"Rh, I really don't see why you have this propensity to defend scumbags. Except to make the point that women are scumbags too."

But that is an important point to make. Some of Weinstein's behavior was grossly illegal and could send him to prison if proven in a court of law. But that isn't really the part that the mob is angry about. The mob is angry about the consensual deals as well. And there is no telling what damage an angry mob will do. This mob hasn't got a rope, but they've got a legislature.

Big Mike said...

@Osp Negro, the GOP isn't the only stupid party.

Big Mike said...

I enjoyed this quote from Andrew Klavan (link through Instapundit):

But the fact is, if you teach boys not to protect girls, all you're left with in the end is Harvey Weinstein and the men who are too weak to stand up against him.

Being a man — a real man — is hard. Being a gentleman is hard. Men won't do it if they don't have real women — real ladies — to do it for. And wherever ladies stop being ladies and men stop being men, it isn't Equality World, believe me. It's Harvey Weinstein all the way down.

Jupiter said...

Those of us who have spent a lifetime watching a justifiable outrage at the limited career opportunities of women morph into a humorless regime of female chauvinist oppression have learned to be a little leery when women start talking about how hard they have it. Women are very fond of having it both ways. And what I am seeing here is a bunch of women who are exceptionally attractive. They are well aware of the powerful effect their sexuality has on men, and they set out to use that power to gain wealth and fame. They spend huge amounts of time and money honing and emphasizing their sexual allure. And now they are complaining about the powerful effect their sexuality has on men.

J Melcher said...

Odd how discussion doesn't draw comparison to Governor (celebrity, movie-star, body builder) Arnold Schwartznegger.

Bad Lieutenant said...

But that isn't really the part that the mob is angry about. The mob is angry about the consensual deals as well. And there is no telling what damage an angry mob will do. This mob hasn't got a rope, but they've got a legislature.


Other than fap material, I'm not sure how helpful it would be to learn which actresses took the chocolate. But making e.g. Salma Hayek look like a whore won't move elections or reduce Dem/left/media power. There's no juice in destroying Hollywood chippies. You need to take out the six-figure donors, eight-figure bundlers, greenlighters of Left propaganda.

Frankly from both a morals and a political power basis, rather than get Weinstein, who had the right idea biologically who but admittedly went off the rails, I'd like to have the gay mafia's hides tacked to the barn door. And their enablers like Bawbwa Wawa, who shushed Corey Feldman while he was telling the truth that we all now say we want to hear.

The investigation should be sustained. Use this opportunity. Roll up these networks, don't settle for a single scalp! Why do you think this particular scalp is being offered up on a bloody plate? That's why you make sacrifices to the monster. So he doesn't eat all of you! But I want them all et. I'd give HW a deal (if he needs one) if he'd rat. But I'm sure he'll die first. IYKWIM, AITYD.

Bad Lieutenant said...

The mob is angry about the consensual deals as well. And there is no telling what damage an angry mob will do. This mob hasn't got a rope, but they've got a legislature.


Put it this way: all red on red. Iran-Iraq. No friendly fire. No friends. Burn it all down, it's none of mine.

Unknown said...

So after years of writing about Hollywood, dating Michael Douglas, and sucking up to Mr Weinstein, MoDo is shocked, shocked, that gambling is going on....

Give us a break.

n.n said...

Trump never professed to sexual predation. The press's epiphany was Trump's observation of social liberalism's progressive nature. That is monotonic divergence.

Baby Lives Matter.

Big Mike said...

I finally got around to reading MoDo's column, but only got as far as her reference to the Hill-Thomas hearings. Just to remind MoDo and other ignorant shit-for-brains, Anita Hill got a fair hearing, and people who considered both her evidence and the contrary evidence of individuals who knew them both, decided that Hill was lying.

n.n said...

It was consensual, weird, and depraved. A progressive product of female chauvinists' power to influence the formative minds of prepubescent and adolescent girls.... and to paint men and boys as predatory creatures devoid of religion/morality.

n.n said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
n.n said...

So, the question is what behaviors should society normalize (i.e. promote), tolerate, or reject?

The female chauvinist would argue that it's exclusively the woman's Choice.

The prostitute would offer a similar argument: my body, my Choice.

The politician would follow the prevailing winds or sustainable, renewable sources of green funds.

