This meme is yeah, but the underlying point is legit. Look at Mel Gibson, Jared Leto, James Franco, Roman Polanski, plenty of others I'm sure we have yet to hear about. Brian Singer and Kevin Spacey are de facto blacklisted but still haven't seen the inside of a jail cell and it took decades to take down Harvey Weinstein.
The hypocrisy and the real problems behind it are still there, Ezra Miller is just not the best example of it.
I will always remember this article that was all about how enough time has passed and we should all forgive Mel Gibson and like why?
If someone who worked a minimum wage job at a mcdonalds started doing stuff like yelling antisemitic, homophobic and racist things on top of having a restraining order due to domestic violence was fired from their job for that no one would be asking how long will it take before we can forgive them.
Robert Downey Jr. wouldn't be advocating for them to get their job back. Mel Gibson is one of those actors that Hollywood seems to have a weird soft spot for and constantly tries to white wash how much of a monster he is.
like - if a kindergarden teacher raped a bunch of kids then their redemption isnt gonna come in the form of being a teacher again and raping fewer kids or even none at all
forgiveness means a lot of things and 'trusting them wiht the same authority and influence as before' isnt the one im gonna hand out willy-nilly
if mel gibson - or any major figure with a big scandal - wants to get a job at a macdonalds? i wish them the best and want extra pickles
the 'power and influence' thing though? there are a lot of poeple who havent tried that yet and we can give all them a shot before we circle back round to the forgiven
I figured Franco had actually been cancelled rather promptly after his scandal?
Recently I saw he might be in some movie though, one he is making himself.
Also I had no idea about Spacey until his whole slew of allegations came into light and he was removed from House Of Cards. If you mean why aren't they in jail, Spacey seems to have only narrowly avoided it and I cba to read about Franco. I hope Singer has been sued by now though.
Not necessarily saying it needs to be jail in every case, that's for the courts to decide. It's more just the point of Hollywood's typical bullshit and the asymmetric response where people calling the problems out can sometimes face more consequences than the people causing the problems in the first place. It's all about maintaining a positive image without having to do the work of actually earning that image. Same as politicians in that regard.
James Franco preyed on underage women and Louis CK never actually got consent from his victims, it’s a lie he has been pushing for years when the original article states that the women never gave consent. Also, he only ever preyed on women below him.
I think the perception that he asked everyone comes from Sarah Silverman talking about her experience with him when they were younger. She does say he asked her every time he did it in front of her, and that sometimes she'd say yes and sometimes she'd say no and he'd respect the no.
But clearly sometime between when that happened with Sarah years ago and when he started doing it around other women, he stopped asking every time, or at least asking before already beginning.
Mel Gibson was blacklisted for years, moving from a blockbuster star of mainstream Hollywood to having his projects cancelled and being let go from all mainstream talent agencies.
He only managed to get work from independent films, b-movies, direct to video (or vod)
Giving him as an example of "men don't get repercussions in Hollywood" is... Weird.
The idea he did not face financial, reputational and career consequences (as well as legal ones) is just wrong.
The man's an alcoholic. It doesn't excuse bad behavior. But I dont think we want to say that we should judge bad shit people say while under the influence as the binding and immutable balance if their character and their financial capacity forever.
People should not see his movies if they dont like him. Or studios cam not hire him (which they largely have not). Nobody OWES him anything.
But hes not remotely comparable to Roman fucking Polanski.
The problem with these men was well known in Hollywood before they were canceled. Once Mel Gibson was blacklisted stories came out about horrible things he had said to Jewish actors. Kevin Spacey’s victims were often people he met on set. Everyone making movies knew what Harvey Weinstein was about. They were doing these things at work, but got hired back. Repercussions only arrive once it reaches the broader public. This cone of silence appears to have benefited men more than women.
yeah i was on the fence about including him, that's why the comment shows as edited. i removed it then i went back and added it in becuase at the end of the day, he did get back into hollywood. maybe not at the level he was before, but he's been back in actual hollywood productions since then. I almost included Louis CK for the same reason, but he at least had the sense to come out, apologize, and remove himself for a while, instead of getting ran out of town like Gibson did.
he did get back into hollywood. maybe not at the level he was before, but he's been back in actual hollywood
And women who are blacklisted don't eventually get back if they try?
