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Polanski's Victim And Me
Scope Features / Landov
As a fellow child rape victim, hearing Roman Polanski’s supporters cite his filmmaking to justify his freedom brings the injustice of that incident flooding back.
There is a sense of outrage that cannot be quelled, that never goes away.
It appears that Roman Polanski, the film-directing admitted child rapist, has become something of a martyr to some of the smartest and most creative people in the world. People from Pedro Almodovar to Jack Lang, the former Minister of Culture in France, are attempting to portray Polanski as a man pursued by cruel and relentless demons, as though he were a victim of the Salem witch trials.
Their mitigating circumstance? He is a great Artist of the cinema. And it makes me want to vomit.
That girl is forever defined by that moment, as I have been defined by my own moment of terror and pain and horror.
Define Artist. Not so easy to do. Now define pedophiliac child rapist. Pretty simple. If Polanski had been, say, a bus driver in Cleveland who had fed Quaaludes and Champagne to a thirteen-year-old girl and then raped and sodomized her, I doubt Jack Lang would be so quick to tell the rest of us about the privileges that come with driving a bus. Jack Lang doesn’t care about bus drivers. Jack Lang cares about Artists.
Let me tell you a few things about the rape of a child. It happened to me. I was raped by my drunken father at the age of four, before the drunken eyes of my mother, so I know what I’m talking about.
• Thaddeus Russell: How Young Is Too Young?
• Marcia Clark: Polanski's Lost Alibi
• Read full coverage of the Polanski scandalIt hurts like holy hell. The next time you see a grown man walking down the street with his four-year-old son or daughter, just observe the sheer difference in the size between the two people.
And, more importantly, it is the absolute, final, and total end of childhood, of any sense of innocence and wonder. Perhaps the girl in California had already lost hers. Perhaps her mother manipulated the situation. I, frankly, don’t give a good goddamn.
That girl is forever defined by that moment, as I have been defined by my own moment of terror and pain and horror. There is, for me, no place on this whole planet that is safe. I move farther and farther from the center of things. I find myself in hotel rooms or houses in remote places where nobody knows where I am, and very few even care.
John Talks Joe
Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Jacob Bernstein is a senior reporter at The Daily Beast. Previously, he was a features writer at WWD and W Magazine. He has also written for New York magazine, Paper, and The Huffington Post.
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Jeff Madrick is a contributor to the New York Review of Books and a former economics columnist for the New York Times. He is editor of Challenge Magazine, visiting professor of humanities at Cooper Union, and senior fellow at the New School's Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis. He is the author of Taking America, The End of Affluence (Random House) and The Case for Big Government.
Well said sir, well said.
Truly sorry to hear of your pain but very happy you were brave enough to help people understand about the horrors of child rape. There have been far too few voices speaking out for the victim in this situation.
Thank you.
I am not defending Polanski. He was a guy with a lot of money and connections who was able to get away with it, and hide out in Europe for years. Some bus driver named Ralph Kramden in Cleveland wouldn't have been able to do that if he'd wanted to, and would have just gotten the maximum sentence.
As a progressive, I have known all my adult life that our "justice" system is the best that money can buy, as is our political system. People with money get all the breaks, everyone else gets shafted--1 1=2. It happens every day.
I do wonder where this girl's parents were in all this, letting her run around to late-night "parties" with older guys at the age of 13. I know she was supposedly a "model" and have a pretty good idea what that means, but the parents are partially to blame here. If they were worth anything they wouldn't have allowed her to be doing all this at a young age.
The girl was just young and dumb, as were all were once, and I do not blame the victim for getting trapped like this.
