That is what will happen, because that is what always happens.
Every bandwagon ends up in a ditch, because the bigger it gets, the harder it is to control. All you need to do is to set up a comfortable chair and wait. And the way things go these days, you may barely have time to finish setting up the chair.
I work at an organization that provides, among other things, legal advocacy for victims of sexual assault. A large part of the work of our advocates is simply explaining to victims that they probably won’t go to trial or see justice. Many of them choose a forensic examination anyway because there’s a period of time the kit has to be held while the victim decides whether or not to press charges. The vast majority of women for whom we give forensic examinations never see trial. Not because they weren’t victimized but because sexual assault is so difficult to prove.
I’m not pretending anything. I have great compassion for any victim of sexual assualt or rape. These predators need long prison time.
What I object to is broadening the definition to encompass every conceivable situation.
It’s blurs the lines of the true horror of sexual assualt.
I shouldn’t have said what I did in this forum. I apologize.
I think we as a culture need to figure out when people are legitimate scumbags who need punishment and when people are a product of a bad culture doing bad, but correctable things. The type of behavior described is unacceptable, ubiquitous behavior that reflects our cultural norms and people do need to be held accountable, but it doesn’t mean lives should be ruined over it. There are cases where it’s a cultural problem, not a personal one, and this sort of event would qualify, IMO.
This statement reads as an implication that someone (or an amorphous group of someones) is creating fake scandals in order to somehow make money by closing film projects. I find this implication abhorrent. Please let me know if I have misunderstood.
Something that bothers me:
This isn’t something that normally happens after two drinks. And especially it doesn’t happen to a 23 year old guy who seems to have frequented clubs, and presumably had a reasonable amount of experience with alcohol.
Did Takei put something in the second drink?
One minute you’re tweeting your genuine shock and disgust at the revelation by your young son that he was molested by Kevin Spacey right in front of you, the next minute you’re accused of sexual harassment and indecent exposure yourself. Richard Dreyfuss is the latest target. The roulette wheel spins again, where will it stop this time?
I completely agree. It is difficult to separate the sexual predators from someone who acted inappropriately in a social situation.
I enjoy reading your posts. You always bring unique insights to the SD community. I’d very much like to make amends for any past posts that offended you.
George has been an important activist for a long time. I hope this one reported incident is just a misunderstanding. If other people make allegations then perhaps George’s conduct needs to be looked at more closely.
Dude. Let’s play what-if.
It’s a beautiful Saturday. Your grandkids are over for the weekend. You have the windows open, you had a big pancake breakfast with them, and you go upstairs to play with their model train.
While you’re upstairs playing, someone enters your house through an open window and steals the video game system they brought with them, and all the games and accessories that go with it.
Do you report the crime?
Hey, it isn’t like anyone broke a window to get in, or forced a lock. It isn’t like you were held at gunpoint. Do you really deserve to have the crime against you put on the books when it was such a small one? Hey, it’s not like anyone got HURT. Maybe you’d better just get on with it–after all, the guy who took the stuff has a right to want nice things too, doesn’t he? Is it a CRIME to want nice things? Now everyone who wants nice things is going to be accused of a crime!
But suppose you do call the police. Now they want to know if you really had a video game system in the first place. They don’t see any accessories or games; no physical evidence it was ever there. Are you sure you didn’t imagine it? And anyway, SUPPOSING this obviously hysterical senior citizen did have a video game system, isn’t it more likely that he loaned it to someone and forgot, than that someone actually came into his house and took it? He’s definitely making more of this than is really there.
Also, he shouldn’t leave his windows open, even on nice days. It’s like asking people to take stuff.
I am only pointing out that George went on a date. There apparently was a mutual connection between the two men. They were attracted to each other.
George clumsily made a sexual advance. He apparently thought his date had similar interest. It was rejected. George stopped and even expressed concern over his date’s ability to safely drive home.
George followed the guidelines of the No means No campaign.
I don’t see a scandal or crime. YET.
It depends on what other allegations come up. Was this a one time mistake or is there a pattern of sexual misconduct?
In Cosby’s case, it’s the statute of limitations.
Already happened, if celebrity CEOs count:
Horseshit. People blatantly imposing their sexual desires on other people with whom they don’t have any kind of sexual relationship, especially co-workers and subordinates, is indeed an evil, but there’s nothing new about it.
The only thing that’s new is the emerging attitude that people in the workplace, even in positions of power, don’t actually have the right to subordinate the work environment to the service of their stupid boner.
According to Brunton, Takei initiated the sexual advance when he (Brunton) was unconcious. Brunton passed out after having a couple of drinks, and when he woke up he found Takei had pulled his pants down around his ankles and was groping his crotch. When Brunton objected, Takei claimed at first that he was just trying to make Brunton comfortable. Brunton objected again, after which Takei stopped.
An unconscious person can’t give consent.
Ugh.
We don’t know what was going on earlier. Were they making out on the couch? We don’t know the setting and context of the date.
I haven’t been drunk since college. I do recall nodding off for a minute wasn’t uncommon. I’d wake up, have another drink, and continue the party. I may have nodded off but I’m functioning and still interested in sex with my date. People behave irrationally when they drink heavily.
It depends on how drunk you are. This guy says he drove home not long afterward. He wasn’t totally wasted. Still a dumb thing to do. He should have called a cab.
Whatever was going on earlier doesn’t affect the fact that, as Jeff noted, unconscious people can’t give consent. Don’t start or continue sexual activities with an unconscious date, even if they were happy to be sharing sexual activities with you before they lost consciousness.
This just sounds like a drunken date that ended badly.
I’m glad George stopped his actions and expressed concern about his friend driving drunk.
They easily could have continued dating and never given this bad date a second thought. Apparently that didn’t happen.
George certainly made a mistake. He acted stupidly and may have ruined his chances of a future relationship with this guy.
I just hope this is an isolated incident from his past.
Am I the only one not at all surprised that George Takei would have a giant yellow bean-bag chair?
At this point George is saying it didn’t happen and he doesn’t remember ever meeting this guy.
I have no problem with creeps being called out. The only problem I see is the media and others following the media’s lead using specific legal terms in very imprecise ways. Sexual harassment is a tort and often not a crime. Being inappropriate in the workplace and making others uncomfortable is creepy but not necessarily criminal. Actionable yes, but not criminal. Calling it sexual assault lessens the impact of the term. Much of what has been reported against various people is sexual assault. Other reports are not. It is really not hard to tell the difference but reporting it accurately requires a little effort.
You did this in the thread about Josh Duggar. Just stop it. Quit trying to minimize sexual harassment and assault. You do it all the fucking time. “Well, it might have been blah blah blah.”
Just fucking stop it.
In my partially misspent youth there was an incident involving much alcohol, a car accident (designated driver no DUI), and a trip to the MP station. Somewhere during that time I lost 5-6 hours. I woke up with my head on a desk in the MP station. I asked the designated driver how I was acting. He told me I seemed a hell of a lot more sober than the idiots we were with. I carried on coherent conversations and traveled between a few different places. He thought I had sobered up. During that time I could have had sex or been abducted by aliens or signed the Louisiana Purchase and not known. And nobody would have known I was drunk off my ass. Just because someone doesn’t remember doesn’t mean they were unconscious. Without a 3rd party witness it’s hard to tell exactly what happened. Thankfully that was the first and last time that happened to me.
Is it more likely to be passed out rather than blacked out? For most people, I’m sure it is.