Momma, don't let your daughters grow up to be sluts.

Speaking of sluts, we are overdue for a Slut Walk.

Bob Boyd said...

Hillary was asked if Weinstein's behavior was comparable to Bill's.
She said, "Close, but no cigar."

Ray - SoCal said...

HW was a schmuck. And he’s now up to 33 public accusers including a couple of rapes and was caught recorded by the nypd.

And unknown is trying to compare this behavior to Trump?

What I find more interesting is what else is coming out:

- Woody Allen saying he fears a mob. Hypocrisy...

- Lisa Bloom played hardball attempting to save that Amazon film bigwig. Calling news outlets to kill the story.

- Polanski still member of motion picture association of America. Weinstein expelled.

- Courtney Love accuses caa of Banning her over 2005 warning on Weinstein.
http://m.tmz.com/#2017/10/14/courtney-love-harvey-weinstein-2005-warns-actresses-sexual-harassment/

- George Clooney accused of helping Weinstein blacklisting.

- Barbara Walters video interview was wow!

I am surprised more people have not been accused / unveiled for casting couch behavior...

Yancey Ward said...

An essay on what is happening in Hollywood:

End of the Gatekeepers

Chip S. said...

rhhardin's hot takes fail to consider nearly any of the relevant issues, either wrt Weinstein specifically or the movie biz in particular.

For actors who aren't established stars, it's almost certainly the case that union scale is more than the minimum they'd accept for a role. In fact, that minimum might even be negative if the role is viewed as a way to become a star. So an exec has the latitude to extract some other form of payment. If it were simply a cash payment, hardin's auction analogy would be on point. However, SAG would be very upset at such blatant undermining of its pay scale, so supply and demand are not equilibrated by means of money prices. The excess supply of aspiring actors must be rationed somehow, and--these being unusually attractive people--sex is an obvious one. But this type of side payment distorts the decision to enter the acting profession quite obviously: men and women who don't want to be part-time prostitutes are deterred from the biz. So the talent pool isn't as good as it would be otherwise. That's the systemic cost of the casting couch.

In the specific case of Weinstein, a comparison to ordinary business deals is false. The quid pro quo is implicit and ill-defined. Is it going to be enough to watch him shower, or will it degenerate into rape? The least informed, weakest and most gullible will be disproportionately represented among his "negotiating partners." And if he fails to deliver, what is the remedy? There is no written contract; it is a "he said, she said" in which the only certainty until now was that a complaining actress will be humiliated.

The only way to attack the entire institution of the casting couch is by exposing individual practitioners. Weinstein isn't a scapegoat, he's a starting point.

Jose_K said...

FWIW: in Latin America , a woman would call a man an octopus if he is too insistent touching. Like he has 8 hands.

Ray - SoCal said...

The attempt to link Donald Trump to make the Weinstein / Hollywood scandal more acceptable is not working.

Why?

Probably 99% of Trump supporters know he is not a paragon of virtue. Trump does not pretend he is, and neither do his supporters. Hollywood acts like they are virtuous and entitled to lecture us.

Trump voters did not vote for him for his feminist credentials, but other reasons.

I’m surprised Trump has survived the nuclear level accusations around sexual harassment. It would have destroyed any other candidacy.

I’m also surprised that Billy Bush was the one that got the fallout of the grab them by the ... tapes. I guess since he allowed his network to be scooped?

walter said...

An octopus wouldn't pressure someone to watch them shower.

Ralph L said...

Billy Bush was on Today, a show watched largely by females.

rhhardin said...

So the talent pool isn't as good as it would be otherwise. That's the systemic cost of the casting couch..

So the mob wants better actresses. There aren't good enough. It doesn't seem that way from what they're shouting.

The quid pro quo is implicit and ill-defined. Is it going to be enough to watch him shower, or will it degenerate into rape? The least informed, weakest and most gullible will be disproportionately represented among his "negotiating partners." And if he fails to deliver, what is the remedy? There is no written contract; it is a "he said, she said" in which the only certainty until now was that a complaining actress will be humiliated.

That's the male instinct to protect women, and the female instinct wanting male protection. That's very nice but it's not feminism.

Is the mob anti-feminist?

It's easy to say why you or your girl wouldn't act that way, but you're not selling pussy.

Earnest Prole said...