Next time at least try glancing at the widely available facts before you make assumptions about the victim's behavior. She wasn't just a "dumb" kid out partying out late at night. Polanski approached her mother under the guise of hiring the girl for a photo shoot of the European edition of Vogue. Once there, he talked her into posing nude in a hot tub. Then he tried to make advances on her and she resisted. He then forced her to drink alcohol laced with drugs to make her more compliant and proceeded to vaginally, orally and anally rape her, over her continued protests to stop and let her go home. And he filmed it all. This isn't some case of an opportunist kid/parent who knew what they were getting into and then regretted it. This is a full on kidnapping, rape and child porn predator case. Sure, you could still question the wisdom of the mother encouraging her kid to model and leaving the kid unattended with the man. And that fair, but that has nothing to do with the victim. And besides, he wasn't some strange letch at the time. He was a famous director doing the shoot at Jack Nicholson's guest house. It was reasonable to assume it was "legit." Polanski is a pedophile and a monster, period. His talent or childhood experiences as well as the behavior of the judge or prosecution are all irrelevant to that fact.
Did you read the court transcripts? You are completely ignorant and completely wrong. Take the time to educate yourself on the matter before mouthing off lies.
Roman Polanski at 43-years old drugged, raped, and sodomized a 13-year old child against her wishes. She didn't go to a party, she went to get photographed and asked to go home when he started coming on to her. You are a pathetic pedophile apologist and complete scum.
Hold on a minuter, crymeariver, you are way out of line. You berate mcmchugh99 as a pedophile apoligist and someone who doesn't have the facts, but did you read what he wrote? He is not excusing Polanski's actions, he is questioning the parents part in setting up what happened. While he may not be reciting from the court transcript he is certainly asking a question many of us might have. The parents did allow the child to go with him unescorted. This set the stage for what occurred later. I don't think a responsible parent lets a 13 year old go off with an adult that is not either a trusted friend or relative, and I don't believe Polanski was either. I don't think there is any call for the nastiness you unleashed because he was not saying it was okay that Polanski did this.
Crymeariver is a typical Repblican who rants and raves all the time, based on no facts at all.
Okay, fine. and the writer's story is awful. But I suggest that being raped by your father at age four is not a remotely comparable situation.
soporifix, you're right -- different situations. But murder is murder and rape is rape. They are both equally mosterous acts in the end. I hope you don't mean to suggest that kidnapping, drugging and repeatedly vaginally, orally and anally raping a 13-year old girl over her repeated pleas to stop and let her go and filming it all is somehow not quite as terrible a crime? Thta's like trying to split hairs over whether Hitler or Stalin was a more terrible dictator -- both killed millions of people.
The girl's mother asked to go along on the "photo shoot," but was told that her presence would inhibit things. Did she make a mistake by agreeing to stay home, i.e. being blinded by a celebrity director? Well, yes. Was that mistake as great as Polanski made? Hell, no.
What difference it make "where this girl's parents were"? Give me a break. I guess if a woman where's a short skirt, her morals are in question and she's responisible for whatever comes her way.
Polanski duped the mother. But what does it matter about "where were the parents??" Really? A rapist is a rapist.
Excellently said!
I'm sick of people dancing around this issue -- with Roman Polanski or any other criminals of his ilk. We don't want to call them by the vile names they are. Thank you for being one to call it!!!
And you are right -- Polanski doesn't deserve any consideration even if her mother stood there and helped. He should be punished to the full extent of the law and THEN look to see if the mother should be prosecuted too. Outrageous.
the new Holywood motto:
Rape a child and be a star
Shame on those people
By the way Hitler shouldn't be forgiven , he was also an artist!
Very good, thank you for saying that, my heart goes out to you.
Living in France, I am saddened but not surprised at the reaction of these neo latte liberals.
No, correction: it's not fair to say it's only coming from the Left over here. I hear it from all sides, and It's another flimsy, ill-thought out excuse to berate the US....again.
The bus driver analogy is good, it may work in the US, but I swear, right now the French are being spoon-fed anti American drivel again by the press here, so they would sympathize with Polanski even if he were an axe murderer.
