I’m afraid there won’t be any men left in Hollywood. The way things are going, they will all be out on sexual assault charges. This is not me saying this stuff didn’t happen. I’m positive it did. I always thought it was going on. Everything I knew about people in show business said that powerful men abused women pretty much all the time and got away with it because … they were powerful men.
Some guy I know suggested he had thought that it was a mutual thing. Sort of humorous.
No, it wasn’t. Not mutual nor humorous. Guys who force women to have sex don’t look like a young Robert Redford. Guys who can have any woman by saying “Hey baby … ” and she faints in his arms, don’t need to force anyone to have sex. Okay, well, there are some pretty weird guys out there, so who knows … but overall, I think you’ll find more guys like Harvey Weinstein and fewer really handsome studs.
Date rape — regular old date rape — was so common when I was in college, no one bothered to officially complain about it. I wonder if they still don’t bother?
No one believed in date rape. If you were “out” with a guy, clearly you expected sex, right? I mean — we all know that women never dated men unless they wanted to have sex.
Your girl friends believed you, though. Because they had gone through the same experiences, if not with the same guy, then with guys just like him. The best way to prevent it from happening again was to tell all your girl friends — and have them spread it around — so they would know and not go out with those creeps. Those guys with eight, tentacle-like arms who more or less strangled you in the car and then told their friends that you’d really wanted it, oh yeah!
So there was no point in complaining because the cops sure as hell wouldn’t believe you. The school authorities wouldn’t believe it — and mostly, they still don’t. It was entirely possible your own mother wouldn’t believe you, so if you got into one of those scenes, you just got through it, never dated the asshole again and tried to make sure other women knew he was “one of those guys.” It was the least you could do for them.
So it’s really possible that by next year, at least half the guys in Hollywood will be up on charges, behind bars, or simply too embarrassed to be seen in public.
It’s going to put a real hole in the scripts of some yet-to-be-made movies. Somehow, I’ll deal with it.
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Categories: #Women, Celebrities, Crime and Cops
SERENDIPITY - SEEKING INTELLIGENT LIFE ON EARTH 
If men would be more attuned to women and learn to back off when we just aren’t interested, that would be part of the problem solved. However, it is more than that, it is the power that is being wielded.
Leslie
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Some of these guys needed a mother they respected. They come from families where dad had all the power and mom did what she was told. They never got the message. I would think commonsense would do the job, but apparently not.
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Well it’s coming out now.
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Yup. But I don’t think this is a problem we are going to solve … probably ever. It’ll get a little better, maybe. Some guys will be more careful how they deal with women. Maybe they’ll improve some of the laws, but I wouldn’t count on that — I mean we can’t get gun control after a massive shooting, so this is nothing.
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You’d think they could do something more because it does affect 50% of the population.
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There are a lot of things that could be done, in theory, but not easily … and not in a way that will really work.
What can you do with these guys? Fine them? Make them do community service? Send them to school to relearn how to relate to women? Would any of these things accomplish anything? I tend to doubt it.
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Thank you, Marilyn. Thank you.
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You are welcome, Evelyne … and meanwhile, we are in the middle of our annual viewing of “Oh, What A Lovely War.” It is still the greatest anti-war movie ever made.
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I wondered that myself. Who will be left in Hollywood. Maybe it will crash and burn. If that is the end result, so be it. I smile every time I see another one getting called out. This is just the beginning.
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I’m pretty sure it won’t crash and burn. I don’t even think it will change much. I think a few men might be a little more cautious about it at least as long as they remember what happened, but for many men — and some women — that kind of power is part of the package. They worked hard and became powerful and they EXPECT the right to use and abuse other people as they like. This IS what they worked for. It’s not just Hollywood, either. Law offices, political and government job. Army and Navy and all the other armed forces are notorious for abusing women and sometime men, depending on personal taste.
This isn’t something new. It’s something very old which has gone on a long time. I think probably as long as there have been powerful people who think rape is fun. Will this stop it? No, but maybe, for a while, it’ll slow it down. As my husband says, it really helps to have a mother who had some serious attitude about the position of women … and a certain amount of humility.