I see rhhardin is back with his mob version of the free market. Extorting sex from female associates is a textbook racket. Racketeering is “the act of offering of a dishonest service to solve a problem that wouldn't otherwise exist without the enterprise offering the service.” In his version, Weinstein threatens to ruin women’s careers without sex, and promises their careers will thrive with it. Bribery, extortion, rackets: That’s how third-world capitalism works.

Narayanan said...

@prole ... You Do you realize your definition applies to all politicians offering to be lobbied.

rhhardin said...

He's not threatening to ruin careers, any more than an auctioneer holds a gun on the lower bidders. The top bidder wants to get ahead most, is all.

If he threatens to ruin a career over sex, that's a crime. If he threatens to withhold aid, that's his choice.

rhhardin said...

Harvey Weinstein never helped my career, and we had no sex. It came out okay.

rhhardin said...

The mob is the worrisome and dangerous thing here.

To show that the mob isn't up to what the mob thinks it's up to, I'm debunking the Weinstein crisis as a crisis.

Normal stuff is normal stuff. It's not hurting anything. It's adults and adults making a living doing what they like.

Chip S. said...

So the mob wants better actresses. There aren't good enough. It doesn't seem that way from what they're shouting.

At least you've moved on from amateur economics to amateur psychology.

rhhardin said...

Don't join the first mob that offers a chance at woman-protecting virtue signalling. You're being had and it undermines rule of law completely.

rhhardin said...

What's the psychology of mobs?

I could read up on mass hyeteria, I guess.

rhhardin said...

Althouse follows it because it hits one of her hot buttons, so it's worth blogging.

Finally women will have equality, she thinks.

rhhardin said...

The interesting thing is how many on the right are mob joiners. I didn't expect that.

The left, yes, all the time. It's what talking points and MSM memes are about.

rhhardin said...

When Derbyshire got fired from NR, the right split into mob joiners and not, the division being along the establishment / non-establishment line.

SDaly said...

Sometimes, when you are making the same argument over and over and over and over and over, but no one else seems to agree with you, it's not because you are a misunderstood genius.

rhhardin said...

Misunderstanding is how people reach agreement.

Bad Lieutenant said...


rhhardin said...
The interesting thing is how many on the right are mob joiners. I didn't expect that.

The left, yes, all the time. It's what talking points and MSM memes are about.


Your problem, no, one of your many problems, is that you don't listen to people. You don't have the respect to process and refute their arguments.

Howard said...

Octopus eating Hot Tuna explained on Mad Men:The only time any real attention is given to one of Cooper’s woodblock prints is in the first episode of the fourth season when Hokisai’s “Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife” is shown, used as a metaphor for the skill and insight of the show’s protagonist Don Draper (played by Jon Hamm). While admiring the the piece Cooper exclaims “Who is the man who imagined her ecstasy?” and when Draper walks in says “Don we were just talking about you” referring to Draper’s talent for manipulation.

eddie willers said...

I never block anybody, but rhhardin has joined Check and TTR as posts I scroll past quickly and unread.

Earnest Prole said...

If he threatens to ruin a career over sex, that's a crime.

We are in violent agreement. What's left to dispute?

Howard said...

...that's why I like your posts so much, Harvey (or do you prefer Winston over Mr. Wolf?)... you're such a great listener. You should do a listening tour!

rhhardin said...

Your problem, no, one of your many problems, is that you don't listen to people. You don't have the respect to process and refute their arguments.

That was the complaint about the Jews somewhere in Mein Kampf. You'd argue something out with Jewish scholars and the next day you'd come back and they'd completely forgotten what you'd proved the day before.

It was just a matter of getting a mob to straighten it out.

Lydia said...

From "Secret lives of women who broke taboo to act in Shakespeare":

Shakespeare’s female roles were played by boys or young men until 1660, but new research by the British Library has uncovered details of the careers of the few, ground-breaking women who began to take on major Shakespearean characters in the face of the prejudice of their times.

Regarded as prostitutes or, at best, titillating diversions, these six or seven prominent actresses had to carve out places inside previously all-male companies. They also had to deal with wealthy male theatre-goers paying a little extra each night to watch them dress in the wings.


Always some dirty little fringe to the profession, it seems.

rhhardin said...

"If he threatens to ruin a career over sex, that's a crime."