Their point is that sex is good--ANY kind, and with ANYone--, and that Americans are "puritans."
overdue:
What makes you think that people that lean toward liberalism (like me) don't think this troll is getting a pass? You need to get out more and meet people that don't necessarliy think like you do.
Dear Genni: please re-read my post. I'm talking about French people I deal with on a daily basis.....in france.
My job allows me to meet people from all walks of life, and many demographics; roughly 10-15 new faces every day.
I have yet to meet ONE French person (apart from my wife) who doesn't excuse him.
Furthermore, I "correct" myself, and note that it's not ONLY liberals who think he's getting a free pass.
Have you read ANY French press that isn't sympathetic to him?
You're right though. At least the feminists over here are asking people to question their allegiances to Mr. Polanski.
Ah yes, the French feminists: How's it going, Mr Strauss-Kahn?
many liberals (esp Hollywood) have said that he is too talented an artist to go after him. Whoopi G said it's not "rape-rape". They seem to represent the left in almost all cases. I also heard libs calling into a talk show and using every excuse in the book for the sick rapist. Maybe you need to talk to 'your reps' out there.
over: you said you live in France, doesn't mean you are only talking about the French and I believe that elle also recognized this by immediately mentioning Hollywood....Agree with you that a lot of support is coming to him from a variety of people and I don't understand it?
over- ya, okay. It is there...
Why are you "putting everybody in the same basket" as we say in French. I am a French liberal (but without the latte) who has lived in the US and is sometimes amused, sometimes appalled by the degree of ignorance and quick judgment from the US towards France and vice versa. I, for myself, don't consider that all americans are "puritans", nor that French will have sex with anyone, under any circumstances (Wouah : that makes what? 30 million of potential child molesters!, very scary!You should go home!). Living abroad, you should know better than judge a whole country by his politicians and its press. I could not have stayed in the US if I would have restricted my understanding of the american people by the same means. I am also outraged but not surprised by the support Roman Polanski is getting and I believe that justice should follow suit. A rape is a rape. He definitely should stand trial.
I also take issue with your assumptions that all liberals are ready to let this guy off the hook. As a card-carrying liberal from way back I hope they keep this guy in jail and toss the key into a pit of alligators. I teach kids the age of the victim, and every time I think of one of my students going through something like this I am torn between sorrow and absolute outrage.
I am a liberal and I am disgusted by those trumpeting Polanski. If he did that to my kid I don't know what I would have done.
Roman Polanski is a world famous director and a rapist.
He knew the girl was only thirteen.
He was over 40 years old.
He fed her alcohol and a quaalude so he could penetrate her.
He did so anally.
What excuses that?
Time?
Awards?
He ran away and stayed away.
He got caught.
I don't feel sorry for him.
I comprehend the circumstances of child rape, I was a victim of repeated rape at the age of 8. For much of a year, I spent every day and night waiting to see if it would be that day or the next when I would be raped again. I am now 40 and rarely a moment has passed in my life when the events of my 8th-9th years do not impact me.
However, I support the victim, Mrs. Geimer when she begs not to have to face this whole issue again, when she asks the D.A. of Los Angeles not to have to deal with the case. She says that each time Polanski is in the news all attention turns to her, she must confront her rape again and it hurts her, her husband and her children.
I have never met a victim of child abuse that does not wish they could put it all aside, place it on a shelf somewhere and be at peace. Statements by Geimer indicate that the events of over 30 years ago are only a problem for her when she must confront them again, that is reason enough to let the issue alone.
Polanski can never be excused, never. He should however be set free so that his victim doesn't have to go through with this again. Set the charges aside, cease to prosecute them, not for Polanski, for Geimer.
No.
