To hav3 had enough of Harvey Weinstein on the radio

These are alleged awful crimes GGMk2 so let's not start being judge and jury here before a proper or indeed any trial has been held. Are you then saying that there are no women who are prepared to sexually service a powerful man and/or ignore his actions because they think this is acceptable as a trade for career advancement? Or that these women are victims because they choose to do so? I think that times have moved on and we now have some women (and in some ways I admire them) who are fully aware of their sexuality and are prepared to use it. Of course there are real victims, but not all women are victims and casting them as such is actually demeaning women.

Still victim blaming deciding who you will choose to see as victims and who are not Anya and Trisher even though you have no evidence whatsoever.

All abuse is abuse. There is no hierarchy.

Rather than wasting your energy making yourselves happier people by reducing the empathy you have for others why not use that energy to make the world a more just place.

Why not fight the impulse to rationalize what has happened and recognize that you, in different circumstances, could have been in their shoes. It does not make anything less illegal because of the industry it takes place in or because of the culture or because of the clothes people wear.

Why not use the compassion - which you seem prepared to give up to make these awful crimes seem acceptable to yourselves - to work for a more equal workplace and one where people can always be heard if they complain and where they will not have others dreaming up a vision of who they are in order to make themselves feel better.

Well said Anya and Trisher .

Will we have posts on the treatment of kitchen maids in the 19th century ?

I wonder if all these complaints are true or is it like many other abuse allegations, some true some some not.

I think have to view this in many ways. Firstly it has nothing at all to do with child abuse and there is not some sort of a sliding scale where people slip from one form of abuse to another. Secondly this took place in Hollywood in an industry which judges women by their looks and where they negotiate what they are worth mostly by this and what they are prepared to do. So some actresses will appear naked in sex scenes, some won't. Equally some women will have sex with someone who is powerful and might help them and their careers, and some won't. This isn't excusing any instance of assault or of Weinstein using his power to co-erce any woman into having sex, simply pointing out that the context of what happened is important. And that the border between payment for sex (in kind, not necessarily in cash), consensual sex and coerced sex are not necessarily as clear and obvious as is being assumed. Of course the women who said 'no' were entitled to do so and he should not have proceeded, but equally the women involved could have spoken out some time ago and chose not to, that they have chosen to do so after a substantial payment was made to an accuser must cast a shadow over their reasons.

Like many on here I suspect, I was groped at work. He was a very senior person within the company,and made a very vulgar comment as he brushed against me ( I was bending over to get something out of a drawer). Luckily, the men I worked with were angry on my behalf and told me to complain, they would back me up. I did, and he was made to apologise to me in the HR office. A small victory, although he qualified it by saying it was a misunderstanding. Still at least his card was marked, I kept my job, and he didn't do it to anyone else as far as I know. I do understand that not everyone has this option, and can I repeat again, I am not victim blaming.

I’ll save my sympathy for those victims who had no choice in the matter. Woman who were forced into sexual acts and children.

I’ve no time for those who constantly see women as victims. Portraying them as week and at the mercy of men does them no favours. The message should be that women are strong, women have choices and it’s OK to say no, OK to tell. For those who have no choice I cry.

But for those who stand in shock while, as an actual example, this idiot masturbates into a plant pot in her presence and keeps schtum, then I say ‘Sister, FFS, shout that from the rooftops loud and clear’.

Gillybob - I do use the preview button and still manage to produce gobbledegook so I hope people can sort mine out too.

It is really good to read the reasoned and thoughtful posts as I am actually really shocked - not at the victim blaming - we all want to find reasons for the unreasonable - but that people, in this day and age, cannot see what they are doing and what it does to our culture.

To me the victim blaming they are undertaking is no better than the men in Rotherham, and some of those in the services that should protect the victims, blaming the child victims. It was the men that were culpable not the victims and it is this man who is in the wrong - not his victims.

Gilly after reading all the gobbledegook on here, already, your post makes perfect sense.

Why oh why don't I use the preview button? Hope you understood that gobbledegook.

Several really good and thoughtful comment - good to see them.

To me it appears that one man has committed many crimes. He either has or he hasn't. He, from what we have heard him actually saying, appears to have no idea of what 'consensual' means. He is a manipulative bully - we have heard that from his own mouth. He is an adult responsible for his own actions.

It is simply the case that bad things do happen to good people and the bad people perpetrating the bad things do not always get punished.

It may make people feel less frightened of the world to infer this only happened if there was some 'reason' - in this case the possible character of the victim - but actually all that does is enable more bad things to happen to more good people and more bad people to go unpunished.

That boss to which I referred would have never been sacked or replaced if I had spoken out Eloethan I on the other hand would have probably been out the door for causing trouble and he knew how much I needed that job so had no choice out to put up and shut up .

I am shocked to see some of the comments on here and don't feel that Gracesgran is "going over the top" in feeling very strongly about men who appear to believe they have the right to use and abuse women. We have had comments such as:

"Hollywood is not the real world" (I'm not sure what that means. These women are "real women". Just because they work in a superficial and non-essential job (as do many other people) does that mean they must accept this sort of behaviour?

"The people who were abused here were victims but they were adults, adults who had an element of choice ..... these adults could have decided that getting into or staying in the film industry was not what they wanted"

"These women were only "vulnerable" in as much as it affected their careers" (Isn't a woman's career of importance then? Should women who are routinely intimidated in their work simply decide to give up their ambitions and do something else?).

"[these women] not your usual victim types" (whatever does that mean?).