We are in violent agreement. What's left to dispute?


Withholding aid is not ruining. He's not obligated to aid. One's barter and the other is extortion.

Earnest Prole said...

Withholding aid is not ruining.

He threatened to ruin careers over sex, which you concede is a crime. What's left to dispute?

Howard said...

Eric Weinstein on the Joe Rogan show recently talked about how women need to become more irresponsible if they want to become successful outliers on the financial reward tail. In a nutshell, over-promise and over-deliver. Something about how men are willing to risk crossing adaptive valleys by using the pressure of failure to get the juices flowing to solve problems in a new way. One has to believe that some women "crossed over" to make their bones as A-listers on a faster track. We should applaud their sacrifice for art, like van Cough cutting off his ear.

walter said...

If it was a dog licking peanut butter off her, that would not be acceptable.

Earnest Prole said...

As I mentioned in a previous thread, there’s vast legal and economic literature on bribes, extortion, and rackets. Ordinary people are often unable to pinpoint how a particular scheme is illegal, which is exactly what racketeers rely on.

rhhardin said...

He threatened to ruin careers over sex, which you concede is a crime. What's left to dispute?

He also raped, kidnapped and groped, all crimes but not a moral crisis. As the story variously goes, at least.

If he threatened to ruin, not just withhold aid, that's a crime too. Extortion.

But he's not obligated to give aid, which is what he's bartering. Aid for sex. Aid being you get the part.

The mob though is worried about the last, the casting couch. How unfair to women and so forth.

Bad Lieutenant said...

That was the complaint about the Jews somewhere in Mein Kampf. .

RH, I'd appreciate it if you would stop discussing Weinstein now, and spend a little time discussing everything you learned from Hitler's Mein Kampf. I'd be very interested in getting that information from you.

rhhardin said...

Ordinary people are often unable to pinpoint how a particular scheme is illegal, which is exactly what racketeers rely on.

If it's illegal, it's not a problem. The law already does the protection. No moral crisis.

rhhardin said...

Kenneth Burke, "The Rhetoric of Hitler's Battle" in _The Philosophy of Literary Form_

Bad Lieutenant said...

If it's illegal, it's not a problem.

Bullshit, Mr Rain-Man!

Bad Lieutenant said...

Kenneth Burke, "The Rhetoric of Hitler's Battle" in _The Philosophy of Literary Form_

I don't have a subscription. Go on, enlighten us some more. What other points did Hitler have?

rhhardin said...

I don't know, I read it in the 70s. It's not too long, you could read it yourself.

Burke was concerned with how in the world do you rouse such a mob. What's the magic.

rhhardin said...

Burke was keen on the principle of the scapegoat, and saw it as what will probably end civilization.

The Grammar of Motives
The Rhetoric of Motives
The Philosophy of Literary Form
Language as Symbolic Action

being the chief books.

rhhardin said...

The scapegoat is there as a means of purification.

Howard said...

I heard that after having his way with Gwyneth Paltrow, Weinstein was foreverafter known as Harvey Wall-Eye Banger.

Bad Lieutenant said...

No no no, it's not a question of what I will take from secondary sources. I'm interested in knowing every piece of wisdom that you learned from Hitler.

I'm also a little curious why you're so afraid of mobs. Apparently nothing concerns you except mobs. Mobs is what you get when the system doesn't work. Mobs, literally, is what you get-what you ask for-when you say "not illegal, so no problem."

Bad Lieutenant said...

Curiously the scapegoat has been around as long as civilization. If scapegoats will end civilization, so will fire. If you're saying that Weinstein is a scapegoat, I'll agree to the extent that there are plenty more like him and I want them all rooted out and destroyed.

rhhardin said...

Civil indifference is what you get when you say not illegal, no problem.

Adults with other adults.

rhhardin said...

The point of the scapegoat is that you don't have to root out the others, which in particular includes yourself. How else is a scapegoat going to purify things.

Earnest Prole said...

Mobs is what you get when the system doesn't work. Mobs, literally, is what you get-what you ask for-when you say "not illegal, so no problem."

This.

Bad Lieutenant said...

Blogger rhhardin said...
I don't know, I read it in the 70s. It's not too long, you could read it yourself.

Probably not in time before this thread locks. Besides, I mightn't take the same lessons as you from it.