I sympathize with that statement and also the desire of Geimer (and many others like her) to abandon this painful memory instead of reliving it again and again, but crimes of this nature are always traumatic, and if we stopped prosecuting people in order to spare the difficulty it puts on victims and their families, rape would be an even more widespread issue than it is today (if you'd like to imagine that). The fact is, Polanski already thinks he's right, and that is the most grotesque thing he's done thus far. Obviously I say that for effect, but truly - to brutally rape a child, admit to it, and then actually proceed, balls-out, to paint yourself as a martyr is the most disgusting thing I've heard so far. His justification of his actions is almost sociopathic. Some genuine remorse might help his case a little, not this "everyone wants to f**k young girls!" bullshit excuse-making.
Another thing: I think it's safe to say that, along with the hypothetical bus driver, it is a fact that if this case were not decades old, nobody would have the balls to stand up and spew pathetic defenses like it wasn't "rape-rape" or that Polanski's art outweighs his violence and perversion. If we still had a traumatized thirteen-year-old girl in front of us, rather than a grown woman with a family and a new life desperately trying to stay out of the limelight, not a single Hollywood bigshot would be caught backing Polanski. If anything, they'd be as unassociated as possible with something so unsympathetic. But time has taken away much of the effect of this crime, and now it is safe for some to claim, from a distance, that a handful of Polanski's achievements (the good ones) are more influential and relevant than the traumatic event that left permanent marks of pain to haunt one woman her entire life. Thirty years later, it is no longer philistinism (or barbarism) to condone the rape of a minor. The only "Philistines" in 2009, according to Hollywood, are those who cannot sweep such crimes under the rug in the favor of Art.
Errol Flynn's acquittal in the statutory rape of two underaged girls coined the corruptible phrase "in like Flynn.' In 1959, at age 50, Flynn planned to marry15 year old Beverly Adland but died before doing so. Charlie Chaplin, who shared Flynn's and Polanski's underage peccadilloes, was 29 when he married 16 yr old Mildred Harris. At age 35, he married 16yr old Lita Errol Flynn's acquittal in the statutory rape of two underaged girls coined the corruptible phrase "in like Flynn.' In 1959, at age 50, Flynn planned to marry15 year old Beverly Adland but died before doing so. Charlie Chaplin, who shared Flynn's and Polanski's underage peccadilloes, was 29 when he married 16 yr old Mildred Harris. At age 35, he married 16yr old Lita grey. His final marriage was to Eugene O'Neil's daughter, Oona, just turned 18 who was 36 yrs his junior. Conductor Leopold Stokowski wed Gloria Vanderbilt when was 17 and he 58. And though Polanski may not have the history of Flynn and Chaplin, he has the credentials of Clare Quilty, Lolita's rapist, who lured his victim to pose for photographs. Those complacent Polanski apologists who attempt to excuse his crime because the 13 yr old "looked much older" and/or that the child's parents should held responsible for having left their daughter unchaperoned elide both justice and humanity. Complicity is itself a crime.
Why do you mix fact and fiction? An older man marrying a younger woman is a practice that goes back to the caves. What does this have to do with the rape of a child?
Why is it that one man's supposed crime, becomes a crime for everyone on your personal self loathing laundry list?
Power is an elixir that erases boundaries. Hollywood is still a horrifying example of how power corrupts. Why, just yesterday I was watching Larry King as an actress described how she and her famous father had sex together for many years. She defended him!
I have nothing but disdain for most of the elite Hollywood crowd. What a poor example they are to our children---and to the rest of the world. They do not represent what is best about America. I think they shame us instead.
Nice line about power," By the way, magicians wands are made from the wood of holly trees, thus we have Hollywood." found that quote the other day, google it for all that goes with it. http://www.davesweb.cnchost.com/index.html This site will open your eyes to mind and scene of Polanski, Phil Spector, Mackenzie Phillips, and lots more..
Why are you dragging in Leopold Stokowski and Gloria Vanderbilt, a completely consensual and legal marriage? There have always been older men with young brides, and guess what! There have also always been young girls who are very attracted to older men. Your list of famous couplings is kind of slanderous. And you don't seem to know what you're talking about.
