Another Canadian Icon Sullied (2014 Jian Ghomeshi sexual assault discussion)

well, I mean a week ago I would've. I'd be way too creeped out by it now.

A few thoughts on this matter:

- in Canada there is no such thing as consenting-to-violence, so even if Jian had these women sign notarized consent forms it wouldn't have made a difference.
> I don't agree with this law, or maybe I do? but so many people certainly break it, with consent, which makes Jian's donning of that particular defence that much more disturbing, as it implicates family and friends who work in/engage in BDSM.

- physical and sexual assault claims are notoriously difficult to prove in court, and proceedings are intensely degrading to the victims; my mother, who works with battered women, says "filing charges" should be the second-least preferable resort (with staying silent being the least preferable).

What is intensely dispiriting to me (aside from the obvious) is the insistence all over the web that Jian needs be charged/proven guilty before anyone can pass judgement, as if people are incapable of dealing with systems of physical and sexual violence without the justice system getting involved.

Been interesting seeing a lot (hardly all) of clowns who had been going just like that either settle into quiet begrudging acceptance of what went down or else went into self-flailing mode shrieking that they were 'betrayed' by Jian's Sunday statement.

I'm frustrated that people needed the movie version of events instead of the journalism version

I can't be the only 29 y/o music-liking Ontarian who had to be reminded who Moxy Früvous are.

You might be just a little too young. They were huge for a minute in the mid-90s, with heavy MuchMusic play. I'm 35 and went to a school with a Gifted programme; I had to hear frequent singalongs of "The Drinking Song", "King of Spain", etc.

Fairly recently, some high school friends were posting the MF version of "Green Eggs and Ham" on FB.

Idle checks on his FB page show his 'likes' numbers steadily dropping. Not precipitously dropping (yet) but the spiral is in play.

There's a FB campaign to defriend him - a link going around that tells you which friends like him and you're supposed to ask them to defriend!

MF's actual moment in the sun, when they got lots of plays on Much Music etc was 1992-93. All the famous songs mentioned here (King of Spain, Green Eggs, Drinking Song, the one about Authors, Gulf War) were all on their 1992 demo cassette, when that was a thing in Canada- the Barenaked Ladies did an indie cassette that went gold. Their debut album which came out more than a year later had re-recordings and everyone was tired of them by then (plus the other, worse material of course). Why am I telling you this fact? To establish that you would have to be at least sentient by 1992 to have experienced their heyday.

Meantime Amanda Palmer has gone "Uh I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO." Kinda.

https://www.facebook.com/amandapalmer/posts/10152576179293375

Man, I know appearances are deceiving etc. but it's still tough to square this whole story with the guy who sang "My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors".

xxpost -- Yeah I first heard of them thanks to the said tape in, I think, early 1993; a friend of mine down here had it and was all geeked out over it (in more than one way).

Annnd his (I gather) longtime PR firm has dropped him

https://twitter.com/rockitpromo/status/527926831572602880?lang=en

The point is that the person who is subordinate holds the real power.

But isn't there an inherent contradiction here? That what the person dominating gets out of it is thinking they have the real power? At least, I can see what you're saying applying to, say, a professional, like a pro dominatrix, where it is clearly a fantasy arrangement. But in the context of real world relationships, I just don't see how this can work without someone getting hurt, literally or figuratively. You need someone really hitting, or hurting, or whatever, to whatever degree, for there to be a sub under the illusion they have the "real" power. The sub can (or should) be able to stop things before things go too far, but the job of the dom is ... to push things too far, for real. Someone can say stop, but someone still has to hit or hurt first. It seems an untenable imbalance.

Plus another public statement:

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/reva-seth/reva-seth-jian-ghomeshi_b_6077296.html

Would not be surprised if there are plenty more ahead.

Re: Amanda Palmer remaining neutral on this - even if that's her attitude, does she REALLY think Ghomeshi is going to walk out on a stage in Toronto next week? Fucking hell. They'd need the police there.

Maybe he can do penance as a living statue.

you could poll which line from that palmer post is the most tone-deaf

if you've been following the news, he's become a lightning rod in the past couple days.

i see all your thoughts and it is my personal style to never shut down a conversation or run away from the fire: a philosophy that often (as you've seen before) lands me in hot water.

sorry for the mixed fire/water metaphor....haven't had my coffee yet.

ironically (poetically?) enough, i am spending my days, as we speak, at bard college making a musical with a bunch of students that deals directly with the painful aftershocks of sexual abuse, rape culture and lack of communication. and i'm about to publish a book about how communication and openness trumps anger, hate and fear. these things can't be coincidental.

so to sum-up, she's awesome, she's not sure what ghomeshi is other than talked about but be nice she hasn't had her coffee and isn't it amazing how the stars have aligned

and please buy my book, available for preorder on amazon

completely empty bunch of words she's put together. anti-meaning, even.