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I remember when I wrote on several membership political and world news sites, then went and made my own, I always warned them to keep their zippers up. I mean, how stupid do you have to be? It is also the oldest blackmail trick in the book.
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Surprisingly, on THIS subject, most men are stupid. It’s genetic.
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Recently there was a sort of poll thing on Facebook. I don’t usually participate in those, I go to FB to say hey to a couple of on-line friends and to stay in touch with extended family and that’s all. But this poll was about women speaking out (anonymously in a sense) about their experiences with rape, date-rape, sexual abuse and assault and all things of that nature. Apparently the results were astounding and many people (men and women) were writing things like “I had no idea it was so pervasive.” I wondered where those uninformed people lived…under a rock in NeverNever Land? (bad reference).. I know at least a dozen women who have been the victims of sexual abuse (harassment, assault, rape). I’m a survivor myself. So maybe Hollywood is just catching up with the rest of the world OR the perpetrators can no longer freely indulge their baser instincts just because they’re a ‘star” or a power broker etc. I think it’s marvelous.
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I would go you one further: I do not know any women who actually dated men who were not either raped or nearly raped by their dates, or by guys who they assumed were “just friends.” The belief that forcing a woman to have sex is “no big deal” is pervasive and NOT only in the U.S. This is everywhere. Literally EVERYWHERE on earth. Is it going away suddenly? No. Some people will be more careful and cautious.
As long as men are powerful and women (and many men) are not, it will continue.
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I’m really glad you made the point that Robert Redford etc. didn’t have to offer favors for sex. 🙂 I look at Harvey Weinstein and I think, “There’s no way you could ever have gotten laid without having something major to offer.” Maybe that’s wrong thinking, but…
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No, I think that’s probably pretty close. If all you have to do is ask, then you ask. It’s so much easier. Ironically, many of the guys who were most handsome and “hot” were notoriously married to the same woman for a lifetime and as far as anyone knows, monogamous. Funny about that.
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They didn’t have anything to prove (to themselves?) like, “When you’re famous they let you.” That is truly one of the most horrifying and horrifyingly insecure statements I ever heard.
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Worse yet, it’s largely true. It wouldn’t work on me or you, but we never aimed at fame on the screen. How DO you become a working actress and not bow to the pressure? Is it even possible?
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I dealt with the same shit in academia. It’s a male power and inadequacy thing. Hollywood is just the most conspicuous place where it occurs.
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I know. I dealt with it working as a tech writer in development groups where you wouldn’t think it would be an issue. But men are men and honest to god I think at least some of them think they are doing us a favor or some crap like that. They absolutely do NOT see that forcing women to have sex is a BAD THING, even if you are a good looking man. It really doesn’t matter. Force is force is force. But they do not get it. I have noticed that many of the men who DO get it had MOTHERS. Garry had a MOTHER. You didn’t mess with mom. NO ONE messed with mom.
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One of the most surprising things about all of this for me is how surprised men are at the extent of the problem. Women are all just nodding our heads and saying, “Uh, huh.” I’m in my 60s now, so I remember the days when an 8th grade teacher could call on a girl by complementing her looks in front of the class, when he could walk down the hall holding her hand and when girls shared a list of classes where you should never wear a skirt if you were in the front row.
I’m feeling a sense of power for my daughter and granddaughter now.
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I hope this make a long-term difference, though I tend to wonder. This business of powerful men – powerful people – who figure they rule the world because they can — aren’t going away. The culture of power is and has been the same since people have been socialized. How many millions of cartoons of cave men dragging women off by the hair (giggle, giggle). How many lurid jokes about “casting couches” and “sleeping your way to the top,” as if this is something women actively CHOOSE to do. At 70, and looking at the culture of power — everywhere, not just here — I have to wonder if this is a fight we CAN win. We can try to make it better. Try to make it possible for women to be believed when they complain.