You have put into words the way I feel about this situation. So very sorry for what you went through and that you had to endure this invasion of your tiny body starting when you were only four. Know that your experience is teaching the rest of us so much.
Wonder if the girl Polanski brutalized was younger, like you were, at the time of his attack if that would make a difference? 11? 10? Probably not for the jackasses that are supporting him today.
I bet you it would make a difference. Because it would be a different situation. Also if she was a male, that would make a difference. Also if there was a knife to her throat, that would make a difference. If she was gang-raped in a jungle: difference. Differences make a difference, or they should anyway. I think that's why some people do feel they can support him and why the victim herself is tired of this.
None of your "differences" would make a difference to Polanski apologists. They are firmly fixed in their defense of him and will excuse ANYTHING because:
1) His mom died in the Holocaust
2) His wife was murdered
3) He is a great film-maker.
Ok, what you are saying is it is reasonable for people to cut him a break because tricking a girl's mother into believing that he was doing a professional paid model shoot for Vogue, drugging the girl so she couldn't resist, repeatedly vaginally, orally and anally raping her as she continued to plead for him to stop and let her go home and filming the whole thing is not the bad kind of rape? Frankly, your moral code sucks.
Look, I don't like what he admits to doing so if it is okay with you, I will stick with my first assertion. That I don't think that it would make a difference to his supporters - although it SHOULD make a difference to him, a person who understands what it is like to be a victim.
One thing, why is being gang raped by many people so much worse than being drugged and raped by one person? What is that all about?
Mr. Goolrick, Thank you! While I have not experienced your pain, I feel the same anger and you've expressed it all so beautifuly! It is true: rape is as vicious as killing , maybe even worse than murder.
I'm going to sent the link to your story to David Lynch, apparently he has found peace of mind in Budhism, yet is one of Polanski's defenders. And I will never see a Almodovar, Scorsese , Miramax film again, unless they come to their senses. Woody Allen I allready stopped watching.
Once again, thank you.
why do you bloggers and their commenters insist on generalizing? Yes, your words are a painful reminder of your horrible experiences and you are brave to share them. But what the F__ does that have to do with the world of art? Of course, his friends, or at least many of them, are supporting him and he is a filmaker. This does not mean that Hollywood is possessed by the devil or that 'everyone in Hollywood' is a liberal, or that this is a left wing/right wing conspiracy. I think most people agree that he needs to come back here and pay his dues. No need to turn this into a religion of self righteousness.
How many unions have come out in favor of giving this pervert a pass? How many dress makers? Have the pastry chefs of the world gotten together to give this wicked man a sloppy kiss? How many men's organizations, besides NAMBLA of course, want him to go free?
The self-righteous are those who think thier 'art' is so important it excuses fantastic wickedness.
al sends
While I'm horrified to read that the author experienced such a terrible trauma, I don't think it is correct to compare a sexually abused toddler to a sexually active 13 year old who had a horrifyingly creepy afternoon.
I came of age in the 70's. My high school had a large number of pregnant girls and casual drug use and alcohol consumption was a recreational pastime. However, I didn't know a lot of girls who were losing their virginity at 13. Samantha Gailey was moving pretty fast for a girl of that time period. She also seems to have had a little more knowledge about qualudes then she should have for someone who took one once when she was 10 (and knew enough to break it.)
I'm not saying she agreed to have sex with Polanski, I'm just saying she submitted (probably with the teenage "I don't care" mentality) to get it over with without putting up too much resistance. That's not really rape, that's an unpleasant sexual experience and a sad rite of passage for an adolescent girl. This was years before the "No means no" campaigns. Back then no meant maybe, maybe meant yes, and a lady never said yes outright. Indeed it was a different time and place. As for Polanski being a middle aged man, I hate to tell you this but middle aged men used to make passes at teenage girls, and if they could get them into bed, they would.
