Loyal reader and fabulous human being Felicity Walker has asked me to cover some topics on the ol’ blog tonight, mostly relating to recent events, and I live to serve[1], so here goes.
Topic 1 : Woody Allen
Recently, the allegations of sexual abuse against Woody Allen have resurfaced because for the first time, his alleged victim has accused him directly and signed her name to it.
Said alleged victim is Dylan Farrow, and the allegation is that Allen abused her while Mia and Woody were still married. Dylan actually wrote a whole letter detailing the allegations and I think had it published in a full page ad to boot.
Well, you have to get people’s attention somehow.
Now I am not normally one to doubt people who make these kinds of accusations. As an adult survivor of sexual abuse myself, I know just how crushing it would be to finally come up with the courage to tell people about what happened, only to be doubted and attacked by fans of my abuser.
But these accusations originally surfaced as part of very, very acrimonious divorce proceedings, and sad to say, that changes things. If there is one circumstance in which people do horrible, unthinkable things like coach a child to lie about sexual abuse, or even convince them it happened, it is divorce.
So I have to wonder if this all started with Mia getting mad with Woody over something. I am not saying Dylan is lying. False memories happen, as much as we wish they did not.
However, none of that changes my utter contempt for Woody Allen as a human being. The deal with Soon Yi was quite enough for me to loathe him forever, thank you kindly. It doesn’t matter that she was not a blood relative. It doesn’t matter than they say the whole thing became sexual only after she was of legal age (yeah right).
What matters is the profound betrayal of trust, and the profound and contemptuous weakness it shows on the part of Woody. The temptation could happen to anyone, and no doubt happens to millions of men every day. Young girls are attracted to powerful, famous, funny, intelligent, sensitive men.
The difference is, most men have the moral integrity to say NO. Let them down gently, but say NO. Even if it is just out of a sense of self-preservation, they say NO.
You didn’t say no, Woody, and to me that puts you in the same category as any pedophile. You are just as bad as any bad babysitter or ‘weird’ uncle. You took advantage of someone far too young to know better just because she fed your lust and your ego.
And this knows no gender lines. Whether it’s Wood and Soon Yi or Mary Kay Letourneaux and Vili, the betrayal of trust for your own selfish reasons and the denial of the inherent wrongness of the actions is exactly the same, and just as repulsive to any decent human being.
So fuck you forever, Woody. When I read about these new/old allegations, I didn’t think “Oh god, how horrible!”
I thought “It figures. ”
Fuck you, Woody Allen. Fuck you till the day you die.
Topic 2 : The Nye/Ham debate [2]
I am glad that Bill Nye, unmitigated force for awesomeness, debated Ken Ham, the clown prince of creationism, about evolution et all recently.
I really am. It shows that people are finally taking ideas seriously again, and are willing to engage with them instead of us all hiding away in our ideological cubbyholes online.
Here is the video, if you want to watch it.
But I never will, and neither will Felicity, because honestly, it can only be depressing.
I mean, I am totally on Bill Nye’s side and I am told he totally kicked Ham’s corn-fed ass, but I don’t care. The fact that the USA still hasn’t gotten over the whole evolution thing is just too depressing and the creationist side is so incredibly weak that I can derive no pleasure from watching it destroyed.
To me, it’s like Crispin Glover picking a fight with Mike Tyson. You know who’ll win and you know it will be brutal, but nobody except people with neckbeards and a fedoras will walk away feeling good about the fight.
Not even if Glover really deserved it.
And honestly, I hate the radical fundamentalist atheist bullies who are crowing about this supposed glorious victory far more than I care about “the cause” of reason versus evolution.
So no, I won’t the video. I won’t even watch a highlights reel. Hell, I won’t even read the transcript. I want nothing to do with it.
The whole thing just reeks of sadness to me.
Topic 3 : Monty Python Recut
On a lighter note, check out this brilliant example of the editor’s art.