And one of her other guests is Bob Lefsetz...

Yup.

also she's offered two responses in the comments. to someone suggesting his presence would be disturbing and an insult to his victims, she responded "i hear you." to someone who told her to take a nap and stay hydrated, she responded "will do. i'm actually about to take the day off with my husband. for his birthday. wish me many cuddles."

so fans of hers disturbed by the allegations get nothing more than "i see you have typed words" while she asks for a hate-free zone and cuddle wishes.

i realize "amanda palmer is a narcissist, film at eleven" is old hat but I'm still amazed she can keep up the shtick in the face of ANYTHING

I believe that Amanda Palmer's relationship with her fans is extremely dysfunctional. I'm not being rhetorical or joking on any level. I think it is a serious co-dependent/narcissist relationship that does no-one any good.

she says "I hadn't been raped" but I'd disagree with that assessment based on what she described happened.

(that was w/r/t the Reva Seth article)

It's understandable that AP would have a hard time with speaking truth-to-power, given her own history

Whatever it's called, she paints a clear picture of why someone would rather just say "bad date, move on" than turn it into a criminal charge, and how ordinary a thing that is in our world.

Josh, I think wiser people than myself can answer your questions, there. Like an entire community with a rich history that probably exists, should you choose to read about it instead of conjecturing.

Google pretends it is a submissive, getting off on people telling it what to do, but we know who has the real power.

Navigator has dropped him now: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/10/30/jian-ghomeshi-navigator-pr_n_6078334.html

Talk about a sign he is TOTALLY radioactive. Even if their hands were forced.

I am so glad! That of all the interesting debates this situation could have stimulated (the use and abuse of power by well-connected media men; the ways in which female communities protect and fail to protect women from predators; the lines between BDSM and abuse, and the known and oft-identified how creepy-doms often use 'BDSM' as an excuse to cover abuse) ILX has now chosen to dwell on and discuss the single most salient and interesting and important aspect of this whole mess!

Indulging its collective grudge-crush on Amanda Palmer!

I am so relieved that we have identified the ~real~ menace here.

^Activist Zero for the next backlash

sucks that you have Eazy akm mh Josh in Chicago doug watson and Ned Reggett killfiled

wait who is Ned Reggett

I don't have any of those people killfiled. But I don't think it's a stretch to say that actually, ILX's relationship with 'Amanda Palmer' is 'deeply dysfunctional'.

xp

Maybe I've forgotten the name and the address
Of everyone I've ever known
It's nothing I Reggett

I have no interest in her but idk she's an asshole who says dumb shit to the internet in order to get precisely this kind of response, I'm not surprised ilx has a thread to point and laugh (like that lefsetz guy). A few posts itt noting that a famous person with lots of loyal fans just publically defended a rapist doesn't seem that off too me

*to

There is no violent, abusive action of a man so horrible, so repugnant, that the good people of ILX cannot find a way into deflecting onto criticism of a woman. (Any woman will do, but ILX is particularly obsessed with AP.) If a male celebrity has done a violet, repulsive, horrible thing, cherchez la femme! This is the true, appropriate target for your criticism, rather than male violence itself.

Reggetts, I've had a few

Nearly all of this discussion here has been revulsion at Ghomeshi, and I don't think anyone would have bothered with Amanda Palmer at all if she hadn't previously booked him for an appearance in Canada next week. When this came up on Sunday, she gave an initial statement saying the appearance was still on; now that more people have come forward, and given that this would have been Ghomeshi's only scheduled public appearance at all in the near future, it's not surprising that there's been a further statement from her. That the statement seems to be a bit of flailing on her part is kinda her burden to bear; the vast majority of commenters ON the Facebook post have been urging her to drop him from the appearance.

Meantime, more background info:

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/behind-the-cbcs-decision-to-fire-ghomeshi/article21396998/?service=mobile&click=sf_globefb

And more about the PR decisions:

http://m.thestar.com/#/article/news/gta/2014/10/30/jian_ghomeshi_dumped_by_pr_firm_over_lies_sources_say.html

It's a little interesting/surprising to compare the discussion here and on my FB feed, where most people have accepted that he is guilty by now, with the comments section on even a recent CBC story on this issue: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/jian-ghomeshi-allegedly-choked-beat-n-b-woman-with-belt-1.2818879

Plenty of commenters still regard this as a vengeful smear campaign by the CBC to get back at a former employee who is suing them and are question the credibility of the women who are making these allegations. I'm usually hesitant to assume someone's guilt in these sorts of situations but, at this point, when eight different women have come forth with similar allegations, and two have put their names to it, I find it pretty hard to not believe them.

Is it possible that AP has kept him on the 'show' 1) because he has some explaining to do and 2) if she sacked him off, she'd still have to pay him?

(bear in mind I know not what the 'show' is)

"... are questioning the credibility ..."