Yes Polanski took advantage of Samantha Gailey and sodomizing her adds an additional level of awfulness to what the kid put up with that afternoon. But she shouldn't have gone back after the first photo shoot when he asked her to pose topless. She should have told her mother. And speaking of her mother.....
Well said, sir. Like many people, I am aghast and appalled at how many seemingly respectable people are not just excusing, but exalting this lowest kind of criminal. Sure, Polanski had a hard life. Harder than many people, I'm sure. It's no excuse to steal someone's childhood. To do so publicly and unapologetically is obscene.
I have to agree that this type of crime is worse than a murder. Murders are sometimes mitigated. Rape is never committed for the "greater good."
I agree his movie making abilties should have not be taken into account when deciding his innocence or guilt, BUT the fact that 1) This case is over Thirty years old and 2) The fact that Polanski's victim wants this charge go away should be enough for this case to go away.
Roman Polanski commited one of the most horrible crimes that a person can commit, but with the facts stated above the media and the attorney need to ask one simple qustion by grandstanding on this case who are they serving justice to.
Also Marcia Clarck's article was silly to say the case could turn on a lying district attorney who says the attorney is not lying to her and told the real truth when he wanted to renig on Polanski's plea bargain and serve him up to the masses.
Your points are not actually very reasonable.
1) So, if a fugitive felon manages to elude capture long enough, his crime should just be forgotten?
2. The victim does not get to decide whether or not the state prosecutes.
Whatever this all just amouts to grandstanding on a case that is more then 30 years old and just has become an issue again recently again it is a horrible crime.
And if you are so inclined to know where I am comming from you should read an article in the Sacrement Bee by Bruce Maimen titled Persue Polanski: It's hard to justify now. He makes a a few reasoned points where he is not defending Polanski, but rather the law as as Americans SHOULD KNOW IT.
You're an idiot.
This case is 30 years old because the perp skipped the country. Doh.
Could the victim be getting a lot of high profile pressure to request the charges go away? From the same sources that are saying this rich, white rapist is somehow the victim.
Read much? The D.A. in Marcia Clark's article was not the same D.A. in the Polanski case. He is a by-stander who attended the court cases. They got him for a propaganda film in defense of Polanski. Although not involved in the case at all, he claims in the movie to have talked to have questioned the judge on the ethics of the plea bargain for such a hideous crime.
He was involved in the case. He did much of the investigation. He also gave the judge the "Oktoberfest scandal" photos. He is only now denying that he had a conversation with the judge to encourage a harsher sentence because of those photos.
So based on your logic anyone who is wealthy or powerful can commit any crime they want and as long as they use their money and connections to evade justice long enough and pay off the victim or family of the victim, that's okay and we should all just move on? Polanski paid the victim millions and now she lives comfortably in Hawaii. She would get nothing more from his conviction and is losing her ability to continue her life without the specter of this case shining a light on her. So of course she wants it to go away. But that doesn't mean it's in societies interest. Its well known that Polanski has had to pay numerous women off subsequently for various sexual allegations. The man is a predator and society has a responsibility to try and remove him as a danger that supersedes the personal wishes of the compensated victim.
Citivas: I am trying to educate myself on the facts of this case. You have mentioned several times in earlier posts that Polanski filmed the rape. Where is this information from? Also, has anyone found any official documents available online besides the victim's account and the guilty plea transcripts?
If Polanski's thirteen-year old victim has been a boy instead of a girl, I doubt very much he'd now have any bleeding-heart apologists.
It's normal to try and explain why, but it confuses the issue. In my opinion, the point should be the law is what it is, and it's gender neutral. At the end of the day it's irrelevant what Hollywood decision makers or bus drivers think.
I do not in any way mean to minimize sexual assault upon children (or anyone) but as I read this article and thread I had just now come off two hours of reading political articles and threads, mostly about the predilection of members of the United States Congress to stiff the American people for the sake of their own accumulation of wealth and perqs and power. "Lots of lobby money for me, and no health care for you; in fact, fuck you." And, frankly, I see a parallel.
