Perhaps nobody went to the police. The stories I heard involved him removing all his clothes, jerking off and splooging on his own belly in front of people who didn’t agree to see it.
Goodness, someone call the FBI.
Yup and he managed to get in a little victim blaming with his assertion that because they didn’t say no, he thought he could jack off. In the world of middle aged male entitlement, stunned silence is assent. We need a registry like the Do Not Call registry for women who don’t want to see Louis CK jerk off to sign up; otherwise, the bitches are asking for it.
Do you believe sexual harassment generally results in criminal charges filed?
Now this I don’t understand. Whatever you think he did or did not do, I can’t imagine how it was “nothing inappropriate.” At the very least, it was that.
You never know. I knew some guys back in Bangkok who could still learn a similar lesson.
You mean they hung around until the end?
I was thinking about this. We could argue all day about whether or not what he did was “wrong” in the sense of being criminal…as far as I know the law is not coming after him. The question I see as far as these incidents are concerned is whether or not it’s reasonable for his actions to have changed public opinion of him. And I would assert that it’s perfectly reasonable to believe that what he did is skeevy and inappropriate and makes him come off as a huge creep who I for one would not want to be around and turns me off to his comedy work. And, frankly, anyone who thinks that’s unreasonable of ME is someone I would also be wary of.
Remember that Seinfeld episode… “He Took. It Out?” Elaine knew 20 years ago that THAT was a dude she was never going to go out with again. Jesus Christ people is this really a hard concept to understand?
Now, I’ve heard the rumors for at least a year or two, and, honestly, I just assumed them to be true. To be honest, these revelations are not really going to affect my enjoyment of his comedy, as I’ve already assumed as much about him. Just like I still eat at Chick-Fil-A and even shop at Hobby Lobby occasionally, despite my distaste for them in other ways. But I can’t see any way at least some of his actions are not inappropriate.
For example, two years ago, I had a single woman in my hotel room during a break while we were both photographing a long Indian wedding. She was there for a couple of hours. We were there to transfer files and just take a break before the evening session. She respected my photography and asked to second shoot for me several times over the year. Now, I can’t imagine a scenario where me saying, “hey, do you mind if I whip it out and start jacking it?” would be characterized as “nothing inappropriate.” I would characterize it as “highly inappropriate.”
Here is a list from the New York Times of the high-profile men who have been accused of sexual misconduct since Harvey Weinstein. Some of them I had not known about before – it’s a disturbingly long list.
The response from Louis C.K. is one of the few that is unconditional in its admission of guilt. I’m not saying that this mitigates anything, just saying it as a fact. Many others seem to acknowledge the truth of the allegations against them with weasel words (“To the extent my behavior was perceived as disrespectful …”) or outright denial (“We are confident that his name will be cleared once the current media frenzy dies down …”). It’s interesting that the lawyer for one of the perps – the one who made that last statement – considers that women finally coming forward because they now have some chance of being believed constitutes a “media frenzy”. :rolleyes:
I find the length of the list totally unsurprising, especially given the fact they’re digging pretty deeply into what constitutes a “high profile” person. How many of those people had you ever heard of?
If you want to be disturbed, read Ellen Page’s account of Brett Ratner’s behaviour. It is profoundly horrifying that an adult man would behave in such a manner. It is more horrifying still that he got away with it for as long as he did.
The accounts I read were that he would block the door while he masturbated. The women would have had to push past him and risk being ejaculated upon to get out of the room. Some of them were probably afraid they were about to be raped, which I suspect was part of the appeal for Louis CK: these were women in his industry but he sexually humiliated them and used his penis to put them in their place.
The forcing women to watch them masturbate is a detail that is in a lot of these sexual abuse stories that have been reported lately. Weinstein did it and so did some of the others. Think about the planning that has to go on in their minds, they have to get the women alone somewhere, put them at ease, then psych themselves up for the act. Afterwards, they’re sticky with their own semen and there’s this stunned woman looking at them. It’s a very strange and ugly compulsion.
This is ridiculously NOT true. I’m married, and I work closely with two women at my office who I find very attractive. There is no situation - barring a divorce and lots of out-of-work socializing - where I could ask for a sexual interaction and it would be deemed ok. Even if I gave them express permission to say no, it would create a hugely uncomfortable workplace going forward.
Other examples:
Patient/doctor
client/attorney
student/professor
congregant/priest
Note that in these cases one person is coming to the other for help or guidance. As such, they are vulnerable. Depending on how bad they need the help, they may feel forced to accept abuse that they don’t approve of. They may even pretend to consent because they fear the consequences if they don’t.
Now, I don’t claim to know the power dynamics regarding Louis and these women. But his success in the industry puts him in line with these other people I’ve described: he had power that he was able to use to sexualize a situation regardless of the others’ desire.
The key here is not to merely stop at: Did she say no. The key is to ask, Was she able to do so?
There was no harrassemnt so it’s another thread.
I understood he masturbated in front of two or more women, hence my comment. The distinction seems relevant in terms of potential/perceived personal danger - a lone woman being more at risk.
Again, he did nothing criminal to be guilty of. This is the point. Hence the speedy apology for behaviour. There is no criminal case to answer.
So the question becomes, what did he do if he didn’t do anything criminal?
Answer: he acted inappropriately.
Calibrating that is the interesting point in all this.
Andy Dick is on that NY Times list! Who saw* that* coming?
And did they want to? 
What’s interesting to me about this whole thing is that I don’t really follow the comedy world and I never got into Louis CK’s stuff or shows at all (I’ve watched a few youtube clips, seen a few quotes, and might have seen half an episode of the show). But somewhere I picked up the idea that he did a lot of questionable stuff with women - not directly sexual contact, but the creepy ‘push them into joining your fetish’ territory. So when the news broke, my first thought wasn’t “how could this guy do this” but “didn’t this story already break a few years ago?”.
…do you guys get all your talking points from the same place?
This was harassment. We aren’t talking about the “legal definition” of harassment but the “plain text” meaning of the word. That “he did nothing criminal to be guilty of” is not the point at all.
15 years is not speedy.
Well at least you’re not confused on the legal standing, which is progress in this thread.
Your Wiki link speaks of “characteristically repetitive” behaviour which was also absent here e.g. subjecting the same person to the same behaviour, perhaps like stalking, over a period of time. That didn’t happen.
I have no trouble accepting what he did was weird or uncool or perhaps eve even demeaning to those present, but I am struggling to understand the ‘pressure’ he apparently applied that prevented women together leaving the room.
I don’t see the distinction. Besides, the New York Times story says “Another comedian, Rebecca Corry, said that while she was appearing with Louis C.K. on a television pilot in 2005, he asked if he could masturbate in front of her. She declined.”
Now, she said no, he didn’t do it (for what we know) and he says the stories are true. Is this still not at least “inappropriate”? It’s not different than my hypothetical.