Louis CK pisses me off and really disappoints me. There were Internet stories for years about him, of course; yet in our current information environment, some skepticism was warranted when a website passed on unconfirmed suspicions about a celebrity’s behavior. Most of us lay-people need a well-reported story using standard journalistic methods of sourcing and interviewing people who willing to go on record. It sucks, but I don’t know if we can do much more than that. The default to believe the women (or men in some cases) is a good instinct, because more often than not, the allegations are true. Which is why male comedians who had heard these stories from female comedians should have stepped up and supported them a long time ago. We need more guys like Hannibal Buress willing to call a powerful man out. And not the word mincing from guys like Patton Oswalt (from whom I expected better.) And when the story comes out, fans should kick guys like CK to the curb.
Which is what Roy Moore supporters should be doing. You could not get a better reported or better sourced story than what the Washington Post published, and another woman has publicly come forward to tell her credible story. Yet the Trumpians have a priori decided that any reporting from any outlet outside of InfoWars, FoxNews and their megachurch is automatically fake news, making it easier for them protect their preferred world view from contradictory information. And that’s how scumbags like Moore and Trump (and a few other rapist presidents) get away with their crimes. The GOP should ditch Moore as swiftly as the rest of us ditched Weinstein, Spacey, Anthony Weiner, and all the other creeps — and to their credit, Mitch McConnell et al are doing just that. (Meanwhile Moore is using the allegations as a fundraising pledge: “The libtards and Satan are conspiring against me!”)
Speaking of creeps, Manohla Dargis wrote a thoughtful piece about the way misogyny informs the work of auteurs like Louis CK and Woody Allen, as well as much of Hollywood history.
Fetch: HEY, LOOK! ANOTHER OF YOUR CULTURAL HEROES IS A CREEP!
Kevin: SIGH... I HAD HOPED HE WASN'T.
Fetch: OH, SO YOU KNEW, BUT IGNORED IT?
Kevin: WHAT? NO! I MEAN...THERE WERE RUMORS.
Fetch: RUMORS? SO IT TAKES A MAJOR NEWS STORY FOR YOU TO BELIEVE THE WORDS OF WOMEN?
Kevin: GAH! NO! UHHHH...MAYBE? CRAP.
Fetch: GET OVER YOURSELF. IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU.
Kevin: TRUE ENOUGH.
Kevin and Fetch look at Man In Roy Moore T-Shirt
Kevin: WE STILL HAVE GUYS LIKE HIM....
Fetch: EW.
Man In Roy Moore T-Shirt: SURE, A 14-YR-OLD CAN CONSENT! BIBLE SAYS SO!
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