The casting shower
An investigation by The New York Times found previously undisclosed allegations against Mr. Weinstein stretching over nearly three decades, documented through interviews with current and former employees and film industry workers, as well as legal records, emails and internal documents from the businesses he has run, Miramax and the Weinstein Company.
During that time, after being confronted with allegations including sexual harassment and unwanted physical contact, Mr. Weinstein has reached at least eight settlements with women, according to two company officials speaking on the condition of anonymity. Among the recipients, The Times found, were a young assistant in New York in 1990, an actress in 1997, an assistant in London in 1998, an Italian model in 2015 and Ms. O’Connor shortly after, according to records and those familiar with the agreements.
He gave a statement to the Times saying the way he’s behaved with “colleagues” (actually underlings, over whom he had all the power) has “caused a lot of pain.” The statement of course does not specify (aka admit) the behavior. “Behavior” is such a conveniently neutral word. He said he sincerely apologizes…but how sincere can an apology that evasive and self-protecting be? “I’m sorry I did something that you – my colleague – didn’t like.” Well what was the something? Forgetting a birthday? Or demanding sexual favors as a condition of employment?
Dozens of Mr. Weinstein’s former and current employees, from assistants to top executives, said they knew of inappropriate conduct while they worked for him. Only a handful said they ever confronted him.
Mr. Weinstein enforced a code of silence; employees of the Weinstein Company have contracts saying they will not criticize it or its leaders in a way that could harm its “business reputation” or “any employee’s personal reputation,” a recent document shows. And most of the women accepting payouts agreed to confidentiality clauses prohibiting them from speaking about the deals or the events that led to them.
Just standard, the executives say. Not evidence of wrongdoing. Move along.
Unfortunately, it seems that’s true. SOP. It’s even on the corporate calendar, right? 9:30, coffee with Woody. 10:00, conference call with Roman. 10:30, go over script changes with Bill. 11:00, “behavior” with new starlet wanting a role.
I so despise the ‘confidentiality clause’ thing. They should be utterly non-binding on the signatory in the case of lawbreaking–and not just to law enforcement.
Two different kinds of reactions to this revelation are, if not equally distressing, then at least both nauseating. The first, by smarmy liberals, is to point out that Weinstein is being shamed and rejected by ‘their side’ while the Pussy-Grabber-In-Chief was not rejected by Republicans (as though nobody who calls themselves ‘progressive’ has ever excused sexual harassment or gone after victims); the second is that Weinstein was one more in a catalogue of boorish sexually-deviant men whom HRC saw fit to include in her social circle, so somehow this is all her fault. (A similar, though less explicit, version of that last is to demand that any Democrats who accepted money from Weinstein return it.)
Wealth and patriarchy don’t know a party; sexual entitlement is bred into men from before they’re born, and general entitlement is bred into rich people. Weinstein’s wealth and his status protected him from these kinds of allegations for *years*, and many of the people who stayed silent would likely call themselves ‘progressive’ or ‘liberal’. The worship of wealth and celebrity are systemic issues that must be dealt with, and they cannot be dealt with by pretending only people who don’t think or vote like we do are part of the problem.
This guy. He grew up in a time where it was… well, not acceptable to treat women this way, but not exactly shameful. And now (like… now, in 2017?) he needs to catch up? Dude, it’s not that hard not to sexually harass your employees. You don’t need to study the law. You don’t need a tutor. You just don’t do… sex stuff with or to your employees.
Hefner, Cosby, Trump, Guccione.
‘If you’re a star, they let you do it.’
This is what heterosexual sex has declined to. Bronze Age property exchange with leisure suits and coke-spoons. And from porn to supermarket bodice-rippers, it has been accepted as normal.
Based on my experience, it doesn’t seem like a decline. It may seem like a decline to people who haven’t had to live as a woman their whole life, and recognize that this is just the same old thing, only now for some reason people have decided to start talking about it and acknowledging that it happens.
If you read old literature the way I do, it’s obvious the views of women have never been all that much different. Women are property to be traded, bought, sold, and kept or discarded.
@Ben
Just don’t do sex stuff to anybody who doesn’t want to do sex with you. Don’t impose it.
How hard is that to understand?