Feeling strongly about this issue does not detract from the obscenity of what has happened, and continues to happen, to children. One does not cancel out the other. Both these issues are about the misuse of power. Why is it felt that being outraged by this man's behaviour somehow renders what happens to children less important?

Should have said the "accuser" not the accused, or rather the victim.

My quandary Iam64 is that if he ever appeared on the news accused of some sex crime or other, would I keep quiet or would I come forward? Not for any personal gain ( I put that particular nasty time away many moons ago) but for the accused so she would be believed ?
I agree there were a lot if these types around back in the day. They got away with it because we had nowhere to turn and we needed the job.

Same on every thread Anya

gillybob - you make the point well, most of us have had very similar experiences. I got a part time job managing an office when my oldest started school. The woman I was replacing warned me the owner was a groper but she felt I'd manage him better than she could
He was disgusting, physically and also his personal hygiene was poor. I could live with that but he behaved in the way you describe, he'd also grab, hold, touch inappropriately. Nowadays I'd have reported him but then, it was genuinely seen as "normal" for some men to behave like that. By the end of week 1 I told him if he ever touched me, came into my personal space again, I'd walk out. It worked. He knew his behaviour wasn't acceptable and he was able to control it. I stayed because I needed the money, enjoyed the varied work and the hours suited school perfectly.
I don't feel scared for life because of this experience but I wish I'd been in a stronger position financially and more able to find child friendly hours. Also the job itself was great on my CV - I did a year and left

I was groped and slobbered over by a disgusting older (married) boss when I was in my 20's (he was in his 50's) he stunk of cigarette smoke and he would grab me from behind and try to kiss me. I was terrified of being alone in the office with him and used to maneuver myself toward the exit whenever he entered the room. He once told me that he had "dreams" about what he would do to me which was the final straw. I couldn't tell anyone as I was terrified of losing my job (I was a single mum at the time) but did manage to pluck the courage up to tell a young lad in the factory who told me that he suspected that was why the woman before me had left. I did eventually find a new job but wonder about the poor (young, because she would have been) girl who replaced me.

There are a couple of BBC interviews on line this morning that I thought discussed the issues here well. One is with Emma Thompson and the other with Jane Fonda. Emma T says she spent time in her 20's trying to keep old mens tongues out of her mouth. Jane F said she heard rumours about HW a year or so ago and didn't speak out because she didn't have first hand experience of it. Both make the point that the now famous women who allege HW behaved inappropriately or tried to coerce them into sexual behaviour with him, were then much younger, some 17 some in their early 20's.
I don't know about anyone else here but I'm much more confident now than I was in my 20's. In one office I worked in, an older man would walk up and stand very close to us young women. If you moved, he moved with you. It was most peculiar and very unpleasant. I complained to the office manager who agreed that his man always behaved like that but as he didn't go any further, it was best to ignore him. Ok don't deal with the man then.

You misrepresented someone's argument to make it easier to attack.
By exaggerating, misrepresenting, or just completely fabricating someone's argument, it's much easier to present your own position as being reasonable, but this kind of dishonesty serves to undermine honest rational debate.

Straw man.

What a load of cobblers!

Anniebach to quote your own words '...you have read what you want to read and not what is my post,...'

What I said was that these acts are part of a continuum that CAN lead to child sex abuse. I think the continuum begins with wolf whistles and can end up with the kind of crimes that make horrendous news articles. Some may never do more than wolf whistle. Others may not stop until they reach the most hideous depravities.

As for HW, I didn't say he was guilty of any crimes. He has, however, confessed to committing a number of unpleasant acts.

I find it very sad that people are still prepared to put the blame on the women themselves for falling prey to such situations. I thought we'd moved on from the days of blaming women for being raped because they wore a mini skirt.

So any woman AB who has been subjected to being cornered by a man, in a position of power, who has her trapped in a place she cannot make safe for herself, who is bigger and heavier than her and who is threatening her career now knows that you and women like you will see her as someone who will grit their teeth and put up with his groping - or worse - in the hope of furthering their career.

Whatever anyone who has been in that position felt before about their abuse you really will have made them feel far, far worse and made the chances of anyone actually reporting such behaviour much less likely for fear of comments like yours.

Some of the remarks on here - which blame women for their own mistreatment - explain why we remain in the situation where powerful men feel they have the right to use that power to abuse and intimidate women.

From what I have seen and read, some women felt they had to submit to this sort of treatment in order to be employable. Other women say that they did not go along with this man's demands and, in fighting off his attentions, were intimidated, belittled and frightened.

Whilst at the moment it is the high profile film industry which is under the microscope, there are no doubt instances in other employment fields where women have felt sexually intimidated, or worse, by their male bosses. It is not a new phenomenon. Historically women have been seen as inferior to men and their function as primarily to serve the needs of men. Whilst much has changed since those times, there is still a disproportionate amount of power accorded to men and an underlying lack of respect for women.

In my view, there is certainly not too much coverage of this issue. As other commentators have said, this is not just about one man but about a culture - even in countries that like to see themselves as "civilised" - in which women are not accorded the same respect as men.

As usual GG, you claim you have read what you want to read and not what is my post,

I HAVE NOT MADE EXCUSES FOR THE MAN, capitals in case you accidentally misread yet again.

He is a leacherous creep, but going by some posts here, gropers will become child sex abusers.

So I wonder how many of us have worked with, dated, stood in a queue with child sex abusers, seems most of us.

I do not agree these woman were naive, vulnerable women, they grittier their teeth and put up with his groping in the hope of getting into films. Stupid yes, but vulnerable ? No

Geyneth Paltrow look traumatised / distressed in the clip I
posted?