liz_marcs | Because Kevin Smith and Neil Gaimen Don't Suck...

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Because Kevin Smith and Neil Gaimen Don't Suck...

We've all seen the list of celebutards who think Roman Polanski should be let off the hook. Some of those names took us by surprise (and certainly pissed me off).

To make you feel better, via my FList this morning, a list of famous people who want Roman Polanski to pay his debt to society.

Although some of those names are a surprise (as in "I'm surprised they said anything at all rather than keeping silent") it warms the cockles of my to see director Kevin Smith was one of the first to call bullshit, which actually not a surprise if you're at all familiar with his movies. And how happy does it make me that Neil Gaimen is on that list?

Celebrity names are going to be added to the "good list" all day. If you see a celebrity tweeting or blogging that Roman Polanski should pay his debt, go here.

While the whole Polanski thing is infuriating, it's so rare to see the assholes admit to their assholery that it's kind of nice in a twisted way. I call it, "A list of people that I'd cheerfully push in front of a speeding bus if I ever had the chance."

Also, SF&F author Jim C. Hines

jimhines has some good thoughts on the whole business here. (The facepalm icon is especially appropriate.)

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Neil Gaiman. Whew. That man can do no wrong.

*nods*

I'm glad to see him on the "good" list, too.

'Celebutards'... I like that!

Thank goodness I don't have to break up with George. *g*

At least not yet. Given the way some of this is going, I honestly don't know what to think. :-(

I don't see his name on the petition, but I haven't heard him take a side. (Although I'd rather he'd stay silent than speak up in support of Polanski...)

I would hope that he's smart enough to keep his mouth shut, either way!

I knew I stayed up all night following Kevin Smith's labor day tweet-a-thon for a reason!

I do loves me Kevin Smith. :-)

That first list makes me want to hurl. Or hit something. Hard. As one of the commenters put it: What part of HE'S A FUCKING CHILD RAPIST do these Hollywood idiots not understand??!! *hands* I got nothing. Nothing.

To be fair, it's not so much "Hollywood" as it is "Clueless Hollywood".

Or, as someone pointed out, the people who tend to say that RP should go to jail are television people, authors, or filmmakers who aren't based in Hollywood — people who wouldn't actually pay any price for saying so. Which, let's be honest, Kevin Smith and Luc Besson though they are filmmakers, really aren't in the Hollywood orbit.

While the "set him free crowd" tend to be people that are overwhelmingly in and reliant on Hollywood films and the industry to make a living.

So, there you go. I don't know if the pattern means anything, but it's interesting to contemplate.

I'm not sure what it means

You're right. The Hollywood thing isn't the important thing here. I'm still full of not-understanding.

But then there's the other list too. Thank goodness.

It's alright if I link to your post here, right?

Be my guest. 'Tis a public post. :-)

True. Thanks!

W-wait. Terry Gilliam is on the wrong list, surely. Surely? Maybe he got handed a petition from an assistant or something and went "sure, whatever?" Please?

It appears not. Yeah. That was one of the names that pissed me off.

I was stunned by the appearance of the original petition. No surprise that there might be people who hold such attitudes … but that people who earn their living through their appeal to the greater public should make a public statement of such attitudes was stupefying not only in its arrogance but in its total, sweeping cluelessness. The petition might as well have been headed PLEASE BOYCOTT ME AS AN UNAPOLOGETIC SUPPORTER OF DEGENERACY.

The appearance of the counter-movement, among a saner segment of the same general set of people (i.e., show-biz folk), is welcome and gratifying, and I echo your relief at seeing it.

Personally, I think those "celebutards" should have to be drugged and screwed by Roman Polanski before they can sign that petition. Might make them think twice.

Or maybe they should volunteer to go to prison in his stead and learn what it feels like. Either way.

Yeah, it's definitely a head-banging, hair-pulling, frustrating issue, isn't it in that there's a certain amount of "blaming the victim" going on here.

Either that, or a whole of "But heeeeee's a jeeeaaaaannnnnnyuuuuuussssss!"

Yeah. No. I don't care who he is. If he was Joe Schmoe on the street, most of those people would be just as happy to see him locked up.

Yes, the blame-the-victim and the whole "well she's forgiven him so she's not really a VICTIM anymore" bit... who ARE these people and WHAT WAS IN THEIR LUCKY CHARMS THIS MORNING?

