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[personal profile] topaz
Dear Hollywood folks:

I like you.  I really, really like you.  Lots of you are really my kind of people: funny, engaging, passionate about making great movies, earnest about progressive change (if a bit shallow in your politics, but lots of us are guilty of that mistake sometimes).  I confess: I am more susceptible to show biz gossip than I like to let on, and am liable to click through on the latest celebrity news quickly when no one's looking.  I care, guys.

So it is only with the deepest sincerity and concern that I ask you today to shut the fuck up about Roman Polanski already.

Seriously!  I don't know what you think you're doing, but it's not helping.  It's not helping anyone.  It's not helping him, it's not helping the situation and it's really not helping you.

Look, I know there are complexities at play here.  I know that the victim has, for most of the last 30 years, wanted to put the case behind her, and since January has wanted the case dismissed.  I know that Polanski was on the verge of locking in a plea bargain when the judge fucked him like.... well, like a 44-year-old director fucks a 13-year-old girl, I guess.  No one, as far as I can tell, believes that he poses a threat to anyone at this point.  I get it.

But please let us return to first principles: this is a man who pleaded guilty to raping a thirteen-year-old girl.  That is not usually classified as a victimless crime, Hollywood folks!  While the judge's apparent decision to reneg on accepting a plea bargain was a rotten thing to do, it does not reduce or lessen his guilt and it arguably does not justify fleeing justice for 30 years.

So if you want to lobby for his freedom by urging that the judge dismiss the charges, or sentence him to time already served: that is a fine argument!  Go for it.

But in the meantime, kindly do not:
And above all, whatever you do, DO NOT allow Woody Allen within a HUNDRED MILES of commenting on this case.  I mean, Jesus H. Christ on a camera dolly.

Or, as [livejournal.com profile] muckefuck put it so eloquently: I ❤ Luc Besson.

I love you, guys.  I really do.  Now stop fucking up.

Date: 2009-09-30 05:54 pm (UTC)

Date: 2009-09-30 10:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] sconstant.livejournal.com
The Times says: "Among [Polanski supporters] was the philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy, who suggested that perhaps the Swiss had more serious criminal matters to attend to than Mr. Polanski, who, he said, “perhaps had committed a youthful error.”"

Date: 2009-09-30 06:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] muckefuck.livejournal.com
I don't know about the rest of you, but as a sprightly 39 year-old, I'm pretty chuffed by the revelation that if I drug Harvey Weinstein and fuck him up the ass it will be defended as a "youthful indiscretion". Hollywood daddies, watch your backs! (At least for the next five years or so.)

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Date: 2009-09-30 05:57 pm (UTC)

Date: 2009-09-30 06:01 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kcatalyst.livejournal.com
I agree, except that you're more forgiving than I am. Because one of the things that this is reminding me is that in Hollywood, the only reason this is still news is because she *was* 13 and was in an environment where she was presumed to be older (and because he ran). That Hollywood runs off a constant supply of vulnerable, sexually attractive young women and that people who inhabit that world are apparently accustomed to that fact and its consequences.

Date: 2009-09-30 06:10 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kcatalyst.livejournal.com
Wanted to add-- when I say more forgiving, I don't mean you're not taking their asshattery seriously, just that right now I'm having trouble with the "I love you guys" part of the sentiment.

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From: [identity profile] qwrrty.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-10-01 04:00 pm (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-09-30 06:11 pm (UTC)
qnetter: (Default)
From: [personal profile] qnetter
First, I'm not sure any crime is worth pushing through the criminal justice system thirty years after it was committed, escape or no escape, especially given the victim's desire not to do so. it's amazing how law-and-order types believe the courts should listen to the desires of the victims -- but only if their desires are for higher penalties...

Second, if I had had Polanski's Auschwitz experience, I know I would have fled rather than ever set foot in a prison. does it excuse the act itself? Hell, no. But the court should have recognized that circumstance and ruled on his misconduct hearing without his physically appearing, since the odds of dismissal or a new trial were significantly non-zero.

Finally, and I know this makes me an evil person: I am really tired of the "but she was only thirteen" argument. I'm not wholly convinced I have a special charter to protect someone else's children's childhood. (I do, however, have a duty to protect the safety of others, no matter their age, so I'm not shirking that here or letting Polanski off the hook -- just saying the age issue seems to be here only as an emotional hot button.)

She was raped; that's enough, whether she was 13, 33, or 93. And, yes, he should be tried and face consequences of that crime. But (please read this carefully, this is not the pro-NAMBLA argument it might seem) I know that age and power inequity are not in all cases the same -- I know that I could have knowingly consented in a lot of situations when I was 13 or 14 -- and [EDIT] while there should be a PRESUMPTION of power imbalance in a case like this subject to legal examination, the real issue here is that, yes, there was a power imbalance, yes, he drugged her, and yes, it was clearly against her will and she said so then and always after. What I am getting at is this: the person responsible for protecting her childhood, legally and morally, is the stupid mother who sent her unattended for a photoshoot. It has pissed me off in this case from day one that we did not bring the force of the law down on this stupid, abusive, and criminal mother.
Edited Date: 2009-09-30 06:19 pm (UTC)

Date: 2009-09-30 06:23 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] aroraborealis.livejournal.com
Wait, seriously? You're blaming the mom???