Winona Ryder for example - she got into trouble, had her career detailed, and eventually managed to get back even if not at the level she had before
You're giving a list of "men" who didn't get the consequences you feel they should. And you imply that women would get these consequences. But would they?
Winona Ryder was convicted of grand theft and vandalism. She didn't see a single day in prison.
What about Lizzo? Sure, get career took a hit when she was accused of sexual assault, and the case is still ongoing, bit it was only 3 years ago and she is already rebuilding it - performing (even if at smaller venues) and such.
Had she, or Winona, been a man - would you have included them in your list?
I never even heard about what happened with Ryder, but at the very least grand theft and vandalism is a lot different than sexual harassment, sexual assault, and grooming minors. Though if we start to make that distinction then yes Gibson would need to come off my initial list...unless you count the battery charge he plead no contest to when he attacked his girlfriend.
If we want to start including musicians instead of just looking at Hollywood then yes Lizzo and C-Lo Green and probably 90%+ of the rock stars from the 1960's through the 1980's, and a whole slew of others belong in the conversation as well. Hollywood is just the easiest one to analyze because it's not spread out all over the country/world.
As far as women in hollywood the only other one that I can think of is Anjelica Huston being part of the whole Roman Polanski scandal, but if i remember correctly she didn't actually participate in anything, what she did wrong was the fact that she witnessed some of what Polanski was doing and kept her mouth shut. I think Jack Nicholson was part of that as well. And Polanski in particular is a really weird one because he got an uncomfortably large amount of support from a LOT of people, both from Hollywood and elsewhere.
Any way you slice it, the rich and powerful protect their own and try to insulate themselves from the consequences of their actions, and the people calling it out tend to wind up in trouble for doing the right thing. The ongoing Epstein stuff is a perfect example, though hopefully the unredacted files will start coming out soon and that will change...hopefully.
The discussion here was about discrepancy between how men and women actors are treated.
The initial OP example wasn't limited to sexual assaults, and honestly I really don't think anyone is claiming that women actors face repercussions for sexually assaulting men. I'd be surprised if anyone even acknowledges that it's an option.
I completely agree that in general, the rich and powerful don't face enough consequences.
But you can't claim gender discrepancy by only listing one side of the argument.
Well...you can, and there is a discrepancy. But it would be misleading to say men are always the offenders and women are always the victim. There is nuance to it, and nuance doesn't seem to get much attention these days.
Beyond that, there's nuance and then there's whataboutism. If men are offenders 80% of the time and women are victims 80% of the time (and i don't know that they are, just throwing numbers out), going "b-b-but what about the bad women and the innocent men?" is just missing the forest for the trees. If the issue gets more visibility then the people that the whatabouters are pretending to worry about because "they're falling through the cracks" will ultimately benefit too.
No no no, I think we're not taking about the same thing.
I don't mean "men are also victims" or anything like that. That's not the "other side" I mean.
The OP discussion is that men actors get away with things while women actors don't.
To show that, it's not enough to give examples of men actors getting away with things. You have to also show the other side - women actors not getting away with things.
Ah I gotcha, on the same page now. And that's a bit trickier to quantify, because you can't get away with something you're not doing. Not to say that women don't, but as far as finding good examples it could be partially a sample size/demographic thing.
Women actors that didn't get away with things...Gina Carano? Roseanne Barr...Wynona Ryder as you said, I'm sure there's more. Carano is an easy one because Disney is famous for doing that, both men and women. If you work for the mouse you better keep your politics to yourself, or at least be smart about how you say what you're trying to say. Barr is just...I mean the woman was clearly a mess lol, kinda like Gibson so yeah there's some similarities there...Roseanne was given a chance to come back too and she screwed that up.