I almost wish that... some highly-placed liberal political figure were friends with the guy. It would be entertaining to watch as the masses defend Polanski with one side of their mouths while calling for a lynching-by-association with the other.

Perhaps my cynicism is showing today xD

But the bottom line is, I do think it matters who he is... just in the opposite way that the offended petitioners do. Nobody remembers what happens to Joe-Schmoe-who-raped-a-little-girl-and-fled-the-country, after all, but if some famous guy gets to slide on it, people internalize the idea that, really, drugging and raping a barely-teenage girl is just a pesky "case of morals."

What does it say that I have such a stronger reaction towards the celebrities who are for Polanski being brought to justice than I do towards the one who are defending him?

I mean I think Polanski is a child raping criminal who absolutely needs to be behind bars, and yet when I find out Wes Anderson is defending him I just kind of sigh and say, "Oh bother."

On the other hand, finding out that Luc Besson or Neil Gaiman are for his imprisonment/sentencing, that just cheers me up pretty tremendously. I wonder if this means I'm growing as a person and no longer focusing so much on hating people when I could instead focus on admiring them.

Nah. That can't be it. Hating people is so much more satisfying. And to prove it, I will add this:

It does kind of bother me that we care one way or the other about any list of celebrity opinions. I wish it didn't actually mean anything to the world that Martin Scorcese wants a convicted child rapist to go without punishment, but it does.

I'm with you. In most cases, I simply don't care. (I rarely even seek out actor interviews — even for actors I like.) I don't care about their political beliefs, religion or lack thereof, or even dickish behavior.

But this case is different for me. I can even explain why my attitude is different in this case.

Because here it is in the 21st century and we are people who live in allegedly civilized societies. Yet, despite the year and places involved, you have a list of people who are not only perfectly fine with 44 year-old drugging and anally rapping a 13-year-old girl who was kept saying "NO" and then fleeing the country after pleading guilty to doing so, they're willing to say so publicly and defend their support of said person.

That's what pisses me off about about the star-studded support for RP. He's not a victim of political shenanigans like Charlie Chaplain was. He's an admitted rapist. And these people are coming out to support him as if saying this guy should do the time is a controversial stance.

Definitely agreed, although for me the reason why I get even more pissed off at celebrities defending him is mostly because their opinions unfortunately carry weight in the political community. Enough people in the movie business making a big stink about Polanski being freed could conceivably have an effect, and that is a really sickening thought.

Otherwise I would be disgusted by the celebrity defensive of a convicted and confessed rapist, but no moreso than I would be disgusted by anyone defending him.

Which is to say: tremendously disgusted. I cannot fathom how any person that actually understands what Polanski was accused of, confessed to, and was convicted of could possibly defend him. It is astonishingly backwards thinking, and quite frankly I'd thought that the modern industrialized world had gone beyond this kind of blame the victim nonsense.

I mean seriously: "She didn't look thirteen?" This is the year 2009. We're not supposed to be saying such idiotic things anymore.

And Whoopi Goldberg with her "It wasn't 'rape-rape'" has now far and away surpassed the previous record holder for most idiotic thing said on television, which just so happened to be her cohost admitting she wasn't sure if the earth was round.

The stupid is really hurtful.

But it matters because those people, for better or worse, speak for our culture. So when someone who has such an iconic voice speaks up for something we find repulsive, it hits pretty hard.

Neil Gaiman is always made of win! I've been rather appalled at the special snowflake status being granted Polanski because he's an "artiste" and thus above mere mortals. I've heard a lot of slams against the girl and how she wasn't little miss innocent. I don't care if she was a child prostitute, she was 13 freaking years old! Polanski was an adult. There is no wiggle room here.

I just had that argument with my mom, although she wasn't blaming the 13 year-old girl, she was blaming the mother.

I pointed out that the mother (and the daughter backed this up) said she was friendly with Polanski and didn't have any reason not to trust him to be alone with her daughter. Besides, who in their right mind would even imagine that what happened to the daughter would actually happen?

I also added that regardless of the mother's intentions, and the 13 year-old's intentions, all Polanski had to do was keep his fly zipped. Period.

Or as they say on The Wire, "The shit's all on him."

While everything I've read on the mother suggests she (at best) made a very stupid decision, she wasn't there. She called the police the second her daughter told her what had happened. Not a canidate for mother of the year but that doesn't make it her fault.

