Let’s say you have a daughter. She is 13 years old.
Let’s say that a movie director supplied her with champagne and drugs and then took nude pictures of her in a hot tub during a fashion shoot. Let’s say that same movie director had sexual intercourse with your daughter despite her resistance and requests to be taken home. Let’s say the original charges against the director included anal intercourse and rape.
Then let’s say that director fled the US in order to evade sentencing. That was in 1978.
Flash forward to 2009. Let’s say that same director was recently arrested in Switzerland when he arrived there recently and faces extradition back to the US.
Then let’s say the Hollywood Elite “weighed in” regarding this favored director. Like Whoopi Goldberg, who said:
I know it wasn’t rape-rape. I think it was something else, but I don’t believe it was rape-rape.”
Plus, over 100 film industry figures signed a petition calling for the release of this director, including Martin Scorcese, Woody Allen, David Lynch, Wim Wenders, Pedro Almodovar, Tilda Swinton and Monica Bellucci.
Actress Debra Winger said of this director:
This is a three-decades-old case that is dead but for minor technicalities. We stand by him (the director) and await his release and his next masterpiece.”
Your daughter has waited 32 years for justice. She is now 45 years old. The perpetrator had sex with her when he was 38 years old himself. And she was 13. Forced sodomy.
But, after all these years, I suppose that just doesn’t mean much now. Right? Because the suspect is such a brilliant director — such an artiste.
How can those in Hollywood look themselves in the mirror today?
You bleeding idiots.
BZ
I think he really has gotten away with it for so long that he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. I know his wife and unborn child were brutally murdered by Charles Manson, but that is no excuse for what he did. I understand that he had a plea deal, the Judge was about to reneg on it and that was why he fled. At the very least he should get theplea deal AND a few more years for fleeing. I have heard the woman on TV say that she is “over it” and that she has no desire to see him locked up. Still, I have a daughter and there would be nowhere on Earth that he could hide if he did that to her. It’s been awhile, but I used to be quitte proficient with rifle, pistol, and shotguns.
There is no excuse for the man.
Do the crime, get the time. Running from justice and bragging about it does not make you an admirable person, but one to be despised as a coward. He deserves the maximum time for the convictions and running from them… and those who prey upon children are despised in jail.
Tim: with all your comments on this and other associated blogs, quite frankly, I am surprised to read your view here. Not to say that you are incorrect; simply to proffer an observation.
But I completely understand your thoughts: things can sometimes become QUITE personal. And that is precisely my point.
AJ: age, as you point out, does NOT diminish the responsibility for his behavior.
BZ
BZ- You labor under the false premise that I am a bleeding heart lib. I am a pragmatist. I go with what works. Leave the idealogy to arm chair pontificators. I sir am a doer first and a thinker second. Think Gen. Custer.
And we ALL know what a fuck up Custer…
You’re a pragmatist…
I’m a REALIST, and that pisses off many, especially when that realism espouses the total truth…
I know exactly what you mean, disgusting.
Reminds me of Catholics and their priest, Christians and their preachers.
General Custer WOW! You’re right he didn’t sexually abuse little girls, he butchered them.
Well, Custer may have screwed up at Little Big Horn, but saved the day at Little Round Top. He helped win the Civil War in that battle. Yes, he made a stupid mistake, but he DID something. He didn’t sit on his ass and critisize while doing nothing. He is also from Michigan and a local hero.
Look at the Charge of the Light Brigade. A stupid and futile gesture. Done for Honor. Imagine that…
Ranando..that’s funny..
I was about to say “Imagine if Polanski was a Catholic priest..”
You think Woody Allen and Mike Nichols and Penelope Cruz would be going to bat for the priest like they are POlanski?
Na..I don’t, either.
You’re missing the point. What we have here is a bunch of elitists defending one of their own. For these people, right & wrong only depend on who you are.
These types of crimes are close to my heart, BZ. That guy is an asshole who deserves the LONGEST punishment allowed by law. The statute of limitations argument should not fly because he KNEW he was wrong. I know the lady wants closure and to not think about what he did all those years ago, but he NEEDS to get thrown under the jail for his cowardice in running away, which shows he has no conscience.
I actually take the middle of the road here. I don’t agree with Hollywood’s collective opinion but I’m not all that Charles Bronson-ish about it either. I think the Hollywood elite is mainly focused on the body of artistic work he produced as a great director and they’re coming at it from that creative perspective so there is the tendency to downplay but I still think a plea deal could work.