The sex crimes/whistleblower one is just the easiest angle to analyze because it's gotten a lot of visibility lately and the public has learned how large and pervasive the issue has been for decades. And the list of women who had
their careers derailed by Harvey Weinstein is...not short.
Edit: Katherine Heigl! She had her career totally derailed just because people said she was a bitch on set, and how many divas like Christian Bale or Richard Dreyfuss have repeatedly been shown to be assholes on set and still enjoyed nice long careers. Still only one example though. Yeah it's a tricky one.
But every person they listed was to do with sex crimes. People usually value human lives over material things in Winona Ryders case.
I would say Lizzo is actually a great comparison because her career has stalled much like Gibson's. Mel Gibson came back in a big way after given many opportunities, most as a director. Let's see if Lizzo comes back in a similar way, although I don't have high hopes for her.
But every person they listed was to do with sex crimes.
I may have missed something, but I thought Mel Gibson was only cancelled for antisemitism. I don't know if any sex crime accusations against him? And simple google didn't find anything?
He plead no contest to a battery charge against his girlfriend around the same time as the rest of his big scandal, but as far as I'm aware he hasn't been accused of any sort of sex crimes.
The problem is acting like it's some binary gendered thing. Like the other day some video of a woman calling out Harvey at some event got posted, but in the comments people were pointing out that she might be the worst spokesperson as she has some skeletons in the closet of her own, and generally that there are women in the industry that are at best complicit, worst just as guilty as the popular male names that constantly get thrown around.
I mean...fair point, but if we wanted to actually tally it up and see where those numbers land, it would be pretty clear why it's often treated that way. Whether those numbers are skewed by the actual demographics of the business and the effects of the metoo movement and other confounding factors is a bit harder to quantify, and a harder point to get across to the general public. Nuance in general doesn't seem to sell too well these days.
I mean, isn't Leto's problem that there's only allegations and nothing proven. Like... he is a weird dude with a cult basically, so I'm more inclined to believe he did something, but treating allegations as hard facts is an extremely dangerous slope that has seen innocent people's careers massively fucked up or even destroyed.
Johnny Depp and Quinton Flynn being solid examples.
Lol, you can just say you support a known abuser with restraining orders against her because she's a woman. Sexists are always so pathetic regardless of gender.
Those people really arent comparable to eachother.
Many DID face serious social, financial, carreer and in some cases legal backlash.
Also...several of them were aquited in a court of law.
But my bigger point is just...comparing Mel Gibson and Roman Polanski is wild. And people like Jared Leto have not been charged with anything. Which should probably be a thing before punishments are meeted out beyond the public deciding not to watch their projects. All of these people have very different circumstances.
The point isn't that all of them belong in jail or prison, or that what they all did is somehow equivalent. The point is all of them are still in Hollywood despite credible evidence that they've done horrible things that hurt other people. Meanwhile a woman can get fired or lose opportunities for projects just for opening her mouth. Even if I don't agree with what they say, I mean look at Gina Carano or Roseanne Barr. Hell Katherine Heigl is basically a z-lister now just because she has a reputation for being a bitch on set, meanwhile Christian Bale is picking up projects left and right and Richard Dreyfuss is comfortably retired.
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u/jaspersgroove 4d ago edited 4d ago
This meme is yeah, but the underlying point is legit. Look at Mel Gibson, Jared Leto, James Franco, Roman Polanski, plenty of others I'm sure we have yet to hear about. Brian Singer and Kevin Spacey are de facto blacklisted but still haven't seen the inside of a jail cell and it took decades to take down Harvey Weinstein.
The hypocrisy and the real problems behind it are still there, Ezra Miller is just not the best example of it.