According to the grand jury testimony of the victim, she said no repeatedly and asked again and again to go home. Polanski treated her like a blow-up doll and he deserves to spend the rest of his life in the nastiest prison that can be found for that.

Absolutely!

I'm not at all surprised Neil Gaiman's backed the arrest. Whenever he's talked about the law in relation to his work with the CBLDF he's always referred to the law as a blunt instrument and that if you want something protected (or deemed criminal) then it must apply in all cases, even if it's a case that you don't like it applying to.

I'm not particularly surprised by Neil Gaimen either.

Actually, I admit that I'm not tremendously shocked by people who stand up and say that Polanski should go to jail because it seems to me that reasonable people can agree that he should be extradited and forced to face the music.

What shocks me is not just the number of people who say he shouldn't, but that they're willing to say so publicly with their real names aattached.

One of the best comments on this I've seen was someone saying that (paraphrased) "all Polanski did was rape a thirteen-year-old girl; had he stormed onto the stage and stolen the microphone from her at a third-rate awards show, there would be real outrage."

Yo stranger!

And BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Yes! Exactly!

Oh, wait. There's an element missing: "If he was a black guy who had stormed onto the stage and stolen the microphone from her at a third-rate awards show, there would be real outrage."

See! Fixed it for you!

Personally I totally think he should have his trial and whatever punishment is decided. But I think it's odd that pretty much everyone seems to be ignoring the actual reasoning presented in the petition:

Filmmakers in France, in Europe, in the United States and around the world are dismayed by this decision. It seems inadmissible to them that an international cultural event, paying homage to one of the greatest contemporary filmmakers, is used by the police to apprehend him.

By their extraterritorial nature, film festivals the world over have always permitted works to be shown and for filmmakers to present them freely and safely, even when certain States opposed this.

The arrest of Roman Polanski in a neutral country, where he assumed he could travel without hindrance, undermines this tradition: it opens the way for actions of which no-one can know the effects.

I hold no particular opinion on that reason, but at least it's comprehensible, and not simply a Whoopi-like denial of what happened. I can understand why film industry people might want the film festival to remain a space where people who are wanted in some states can count on their safety. Primarily, I would argue that one could sign that petition and still hold the view that Polanski should face punishment.

The thing is, he already had his trial, and pled guilty. He confessed to what he did, and then fled before he could be sent to prison.
If he'd waited another day or so, he would have had to dig a tunnel.

I actually look at that the other way around. Should there be events where convicted criminals can go and enjoy themselves without fear of arrest or harrassment? Is this film festival like a medieval Catholic Church where a person can claim sanctuary? Where will that lead? And is it somewhere we want to go?

"Extra-territorial"? A film festival is a cultural event. Not a house of worship with the tradition of sanctuary, an embassy with diplomatic immunity, or military base with foreign soil. It's a bunch of people getting together to watch films in dark rooms, promote their stuff, and have discussions about cinema. By those standards a Star Trek con would have "extraterritorial cultural status".

It's really no different that those who say Polanski should be let go because of his genius. In the real world, your art house film festival has zero importance legally beyond the permits granted to allow it to happen.

sure, I agree. I just think it's weird that no one seems to acknowledge the reason behind the petition; it's like everyone assumes that all the signatories are arguing that Polanski is innocent, or that rape is no big deal, when actually they're saying that they want to preserve their little safe spot. Probably the safe spot tradition usually has more to do with political censorship, like they're worried that breaking the tradition will make it more risky, or at least create the perception that it's more risky, for people who are outlawed in some countries for political reasons to come. But whatever.

I guess all I mean is that I'm not going to assume Terry Gilliam and the rest are all supporters of child rape, when it seems to me they're more concerned about a tradition they think should be maintained in their film festival, and would probably not have signed any petition if the arrest had taken place elsewhere. Like I said, I have no opinion on the validity of the reason, but I hardly think signing the petition is equivalent to saying "it wasn't rape-rape." Whoopi's alone on that one, I think.

Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. Sign a petition asking for the release of a convicted and self-confessed child rapist based on artistic grounds, don't be surprised of other people question your priorities. I'm addressing this to the petition signers, btw, not Dr. Pipe.

It's an extension of the slack the film community has extended to Polanski for over three decades. Crate him up, ship him back, have him go through whatever legal processes await him, and hopefully have him sweat it out in prison until the Hollywood folks badger the Governator into granting clemency.

Not surprised at all that Andrew Vachss is coming out against Polanski, given his background in Child Protective Services.

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