Cowards

An interesting piece on Lena Dunham and rape culture.

The only rape culture preying on impressionable, confused, young women, such as Jackie from Rolling Stone’s discredited story, is the culture created by Dunham, Lady Gaga, Rolling Stone and an industry far more interested in pushing a political narrative into the mainstream than punishing specific attackers. The details become phased out. Evidence becomes inconsequential and the narrative then becomes a moral fable, to be followed, believed and adhered to on broken knee without any bounds to truth, no different than an HBO sitcom or a pop song. Accusers are to automatically be believed without merit, because they then join the ranks and grow the movement. It becomes a crusade. Claiming to be raped becomes much more glamorous and acceptable than surviving and punishing an actual rapist. It becomes cool and then becomes a necessity to fit in.

I have a big problem with all these public accusations. I simply don't know what to make of them. Are they to be taken seriously? Are they to be believed? What am I to think? Maybe I'm missing something, but if someone is raped, it is a serious crime. And when a serious crime occurs, it should be reported to the police. Look, I understand it could be hard to prove and perhaps the judicial system, flawed as it is, won't offer justice. But at least file a fucking report. I mean, how can you be a victim of a serious crime, know the person who committed the crime is out there and probably will do it again, and simply stay mute? It makes no freaking sense.

Side note: James Franco and Seth Rogen are canceling their press tour. Pussies. I still think Salman Rushdie made a gigantic mistake by going into hiding all those years ago. It taught the fundamentalists that we Westerners can be scared. When you reward behavior, you get more of it. So every time someone pusses out, they are encouraging these things to happen to others. And look, I recognize I'm saying this from behind the safety of a keyboard and blog and if I had children, etc, etc, I'm not out there on the front lines either. But I sure as hell wish people would behave with a little more bravery. I sure as hell wish Salman Rushdie, rather than going into hiding, told the Islamic Thugs he'd be happily living in New York and carrying a .45 automatic if anyone of them wanted to come have words with him. I mean, the reason we have these freedoms to publish books and movies and people like Lena Dunham, Seth Rogen, and James Franco are multi-millionaires for doing their schtick is because some brave people in the past and the present stood up and fought for freedom, for the right to free speech and expression, for women to be treated equal and to have equal opportunity. And every day someone stands up to murders and rapists in courts and testifies against them to try and make their communities better.

Lena Dunham, instead, pockets this info until now and keeps it all hush-hush, while, if we believe her, she probably allowed this rapist to go around raping others because she didn't feel like reporting it. I just don't get it...