That's the answer of someone who has ventured onto uncertain ground and doesn't want to play anymore. Which is fine, only it would be better if you owned it.

But go on talking about Hitler, I'm fascinated.

rhhardin said...

I don't see the civil indifference mob forming.

Bad Lieutenant said...

Civil indifference is what you get when you say not illegal, no problem.

Adults with other adults.



English motherfucker, do you speak it?

Marc in Eugene said...

Someone early on asked about this immoral nonsense in the legitimate theater, which I don't pay attention to; did, however, see this at Slipped Disc yesterday, about it in the world of opera.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

I suppose Hollywood will only be casting unattractive people until this storm blows over, just to be on the safe side.

Bad Lieutenant said...

No one knows what you mean with your "civil indifference" bushwah, except, possibly, you.

rhhardin said...

Civil indifference is how people get through life with strangers all around. Sociology.

Dr Weevil said...

"If it's illegal, it's not a problem."
Unless you're in a city which has (a) at least a few corrupt cops, who would be willing to (e.g.) plant a kilo or two of cocaine on an innocent person if someone bribed them enough, so they could go to jail for decades, and (b) at least one totally ruthless person with enough money to pay such a bribe (possibly in the form of sex with actresses rather than cash) and at least one enemy he really wants to punish.
In such a city, a lot of things can be grossly illegal and still huge problems.

Unknown said...

>> Every man is a monster, ugly like Harvey.
> Complete, utter bullshit.

You know it, and seems like I know it

here is the quote Dowd endorses to end her column:

: I asked Tim Robbins, who had some unpleasant business dealings with Weinstein, what the moral of this foul, revolting story should be.
: “It’s not just in show business, it’s every business,” he said. “It’s about men who use power to get an advantage over women. It’s gross, it’s unacceptable, but unfortunately, it’s pretty persistent.”

Krumhorn said...

Business negotiating 101: Get the most for your pussy

This may be the best response to the hypothetical posed by our hostess:

A business executive is in a position to promote one person to a great position within the company. 100 employees are invited to apply and one of the qualifications for the great position is that the applicant must perform whatever action the executive demands. You don't get the job for doing it, but you are disqualified if you don't.

And it may also address her point a couple of days ago about a breach of the bargain in contrast to having made a bad bargain. Anyone selling their virtue for a meatball rather than for the whole dinner has made a bad bargain. Merely getting the opportunity to apply is under-selling the pussy. And yet, there will be paddles raised to accept that deal. I doubt very much that Weinstein ever offered a role in exchange for watching him rub up a chubbie. The most he likely offered was a chance to read for the role. I doubt that Harvey ever breached his bad bargains. They surely got the chance to read for the parts. But Harvey lacked the plenary authority to hire. Lots of folks have a say in that matter.

Most smart actresses know that’s a dumb bargain just as in Ann’s hypothetical. But there are plenty of dumb ones who will make that deal. Just as there are plenty who, upon stepping off the bus, fall into the clutches of that skeezy tatted up guy on the curb who offers to be her “manager”.

The dumb pretty ones are the ones who make the bad deals.

So while some are annoyed by rhhardin plowing relentlessly through this point, he makes a good one. Attractive women in Hollywood are a commodity, and they need to get the most for their pussy if they are going to participate in that part of the market. It’s always a matter of choice generally, Weinstein’s beastly behavior notwithstanding.

That’s why nothing will change except for the beastly outliers because plenty will volunteer to make that choice. They don’t even have to be asked.

- Krumhorn

Bad Lieutenant said...

I don't see the civil indifference mob forming.

I don't see the unicorn mob forming either. Maybe both are childish nonsense.

rhhardin said...

"If it's illegal, it's not a problem."
Unless you're in a city which has (a) at least a few corrupt cops, who would be willing to (e.g.) plant a kilo or two of cocaine on an innocent person if someone bribed them enough, so they could go to jail for decades, and (b) at least one totally ruthless person with enough money to pay such a bribe (possibly in the form of sex with actresses rather than cash) and at least one enemy he really wants to punish.
In such a city, a lot of things can be grossly illegal and still huge problems.


That's not a Harvey Weinstein problem but a prosecutor problem.

The mob's focus is feminist against Weinstein. What an awful person he is.

So we have to get rid of all awful people, but the latter aren't doing anything illegal.