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Date: 2009-09-30 06:26 pm (UTC)
From: (Anonymous)
The big point you're missing here is that he was tried and convicted. In fact, he pled guilty. The issue was already pushed through the criminal justice system in California.

He fled just before his sentencing, after serving 42 days in prison while waiting for the trial and sentencing (which some are saying was enough jail time).

There have been fewer than 10 attempts to arrest him in 32 years.

Did he rape other girls in that time? who knows?

I'm sure that the mother has suffered plenty, and would change her decision that day in a heartbeat. I'm not sure if Polanski has suffered, or even expressed remorse about what he's done.

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Date: 2009-09-30 06:40 pm (UTC)
ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (scohol)
From: [identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com
"I know that I could have knowingly consented in a lot of situations when I was 13 or 14"

The law says otherwise.

Also, i question why you are introducing the red herring of her mother's culpability. She made a questionable decision, but she didn't break a law.

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Date: 2009-09-30 06:57 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] sconstant.livejournal.com
He spent 42 days in jail before he fled, so he didn't flee rather than setting foot in a prison.

Just correcting you because you seem rather insistent that only you know the facts of the case.

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Date: 2009-09-30 07:25 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] opadit.livejournal.com
I'm not sure any crime is worth pushing through the criminal justice system thirty years after it was committed

Roman Polanski's 2 crimes are raping a child and absconding before his sentencing. What's the minimum number of years that have to go by for the courts to let a child rapist and jail skipper not have to worry about serving his time?

if I had had Polanski's Auschwitz experience, I know I would have fled rather than ever set foot in a prison.

You know, a good way to avoid jail time is to not rape children. In fact, maybe someone who has an "Auschwitz experience" should have been even more averse than your average Joe to committing acts that could increase his odds of having to go to prison.

I'm not wholly convinced I have a special charter to protect someone else's children's childhood.

I don't even know what this statement means. Is this a contributory negligence argument, like in some states, where if you get in an accident and a jury decides that your bad driving contributed even the slightest to the accident, you can't recover any money from the other, more negligent side? Are you saying that the state should not be allowed to prosecute a child rapist if there was some "contributorily negligent" bad parenting involved?

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Date: 2009-09-30 08:06 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] trom.livejournal.com
Second, if I had had Polanski's Auschwitz experience, I know I would have fled rather than ever set foot in a prison. does it excuse the act itself? Hell, no. But the court should have recognized that circumstance and ruled on his misconduct hearing without his physically appearing, since the odds of dismissal or a new trial were significantly non-zero.

Except that he wasn't in Auschwitz. If you're going to call other people on their facts you should make damned sure you have your own right.

Date: 2009-09-30 06:32 pm (UTC)
ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (sherman)
From: [identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com
I wonder if it would be different if he'd raped a 13yo boy.

Date: 2009-09-30 06:34 pm (UTC)
qnetter: (Default)
From: [personal profile] qnetter
No.

Date: 2009-09-30 09:16 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] muckefuck.livejournal.com
It's harder to imagine the efficacy of a "Lolita defence" in such circumstances but, sadly, not impossible.

Date: 2009-09-30 07:16 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] dbang.livejournal.com
Gah. I feel most for the woman (formerly girl) in this case. She just keeps getting screwed over and over :(

Date: 2009-09-30 07:19 pm (UTC)
qnetter: (Default)
From: [personal profile] qnetter
I certainly feel for her. But it's apparent that her wishes are irrelevant to anyone here.

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Date: 2009-09-30 07:47 pm (UTC)

Date: 2009-09-30 10:17 pm (UTC)
qnetter: (Default)
From: [personal profile] qnetter
Fine, fine, have it all your way. Committing millions of dollars to bring Polanski back to the US to serve a month and a half in jail somehow shores up our criminal justice system and protects our citizens in a way that leaving him alone when he is thousands of miles away from us never could. Committing a crime against a child is somehow and for some odd reason worse and different from committing the same crime against an adult. And knowingly endangering your child is something we should all look the other way about - constituting the only case in which the john is committing a crime but not the pimp. And now the world is a better place.

Date: 2009-09-30 11:45 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] docstrange.livejournal.com
I am so very glad I missed all these threads as a result of reading, drafting, and editing contracts at the always-zany end of the quarter.

I'll just chime in to say:
a) "Word," a la [livejournal.com profile] keyne
b) Showing that time and money and power do not especially exempt one from the consequences of one's acts to harm another is a high moral and social good. Even with regard to the individual receiving the long-delayed consequences, but particularly to everyone else. And I say that particularly in this case as a grand fan of the principles that make statutes of limitation a social necessity.

Date: 2009-10-01 12:49 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] crouchback.livejournal.com
Add "excuse him because he was a victim of the Nazis" to that list. Although for at least one important columnist (http://lefarkins.blogspot.com/2009/09/further-thoughts-from-anne-applebaum.html), that now appears to be secondary to "the little slut was asking for it."

Date: 2009-10-01 01:47 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] innerdoggie.livejournal.com
All I can say is that I remember being 13, and it would've been horrible if this had happened to me. A lot of child molesters think that once you go through puberty you are "fair game." Some of us reach puberty (menarche for girls) at age 9, 10, 11. You are not a woman at that age; you're just a kid who got her period.

Throw him in jail!

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