You ARE minimizing sexual assault on a child. A child who grows up to be an adult and has to live with it until the day they die.
The similar theme is the one you identified: money is power. People make excuses for those in power for myriad reasons, including self preservation.
I don't think your minimizing anything as long as there's acknowledgment of the activities' legal differences. Thing is I assume people have some sense and there's not always proof of that on blogs, lol.
The loss of innocence in childhood from being raped sickens the soul forever. To never feel safe is the worst sentence a rapist gives to his victim. How can anyone forgive this?
I am alarmed by the attitude of France and many here in America.
I believe you should be saying some in France and some here in America.
@ Overdue
I really hope that what you're saying-----that rape is okay with the French (because after all, good sex is just good sex)---is not true. I hope that you were being simplistic to prove a point.
Rape in any culture should horrify its members, should be outlawed, punished and legally discouraged. One doesn't need to be a "Puritan" to arrive at such a conclusion--one must simply be a human being.
Oh, and yawn, yawn, yawn. The French are speaking disparagingly against the Americans? Say it isn't so! What else is new?
Not being an Obama supporter, I'm just not worried about whether you like us or not. I am concerned, however, about your contention that the French have such a lax attitude about rape.
Nothing would surprise me about the French, though. Nothing.
How the hell does time elapsed have anything to do with raping a minor? that's just flabbergasting. He drugged, raped, cowarded out of his sentence and this country... and we should look the other way? It was so long ago ergo it's forgotten? For whom? The girl says shes forgiven him BUT also said she didn't want to relive the whole ordeal through a trial. Remember folks... a pedo is a pedo is a pedo.
It's pretty stunning Polanski is getting support because
he's a " talented artist. " SO ! Big F-ing Deal.
Just ask all his supporters the simple question . . .
would you be okay if a forty year old man drugged
your 13 year old daughter and raped her, and would you
forgive him because he's " talented ? "
Sir, I am so sorry for what happened to you. It is awful. Please know that all people are not like that. I'm so sorry you had to start your life under those circumstances. I hope you can find peace, somehow, some way.
As for this young girl, now a woman who has learned to live with this disgusting act and now does not want to pursue it, she is the same as many victims who want to try to forget and move on with their lives. But make no mistake, this was RAPE. And if her mother had anything to do with it she should be charged too. I don't know how she can liove with herself. I can't imagine any 13 year old who has consensual anal sex. c'mon people - would you really think it was ok if it had been your child? This whole thing stinks.
Well said. I was also a sexually abused child who spent years trying to drink and medicate the pain away. It is nothing short of horrifying to hear all these people minimizing his behavior.
I am sorry for this person's sad story but the rape of a 4 year old BOY by his own father is many times more horrifying than the statutory rape we are talking about. It just is. I would think that was obvious. A sense of perspective is needed.
To a causal observer with a rape-o-meter, sure we can judge and assume, oh it must have been worse for that 4yo boy than for that 13 yo girl, but the truth is to the victim rape is rape. Because someone else may have been raped more often, or more violently does not erase the incident, the pain, or the memories.
Rape is rape. Heterosexual rape is just as bad as homosexual rape.
I agree Trilby. A sense of perspective is needed.
I had some Germans over this weekend, and they said that in Germany the mother would have been held responsible also as she is legally responsible for the whereabouts of the child until the age of 16. Why was that girl in that house that night? Parents actually sell off their children for sex and drugs, yes, even in America.
Children are raped everyday, girls are sold into 'marriage' before puberty all the time and in many countries. In most cases they have no legal recourse at all and this has gone on for thousands of years in many cultures.
Will America take the high ground on this issue and really look at the sexual exploitation of children worldwide?
There is no reason to conflate this out of what it is. Mr. Polanski raped a child, he is a criminal when he fled America, he is now in custody and should be tried and if found guilty, be sent to jail.
These things you say are true and are a separate issue entirely!