Stick with the crimes, not the moral of the story.

Jupiter said...

If Weinstein actually did the things he is accused of, he broke the law. Frequently. We may therefore state with certainty that the existing laws were not adequate to deter his behavior. But that seems to be less a defect of those laws, than the effect of his great economic power, and his willingness to wield it. Making more laws, or stronger ones, would not address that issue. The victims were mostly unwilling to make use of the laws already in effect.

Earnest Prole said...

The victims were mostly unwilling to make use of the laws already in effect.

Just like those caught up in mob protection rackets.

Jupiter said...

Chip S. said...
"But this type of side payment distorts the decision to enter the acting profession quite obviously: men and women who don't want to be part-time prostitutes are deterred from the biz."

Yes, and folks who worry about falling from a height don't build skyscrapers.

I can't help but feel that a good deal of the angst on these Weinstein threads has to do with male jealousy. If the asshole had been banging Hillary!, we'd be saying, "Tough job, but someone's gotta do it".

Bad Lieutenant said...

So we have to get rid of all awful people, but the latter aren't doing anything illegal.

So, the law is no help.

rhhardin said...

Women have many traditional weapons, the first being saying no tactfully, so Harvey doesn't feel bad about himself. Tact is the female strong point. Why make a confrontation when you can deflect it into something else.

The aggressive refusal is an option, go to the police. You're an adult, act like it.

That would limit Harvery's economic power enormously.

With a regular boss who's supposed to be working in the company's interest in the matter, go to his boss and his boss's boss and on up. This guy is soliciting salary against the company's interests. Call his wife, call his mother.

Or act like me, find a job you like and stay at it.

rhhardin said...

So we have to get rid of all awful people, but the latter aren't doing anything illegal.

So, the law is no help.


Help for what.

Bad Lieutenant said...

Yes, and folks who worry about falling from a height don't build skyscrapers.

So you're saying that sexual abuse is essential to making of movies, that movies cannot be made without sexual abuse, and that that should be freely and openly accepted?

I can't help but feel that a good deal of the angst on these Weinstein threads has to do with male jealousy. If the asshole had been banging Hillary!, we'd be saying, "Tough job, but someone's gotta do it".

Knocking up Mira Sorvino, yes, I could see wanting that job. Whacking off in front of Mira Sorvino? Ygbsm.

MikeR said...

I am still waiting for the now-enlightened journalists who will collect and publish the names of the abusive men and the brave women who are willing to name them. I want the place cleaned out, the abusive men all fired and hopefully sued and up for trial if they committed rape, and the situation in the future like _every other industry in this country_: if you harass an employee you risk your job and your savings. Enough already.

rhhardin said...

They're not employees. They're wanting to be contractors.

Krumhorn said...

What is not addressed by rhhardin with respect to Ann’s hypothetical are the public policy implications of those refusing to sell their virtue for a meatball. If the selection is ultimately made from among only those applying, those who chose not to apply are categorically denied opportunity for advancement because they were unwilling to bargain their virtue. And in a heterosexual environment, men were also excluded.

This is where the law steps in to articulate the public policy response.

One could argue that actresses must present themselves as desirable as well as talented, and that public policy considerations get muddy at this point. But let’s not stop with actresses. What about attorneys? Salespersons? Hostesses? Receptionists? Realtors?

Attractive women know they are attractive and, in one way or the other, they work it. And this is a power imbalance all by itself, although, I happen to love it. But as rhhardin said, if we weren’t attracted to them, we’d likely ignore them. So then that’s where the heavy ugly ones get excluded and we get the Catharine MacKinnons and Andrea Dworkins railing against the phallocracy.

It all boils down to power and who wants it.

- Krumhorn

Earnest Prole said...

I can't help but feel that a good deal of the angst on these Weinstein threads has to do with male jealousy.

To the contrary, it's rooted in the imperative to protect our wives and daughters.

rhhardin said...

Julia Roberts has an ass contract

HG: You actually have... clauses in your contract about nudity?

JR: Definitely. "You may show the dent of the top of the artist's buttocks, but neither cheek." Or if there's a stunt bottom being used... "artist must have full consultation."

HG: - You have a stunt bottom?

JR: - I could have a stunt bottom, yes.

HG: Are people tempted to go for better bottoms than their own?

