He is taking the time to focus on his family
The Times has a new story to add more to the growing heap of Harvey Weinstein ordure.
Gwyneth Paltrow was one. Rosanna Arquette was one. Judith Godrèche, a leading French actress, has a story.
So does Angelina Jolie, who said that during the release of “Playing by Heart” in the late 1990s, he made unwanted advances on her in a hotel room, which she rejected.
“I had a bad experience with Harvey Weinstein in my youth, and as a result, chose never to work with him again and warn others when they did,” Ms. Jolie said in an email. “This behavior towards women in any field, any country is unacceptable.”
A New York Times investigation last week chronicled a hidden history of sexual harassment allegations against Mr. Weinstein and settlements he paid, often involving former employees, over three decades up to 2015. By Sunday evening, his entertainment company fired him.
On Tuesday, The New Yorker published a reportthat included multiple allegations of sexual assault, including forced oral and vaginal sex. The article also included accounts of sexual harassment going back to the 1990s, with women describing how intimidating Mr. Weinstein was.
Several days ago, additional actresses began sharing with The Times on-the-record stories of casting-couch abuses. Their accounts hint at the sweep of Mr. Weinstein’s alleged harassment, targeting women on the way to stardom, those who had barely acted and others in between.
It’s turning into a damn army.
The encounters they recalled followed a similar narrative: First, they said, Mr. Weinstein lured them to a private place to discuss films, scripts or even Oscar campaigns. Then, the women contend, he variously tried to initiate massages, touched them inappropriately, took off his clothes or offered them explicit work-for-sex deals.
In a statement on Tuesday, his spokeswoman, Sallie Hofmeister, said: “Any allegations of non-consensual sex are unequivocally denied by Mr. Weinstein. Mr. Weinstein has further confirmed that there were never any acts of retaliation against any women for refusing his advances. He will not be available for further comments, as he is taking the time to focus on his family, on getting counseling and rebuilding his life.”
To “focus on his family”? A bit late, isn’t it? And as for rebuilding his life – fuck that. It’s not about rebuilding anything for him, it’s about the many many many women he has bullied and harmed.
His alleged behavior became something of a Hollywood open secret: When the comedian Seth MacFarlane announced Oscar nominees in 2013, he joked, “Congratulations, you five ladies no longer have to pretend to be attracted to Harvey Weinstein.” The audience laughed.
Haw haw. Grab them by the pussy. Haw haw. Locker room talk. Haw haw.
Paltrow tells us something very telling.
When Mr. Weinstein tried to massage her and invited her into the bedroom, she immediately left, she said, and remembers feeling stunned as she drove away. “I thought you were my Uncle Harvey,” she recalled thinking, explaining that she had seen him as a mentor.
After she told Mr. Pitt about the episode, he approached Mr. Weinstein at a theater premiere and told him never to touch Ms. Paltrow again. Mr. Pitt confirmed the account to The Times through a representative.
Soon after, Mr. Weinstein called Ms. Paltrow and berated her for discussing the episode, she said. (She said she also told a few friends, family members and her agent.) “He screamed at me for a long time,” she said, once again fearing she could lose the role in “Emma.” “It was brutal.” But she stood her ground, she said, and insisted that he put the relationship back on professional footing.
He berated her for discussing it – yet he’s now claiming they were all consensual. Not very credible.
Five more women tell their stories. One of them is now an academic; she researches the objectification of women. She credits Weinstein for her interest in the subject.
He needs to take some time off to go to jail for rape.
Apparently his wife is leaving him, so spending time with his family is already going poorly.
John Scalzi’s blog post on the topic is good.
Jeff, that’s sort of in line with what David Letterman said when he retired to spend time with his family: before you quit to spend time with your family, you should make sure your family wants to spend more time with you (I am paraphrasing, not an exact quote).
‘…taking the time to focus on his family…’
The sort of smoke you expect from homophobic preachers/senators caught soliciting in men’s rooms. Should be posted next to ‘thoughts and prayers,’ as the two emptiest phrases utterable in public.
Worth noting that, parallel with the long term unsavory reputation, Paltrow was surprised by his behavior. Even someone as (apparently) blatant as Weinstein can still stay under the radar for potential victims.
He’s also supposedly going to Europe to get treatment for “sex addiction.” I’m moderately pleased to see that the media seems to be treating that with the giant eye-roll it deserves.
As I understand it, the entire concept of “sex addiction” is fairly scientifically dubious to begin with. But even if it is a real thing, this was not Weinstein’s problem. He wasn’t just some guy with a high sex drive who did dumb or even awful things because he was jonesing for a fix. If that was his problem, he could have had himself a willing mistress in L.A., one in N.Y., and hire escorts when he was traveling abroad. I mean, that would still be morally objectionable, but less so than assaulting women, and far “safer” for him.
Weinstein’s problem was that he liked assaulting women. He liked deceiving them, intimidating them, threatening them, and forcing sex acts on them. Those weren’t some “necessary evils” he felt he had to do because of his urges, they were the urges. Reading the accounts and listening to the recording makes that very clear.
Very good point.