I feel like this shit needs addressed. My mother stayed with an emotionally abusive man for 28 years, first out of fear of being alone (her family wasn’t exactly sunshine and daisies), and then in the belief that her sons needed a father around.
Using “she should have left” as a reason for calling an accuser loathsome is disgusting.
I think that’s a lot easier said than done.
[Moderating]
I’ve edited the title of the thread to make the topic clearer.
I was a huge fan of @midnight, and was surprised when it was cancelled out of nowhere.
Wondering if there’s more to that story now.
I adored @midnight - I think I watched every single episode (I had a backlog of several dozen on my DVR when the show ended, but I watched them all).
The last few years (and especially the accusations against Al Franken, who was my favorite politician) have taught me the “no heroes” rule. It doesn’t matter how talented a public figure is, or how much I like them – this stuff has no bearing on whether or not they might secretly be an abuser or harasser.
I didn’t really care that much for @midnight, and have never seen Talking Dead, but I’ve been a pretty huge fan of the Nerdist/ID10T podcast, I’ve listened to dozens of them. Having not been aware of any accusations like this it does seem kind of shocking in that he always seemed to be pretty open and honest in the podcast (both introspectively and with the guest) about dealing with mental health issues and just kind of generally trying to be a good person. I suppose he had me fooled, if these accusations are true.
FWIW, and perhaps this is a little late, but Chloe Dykstra wrote her Medium post in order that other women see and notice the red flags. She didn’t do it to hurl random accusations to “get” her abuser. She did it so that other women will be able to better recognize manipulative controlling behavior from their partners, especially when those women are in their early 20s and seemingly hot shot guy 20 years older than them shows interest.
And thank goodness someone can use her fame and power to do that, knowing that she could be a lightening rod for negative reactions.
I wouldn’t call her loathsome, but she admits he was a terrible boyfriend within two weeks. Two weeks. Seriously, how much could she have invested in that relationship in two weeks.
Unless Chris Hardwick is some extra-smooth Don Juan svengali rasputin dracula type, I fail to see why she stayed for week 3. Somethin ain’t adding up here.
Because women are often conditioned to think they can “fix” the guy, he treats you that way because he just likes you so much, things will get better, he doesn’t really mean it, once he trusts you it will get better, I must have done something to make him not trust me, he makes me doubt he meant it that way etc etc etc
THIS.
She wrote it off as he was just coming out of another relationship, that those worrisome red flags might only be temporary, etc etc. It’s goddamn easy to Monday Morning Quarterback that shit and say “Well she should have known better.”
The fact that she didn’t mention Hardwick by name isn’t a defense against a libel suit. I can’t just make shit up and attribute it to “a short-fingered vulgarian” and figure I’m home free just because I didn’t say the name “Trump”. When you’re specific enough that your words can only apply to one person then the fact that you didn’t use the person’s name isn’t relevant.
This isn’t an anonymous accusation. It applies to only one person, and if anything she said would be libelous if she named Hardwick, it’s libelous in this form as well.
That being said, suing someone for libel isn’t that easy. You have the burden of proving that they made false statements about you, that they knew the statements were false, and that you were damaged by those statements. If it’s just a he-said/she-said situation, then proving the statements to be false is pretty difficult.
I just wish guys would work from the place that maybe there is something they don’t understand about being raised female in this society, rather than explain what a woman should have done (and if they didn’t do it there s something wrong with them).
According to her though, there were actual rules within 2 weeks she had to submit to, 5 of which she mentions. Which is less of a gray area.
That doesn’t contradict anything I said.
I’d like to think I’d be smart enough and strong enough to walk away too. Maybe I would be. But I refuse to judge someone who did’t becasue I wasn’t there, I know the emotional crap I was put through by even nice guys, and I wasn’t there. It safer to believe something was wrong with her that she didnt leave, than to realize that strong women sometimes get sucked into the mindfuck that is emotional domestic abuse.
“Starfishing”? 
While that may be true, on principle one would hope enough of the court of public opinion is cautious before being okay with casting arrows at his reputation.
Good for you! You wouldnt be sucked into anything like this because you would know better. Great! Congrats!
If she didn’t name Hardwick, how do we know that she is writing about him?