JR: Yeah. I would. This is important stuff.

HG: it's one hell of a job, isn't it? What do you put on your passport? "Profession: Mel Gibson's bottom."

JR: Actually, Mel does his own ass work.

- Notting Hill (1999)

rhhardin said...

To the contrary, it's rooted in the imperative to protect our wives and daughters.

Moreover they want your protection. Nice instincts, but it's anti-feminist.

It's not going to work out, but forming a mob to make what can't work, work, is a bad idea.

Earnest Prole said...

those who chose not to apply are categorically denied opportunity for advancement because they were unwilling to bargain their virtue

If a local government official requires a blowjob to issue a building permit, we all understand it’s a bribe, and we don't cut the official slack when he says "move to another town if you want to build."

Jupiter said...

Earnest Prole said...
"To the contrary, it's rooted in the imperative to protect our wives and daughters."

From being required to blow Harvey Weinstein in the course of becoming rich and famous? Mission Accomplished!

rhhardin said...

If a local government official requires a blowjob to issue a building permit, we all understand it’s a bribe, and we don't cut the official slack when he says "move to another town if you want to build."

He's obligated to issue the permit.

Earnest Prole said...

From being required to blow Harvey Weinstein in the course of becoming rich and famous?

To allow our wives and daughters to participate fully in our society. As we saw in the conversation about Jim Crow, indifference to that is very telling.

Jupiter said...

"If a local government official requires a blowjob to issue a building permit, we all understand it’s a bribe...".

Well, yes. And in fact if he was asking for a money bribe, a lot of people would just pay it, if the price was right. WTF, cost of doing business. The real issue there is that he is a public official, using his office for personal gain.

But lots of people will offer to further your career for money, and as long as they deliver, no one sees anything wrong with it. If you want to be a star, get an agent. So it seems the outrage here is about the particular nature of the bribe demanded. But when there are loads of people who are perfectly willing to pay in that currency, it's a fool's errand to try to prevent the transactions from taking place.

Earnest Prole said...

when there are loads of people who are perfectly willing to pay in that currency, it's a fool's errand to try to prevent the transactions from taking place.

There are loads of people who are perfectly willing to pay a bribe to the mob to get ahead of their competition, but it's hardly a fool's errand to prevent those transactions from taking place.

rhhardin said...

But lots of people will offer to further your career for money, and as long as they deliver, no one sees anything wrong with it. If you want to be a star, get an agent. So it seems the outrage here is about the particular nature of the bribe demanded. But when there are loads of people who are perfectly willing to pay in that currency, it's a fool's errand to try to prevent the transactions from taking place.

The law's role obviously would be to jail the women.

Earnest Prole said...

What’s noteworthy in these threads is the level of abstraction required to defend the indefensible. For anyone with an actual wife or daughter(s), all it takes is a single tearful conversation to convert the abstraction to reality.

Jupiter said...

"To allow our wives and daughters to participate fully in our society."

Yeah, I've met people's wives and daughters participating fully in our society. First they say that it isn't "fair" to keep them out of the Boys' Club just because they're not boys. Like fools, we let them in. Then they say that we have to stop acting like boys, because they don't like being around people who act like boys. The Boys' Club is now officially renamed the Boys' Tea Party. Please be seated, the imaginary tea is about to be served.

They can't help themselves. They always want it both ways.

rhhardin said...

What’s noteworthy in these threads is the level of abstraction required to defend the indefensible. For anyone with an actual wife or daughter(s), all it takes is a single tearful conversation to convert the abstraction to reality.

That's how you get a mob.

Hannah Arendt said that the Nazi system was built on decencies, care for home and family. But goodness that goes public turns into the worst sort of evil.

So we agree on everything but the abstraction. Take away the details, get to the principle.

Instead follow the law.

rhhardin said...

The feminist view is that she's participating fully in society if she's negotiating for herself.

Big Mike said...

@rhhardin, I reject your notion that Harvey Weinstein is the victim of a right wing mob. The leaders of what you characterize as a "mob" (and you are stretching the definition) are left-wing newspapers like the Times and the New Yorker, hard-core feminists, and Hollywood lefties. The main difference is that folks on the right, like me, are not pushing back on the howling mob. We're munching popcorn as we watch the left devour one of their own.

Do you want butter on yours?

walter said...