The Previous Anonymous poster has it right on: a bunch of Hollywood elite are trying to protect one of their own. Everyone is claiming Polanski’s “brilliance” as a director, as if that somehow is a legal defense. That shifting of focus may work on “Boston Legal” (“Denny Crain!”), but not in the real world. I don’t even care that the now-grown woman he raped is joining the chorus calling for his release. At 13, she didn’t have the emotional wherewithal to engage in consensual intercourse. No. He raped a child. He fled the charges. He finally got caught in a country he can be extradited from. He should to to prison for the rest of his life…and no amount of brilliant movie-making or “time already served” by running should exclude him.
Incidentally, TexasFred: there’s really no such thing as “total truth.” Everyone sees the world differently, and two people can each claim to be “realists” while at the same time pissing each OTHER off with their version of “truth.”
Z-man said…
I actually take the middle of the road here.
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Standing in the middle of the road gets you run the hell over…
And makes you look very indecisive.
A man has to STAND for something, or he’ll FALL for anything.. I have some beach property in Arizona, you interested?
Tim said…
Yes, he made a stupid mistake, but he DID something.
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So… As long as you DO something, even if it gets your entire command killed, it’s OK? Is that what you are saying?? I mean, those are YOUR words…
Ya know, I try to reserve judgement until I know a bit more about folks, so I won’t say what I am thinking, but I will say this, you’re getting in deeper and deeper with every post…
Anonymous said…
Incidentally, TexasFred: there’s really no such thing as “total truth.”
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Not in YOUR world maybe…
Texas Fred I’m not indecisive on this as I’ve heard of the case since when it happened and always had some views. I’m just not that doctrinaire a conservative is all, just trying to add something different into the mix here. Why does it always have to come down to Hollywood vs. US? The Hollywood position here is extreme yes but I agree with those who say something less than the FULLEST EXTENT OF THE LAW might work here (“fullest extent” being defined as also may he get testicular and brain cancer too while Bubba is sodomizing him).
I’m sure someone will refresh my memory, but wasn’t Custer’s issue the fact that he failed to heed the advice and information provided by his scouts regarding the number of warriors at hand?
BZ
TexasFred said: “Not in YOUR world maybe…”
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And, that’s exactly my point. The fact that your worldview won’t account for varying “truths” only points out the truthfulness (to use the word) of what I said. Your world doesn’t describe mine…at least not in every case. Things that you view as “true” might simply NOT be in my world, whether we’re talking about the Bible or the color of the sky. Akiro Kurosawa’s film “Rashomon” details the varying “truths” of rape & murder very nicely. A seemingly simple truth – a man was murdered, his wife raped – is made disturblingly complex as 4 different accounts of it emerge. Each person witnessed the same thing…and yet each person saw a different truth.
Sex with 13 year olds, illegal in the United States.
At the Vatican it’s just another Friday Night.
BZ, the Custer analogy Tim used was hilarious, I mean, it takes a lot of doofus to describe yourself as being just like the worst military fuck up in American history…
And yes, you are correct in your assessment that Custer didn’t listen to more knowledgeable persons…
Kind of reminds you of our current and recently sitting presidents doesn’t it…
Ranando… 2 priests are in a fight, how do you separate them??
Throw in an altar boy… 🙂
Z-man said…
Texas Fred I’m not indecisive on this
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And now I have to ask, just what does *middle of the road* mean? Indecisiveness… Someone that can’t make up their mind stands *in the middle of the road*…
Middle of the road, YOUR words, not mine… I am just making an observation using your words to factor an opinion…
I am NEVER in the middle of the road, I take sides and make NO apology for it being the RIGHT side of things…
The bastard should be hung by the nuts and used for a pinata…Anyone who drugs and rapes a person not to mention a child should be violated with 2×4 with a nail in it…And I really don’t give a damn about how long he’s been away or how sorry he is… IF the victim is ok with him being free, I say give her the board and see if she don’t relive the incident and widen his hole…
But that’s just me, I’m an extremist….
Rope is cheap. I say we use some. He ALREADY ADMITTED GUILT when he plead guilty to doing it, then fled the country.
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Hey at least the ‘elites’ like women as opposed to young pages and public mens rooms.
What a disgusting bastard this guy is, I’d lock him up for the rest of his miserable life.
Hollywood is just sick. These idiots make me see less and less movies, each year.