Fake trailer recuts that change the genre of the movie and thus radically misrepresent the film make me so happy. They are such a juicy form of satire that I can’t help but love them.
And that one is done so well that it makes me glad all over. A few of the cuts are a little cheap looking, and it is probably a little longer than it needed to be, but it’s still a work of genius.
Also in a jocular vein…
Topic 4 : Giant Russian Penis
So, this happened.
I do believe that Putin’s homophobic supporters just received the biggest teabagging in world history.
I support the move to uses penises in politics.
Heck, I still want to put a giant condom on the Washington Monument.
And speaking of humiliated homophobes….
Topic 5 : Rob Ford
Do I really have to bother with an actual story for this one? I mean, the man’s name alone has been a punchline for at least a month now.
Fuck it. I will catch him on the next public disaster.
(And I promise to have a LOC for you by Tuesday at the latest, Felicity!)
Thanks for doing my requests!
1. Woody Allen: FWIW:
—He and Mia Farrow were never married (and apparently didn’t even live together when they were partners), so it was a breakup rather than a divorce. (Feelings could still have been hurt enough to go with what you said, though.)
—Soon-Yi Previn was Mia and Andre Previn’s adopted daughter, and not, as I (and everyone else) had assumed, Woody’s stepdaughter. So that’s one degree less bad.
That doesn’t change the fact that he cheated on his girlfriend, with his girlfriend’s daughter no less.
Add him to the list of great directors who are also creeps.
2. Nye/Ham: I’m at the point where I could almost bring myself to watch it, as it’s bound to be less toxic and more civilized than any of the atheist/skeptic reactions to it. It is three hours long, though, and one review said that they each stuck to their talking points and didn’t really debate the ideas. I no longer completely rule out watching it.
3. Monty Python: my one criticism of the video is that the font for the titles was bad. It was jarring enough to disrupt the otherwise good editing job.
4. Penis: sadly, the victims of the penis prank were two anti-Putin satirists, and the perpertrators were Putin’s gang of bully-boys.
5. Rob Ford: I almost felt sorry for him for a while there. He’s got some bad mental wiring and it’s making him self-destruct. But then he keeps going, seemingly without consequences or contrition.
LOL at “Ham on Nye”!
Well, I bit the bullet and watched the debate (or rather, I played Solitaire while letting the debate play in another window).
It was mildly disappointing in exactly the way that reviewer said it would be: they mostly stuck to their talking points and didn’t address each other’s claims.
However, it wasn’t depressing, and it wasn’t harsh. At no point did Nye call Ham stupid or blame him for the Spanish Inquisition. (Neither did Ham say that Nye was going to Hell, though I wouldn’t have expected that anyway.)
Ham had three problems:
1. He never answers a question or challenge directly. He only weasels out of the issues and returns to his talking points. If pressed further he resorts to redefining his terms. (“Are you saying the Bible is literally true?” “Well, what do we mean by ‘literally’? Let’s examine this…”)
2. He uses the Bible as proof, not as something that needs to be proven. It’s not his job to prove to us that the Bible is literally true; he assumes the Bible is literally true and proceeds from there. This is fine for his own personal beliefs but when arguing a specific point such as the age of the Earth he just points to the Bible.
3. He buys into the old 1950s idea that science and religion are natural opposites, and therefore, keeps assuming that our minds will be blown by the fact that actual scientists are also Creationists or Christians. (“The man who invented the MRI machine is also a Creationist!”) It is possible to be a hard-headed scientist and a devout Christian (like my father) but he uses the existence of scientists who are Christians as if it proves anything else besides that.
Nye did a little better. He remained polite, he did not bash religion, and at least half the time he addressed Ham’s wrong assumptions. On the other hand, some of Nye’s answers were just not understandable, which you expect from an ordinary scientist but not from someone whose career is science communication (frequently to children). Still, that’s a comparitively minor complaint.
I would say that Nye performed better in the debate. Some would say that’s a foregone conclusion, but I’m talking about the debate itself, not the viewpoints.