But the culture itself? I’m not seeing that happening here or anywhere.
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It will also likely provide fodder for plenty of scripts, especially for a show like Law & Order SVU.
There are also plenty of horror stories of men taking advantage of young men, some under age. I read a autobiography years ago (Gavin Jeffrey Dillard, writer, actor) that all but named people, but it was still obvious which powerful Hollywood execs were being talked about. Until Spacey, a lot of that disappeared, like the casting couch for women.
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Abuse by power over those not as powerful is as old as the caves. It is such a part of the culture of power, I don’t know if it will ever really change. There’ll be some scuffles and shifting around … but powerful men think the rest of the world owes them one. Whatever and whichever one they want.
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Sad, true
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Thanks for this post, Marilyn. I’m a guy. I’m guilty of watching the evening news and saying, “Enough of this! Let’s get to the real news.” I know it’s not fake news. I know It’s real and it’s pervasive and its damnable but when every news outlet features the story of another groper at the top of the news hour, I groan. “Just more evidence of this entertainment culture’s addiction to the sensational and lurid — and tweets from the confessed groper who moved from NYC to a prominent address on Washington, D.C., representing the U.S.A. to the rest of the world.”
Then along comes Marilyn “seeking intelligent life on earth.” And I say to myself this morning, “She doesn’t respect the Groper-in-Chief any more than I do. She’s not a guy. She knows something men don’t. I need to shut up and listen.”
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You’d be surprised how many of my own male friends reacted like that, too. Because this sort of thing is SO common and always has been, men never figured it really mattered. It doesn’t — to them. They’ve got it in their heads that “all women want it” and “I’m the one to do it for them.” Good looking guys, too. When I was dating, I remember wondering how these ordinary guys seemed to have eight powerful arms when they wanted to pin you to the seat. Some of them actually SAID “Oh, come one, you really liked that, didn’t you” and that was what they told the world, too.
It’s pretty hard to fight back when the culture of forcing women to have sex is so broad and so inclusive it goes from M.I.T. and Harvard, to the delivery guy at the 7-11. Dad said it was OK, so it’s OK. What do women know, right?
I’m glad to see the fuss going on, though I have a feeling when this kerfuffle is done, it’ll be the same-old-same-old. New faces, same game. Men need to learn this stuff in the cradle and have it pounded into them over the years. Men in power need to learn that power and abuse are not the same thing, or shouldn’t be.
I’m pretty sure there are very few men (maybe women, for all I know, but this does seem to be a sex-linked issue) in power in entertainment, business, or politics who have not abused the women in their world. It is, as my husband so well put it, part of the culture.
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Reblogged this on Views from the Edge.
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I am amazed by the double standards exhibited by our elected representatives. When it happens in Hollywood, everyone is quick to condemn the perpetrators who committed the sexual offenses. These guys get fired, lose their careers, and are shunned, and rightfully so. But look at Roy Moore, the Alabama GOP candidate for the US Senate who had a sexual encounter with a 14-year-old girl when he was 32. Barely a handful of Republican congressmen have called for him to drop out of the race and some continue to support him in his bid to get into the Senate.
But I suppose this is to be expected when the POTUS is, himself, guilty of sexual assault.
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So many of the political sex offenders have made “family values” a running point, they know if they admit it, they’re done. REALLY done. The Hollywood crowd — no one expects them to behave like gentlemen. Which is lucky, because they don’t.
Eventually, they will all be routed. Remember — Moore was elected by the same group that got us our president. You can’t expect them to believe the truth. They don’t “do” truth.
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Sad.
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Infuriating. That so many men actually think this is something women want — still — this late in history.
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One of the side effects of the whole thing is that „normal“ men avoid getting too near tonwomen in shops or on the street in case they are accused of sexual harassment, that’s another side effect.
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I think I can live with that. Remarkably, the nearness of strange men isn’t a big issue in my life. People — men and women — who know me don’t worry about it. Strangers? Why would they WANT to get near me?
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