It was not statutory rape by any stretch of the imagination. That's just the line of propaganda put out by Polanski apologists.
How is forcibly detaining a 13-year old girl against her will (kidnapping), drugging her, then filming yourself vaginally, anally an orally raping hr over her continued please to stop and let her go home merely statutory rape? I believe it is you who needs a better sense of perspective.
There is no perspective to rape. A person being raped doesn't say that this is better/worse than another rape.
That's untrue. I've been raped, and I understand the many degrees of rape. There is a vast difference in degrees of trauma between the rape of a 4 year old male boy by his father in the presence of his mother, the rape of a 13 year old female virgin, the rape of a sexually active 13 year old virgin, the rape of a wife by her husband, a seductive rape, a violent rape with threat of murder, rape by a stranger, rape by someone trusted. It's just a fact. These are all illegal. They progress along the spectrum to the point in some situations where no really did mean yes, where legally the perp should have refrained but did not, but the "victim" has no trauma because they consented in their heart but society made them feel that good girls always protest. (I am not inferring that is what happened in the Polanski case.) All cases are different.
How well I recall the Polanski scandal when it first broke.
There was a slight bit of residual sympathy for him left over from the Manson murders, plus he got some credit for, you know, having the artistic GUTS to defy another old, worn out taboo, etc.
Talk about REPULSION.
Then later from Europe we got to see pictures of him cavorting with some European mother-daughter team, seemingly exalting as he flipped the finger to puritan America.
I'm glad he was caught by his own over-confidence and I will be glad to see him frog-marched to prison.
Perhaps his creepy Hollywood supporters will bear him to prison on a luxury cart.
So Trilb.
Shall we use the 1 to 10 scale to rate rape?
@ Tribly - I don't think you can put such a horrific crime in any order or more or less pain on legal term basis.
I was not raped but came pretty close few time with my uncle. Even if you want to forget everything and move forward, it scars your life forever. I have lost my capability to trust men. I am very paranoid and suspicious when it comes to men. I don't think I will trust anyone with my daughter.
I understand what the author means. No one has the right to touch a child and should not get away unpunished.
I am so terribly sorry to hear about what happened to you, sir. It must have been awful, having to share all of this so openly. But I want to thank you for doing so, because it puts an even brighter spotlight onto the horrendous hypocrisy & disgusting depravity of the Hollywood elite. They dare to preach to us on the one hand about human art, truth, & beauty, yet their private lives are so devoid of any actual humanity that it's truly shocking. Celebrity has become a dangerous virulent disease in this country, one that has been used to excuse all manner of disgusting, criminal perversions. I see this whole mess with Roman Polanski as the culmination of so many years of sexual deviants, out of control addicts, and holier-than-thou political preachers that have come out of Hollywood lately. The fact that any decent American still tolerates this behavior from their "stars" is beyond me, let alone that we still give these people any of our money to "entertain" us. This isn't entertainment anymore, this is us enabling their criminal behavior. And I, for one, have had enough of it.
In my opinion, it's about time we boycott Hollywood, until they can clean themselves up. I'm done being an enabler.
You don't have to boycott Hollywood - you just have to not look to them for morality or special information. They have a product and you buy their product - just like you buy milk or shoes. You don't think that the purveyors of that milk or shoes have any special understanding or insight - do you. Neither do the people of Hollywood - many are actually quite stupid.
The Daily Beast has a split-personality. The same day it publishes this great article about the damage that being raped as a child does to your entire life, the publish "another side" in an article called "How young is too young" in which the writer questions whether Polanski's victim was actually raped:
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"Whether Polanski actually forced the girl into sex is still an open question; she has announced that she "said no" but has also asked for the case to be dismissed."
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I guess when a person says no and they are still drugged and raped, it's only "force" when done by ANYONE else BUT Polanski. Unfortunately the Polanski apologists own the media. I can't wait for their pro-incest article!
Thank you.
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