Chelsea Skidmore met Weinstein around 2013, shortly after she moved to Los Angeles to pursue an acting and comedy career.

“He’d love you,” she remembers a producer saying. So she met Weinstein for tea in the lobby of the Peninsula. Two assistants joined at first, but he soon dismissed them.

“We’re going upstairs,” she said he told her.

In his suite, she said, he asked her for a massage. She tried to laugh it off, saying, “I’m not very good at massages.” She said he then began masturbating in front of her. (Skidmore’s mother confirmed that her daughter told her about the incident at the time; Geiss made an almost identical claim). And after he finished, while Skidmore sat in shock, Weinstein told her nonchalantly that he’d like her to write a pilot for him.

Skidmore would have at least three other encounters with Weinstein in which, under the pretense of discussing business, she said, he would expose himself or, on two occasions, try to coerce her into getting physical with other women — one of whom, at Weinstein’s behest, would try to convince Skidmore to participate by saying, “Oh, but he’s helped out so many girls.”

“He had just a very forceful way of going about things,” Skidmore said in an interview with The Post, the first time she had publicly spoken about these encounters. “He forces himself on you, talks you into it and doesn’t leave you with an option.”

Before their final meeting, in 2016, she said he sent her text messages such as “u r obviously mad at me?”

During that encounter, Skidmore tried again to keep the conversation focused on business, she said, until he walked into another room and returned naked.

“Can you help me out?” she said he kept asking. “Can you help me out? Can you help me out?”

He was both needy and abusive, as on the day 30 years earlier when his “Playing for Keeps” producer said Weinstein punched him and begged him to stay. Skidmore said he finally forced her to stand in front of the mirror, next to him, while he masturbated.

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“I just grabbed my stuff and walked out and never talked to him again,” Skidmore remembered. “I was hysterically crying in the car. Went home really, really upset. Cried for a long time. Like, I’m never, ever, doing that again.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/violence-threats-begging-harvey-weinsteins-30-year-pattern-of-abuse-in-hollywood/2017/10/14/2638b1fc-aeab-11e7-be94-fabb0f1e9ffb_story.html?utm_term=.ea841281e301

rhhardin said...

It's a mob neither leftwing nor rightwing.

As for Weinstein, he has terrible seduction skills.

I just grabbed my stuff and walked out and never talked to him again,” Skidmore remembered. “I was hysterically crying in the car. Went home really, really upset. Cried for a long time. Like, I’m never, ever, doing that again.”

She feels uncomfortable. Probably why Weinstein was unsuccessful.

Ralph L said...

Who's going to enforce the casting couch contracts?

Are we coming to the conclusion that feminism runs against nature (some of us long there)?

rhhardin said...

Drug dealers rely on gunfire to enforce contracts that the courts won't. I'd say it's a perfect fit for Hollywood casting couch agreements.

tim in vermont said...

In that new Amazon movie, the Meyersons, there is a scene where one of the women describes a scene like that with a family friend when she was young and they smash his car years later and she says that it doesn't change anything. The ingenue in the movie, however, makes thinly disguised pornos as a running joke. Hollywood is sick and it's pervasive.

Ralph L said...

Probably why Weinstein was unsuccessful.

Sounds like he got what he wanted every time. Humiliated underling and orgasm.

Respectable hotels didn't allow unmarried couples upstairs until when--Post WWII?

walter said...

There are a range of behaviors and scenarios with Harv. It probably isn't all that helpful to women to publish bizarre ones like Skidmore's as if equivalent..co-mingling terms like "forcing" with "talking you into it". I mean..teach your daughters not to go up to guys hotel room for business discussions..but if you get persuaded somehow, have the sense to bow out when they begin masturbating in front of you.

Unknown said...

> For anyone with an actual wife or daughter(s), all it takes is a single tearful conversation to convert the abstraction to reality.

Then go press real charges when it happens. The court system is set up to protect women.

Don't have Tim Robbins say every business is guilty, or go on twitter to raise an army.

Ray - SoCal said...

Explains why Ronan Farrow wrote the article on Weinstein. So obvious, I’m surprised this is as no matter talked about more.

My Father, Woody Allen, and the Danger of Questions Unasked (Guest Column)

Ralph L said...

Women are attracted to rich and powerful men, so we should expect them to go spineless in their presence.

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