It doesn’t look like Downey’s habit is so benign after all. Someone dropped the dime on him this time because they said there were “drugs and guns” in his room. No mention one way or the other yet about guns being found this time around, but he’s had them in his possession (while high) in the past. He’s obviously got a history with guns, and also a history of driving under the influence. Gee, what a harmless guy.
Once again, his choice. He chose to do all of this, knowing the consequences. He’s been through the system before, he knows the score. Sad.
While I do sympathize with Mr. Downey on his current problems, there are some things to consider.
He is, in some ways, a victim of his own success. In order to keep working, he must keep himself in the public eye. So, in essence, he’s trapped in a vicious cycle. If he goes into rehab and does what is needed to stay clean and sober, his career could vanish. Add the pressures of maintaining a payroll of assistants, agents, publicists, and so forth, who depend on income he generates, and who are not in a position to tell him the truth for that reason, and it’s no wonder he can’t take care of his drug problem.
Plus, as long as he has a career as he does, he has no incentive to “hit bottom”. The above people keep him from knowing how bad the problem really is, and as long as the bux keep rolling on in, what does he care?
Snooooopy (with 5 o’s, I wasn’t trying to be harsh, babe. Just stating an opinion that had it not been way to late in the evening I wouldn’t have.
I think some people are losing the spirit of MPSIMS, and I’m probably one of them. Jail vs. Rehab is a GD topic, not for this forum. I believe he’s a JUNKIE. All junkies deserve sympathy, not jail. Again, sorry if I took a mundae topic and turned it into a debate.
Someone wanted to get him in trouble, and called 911 to tattle. Robert doing drugs on his own time isn’t hurting anyone. It shouldn’t even be illegal. The whole thing is just stupid.
I agree that DUI and the firearms things are bad enough to go to jail for. Not the drug charges.
I’ve done meth. I didn’t hurt anyone. Ok so I stung the inside of my nose and cleaned my house frantically, or stayed up a couple of days working intently on an art project. Oooh. I’m such a major criminal. I should be in jail. I’ve hurt so many people in my horrible criminal career. Oh wait… no I didn’t. Yeah I could have hurt myself, but that is my choice. You can hurt yourself skydiving and rock climbing and scuba diving, but none of those are illegal. You can drink yourself into a coma but that isn’t illegal. You can smoke and give everyone who lives in your house lung cancer and asthma, but that isn’t illegal. Sorry, but I just don’t think that doing drugs should be a crime in itself. Doing stupid things like driving while on them should be a crime, but minding your own business in private shouldn’t.
Whether or not getting high is, in itself, a terrible thing, is another debate, IMO. What I can’t get over is - Downey has so much going for him, and he blows it all, over a buzz. Sorry, this is idiotic, and I have little sympathy for him. He has been through rehab umpteen times. The ball is in his court, as far as whether he really wants to beat his addiction. Fair or not, them’s the rules. If he feels getting high is worth the risk, he’ll take the risk. If he loses, he loses. Once again, his choice.
While I agree that people should be allowed to do what they like in private, he’s proven over the last few years that he can be dangerous to others and will probably do himself irreparable damage in the near future, not to mention what he’s already done to his kid.
It is sad, and the worst of it is that the industry will never blackball him even if it could save his life. Train wrecks get ratings. His contracted performances may get shorter so that the producers avoid the liability that Jack Batty was referring to, but as long as people are interested he will continue to get paid, and probably increasingly well, for guest appearances. At this rate he will probably skip many of the steps to the bottom and end up dead on the sidewalk.
Part of the problem here is that jail doesn’t seem to be a deterrant for him. I can understand using “You’re going to go to jail!” as a last ditch effort to reform habitual drug offenders, but what do you threaten a guy with who has already been to jail twice (or more?), lost his family and still doesn’t care enough to quit doing drugs?
[Is there still a “three strikes and you’re out” law in CA? Could he now go to jail for life?]
I think another part of the problem is that people have been enabling him to be an addict. If they really cared for him, would they see that he continued to earn enough money to buy drugs, or would they call the police on him in an effort to keep him clean? People (his friends) have to stop making excuses that he’s a genius and get tough with him. So far, the only people that seem to care for his well being are the people that keep putting him in jail.
I just read about this at eonline, and I am terribly sad. How am I going to mother his children if he is in prison, conjugal visits aside? He has always been one of my favorite actors…
Anyway, my brother has an ongoing drug problem. He was thrown out of the army when they found cocaine in his piss. He also got put in jail for a DWI. My mom coddles him but she is just feeding his addiction. (“Sure, live at home! That was you can use rent money for more drugs!”) I think most people just have to hit rock bottom before they come clean. I am sick of dealing with my brother (I’ve been dealing with this since 7th grade, when he was caught by his 9th grade teacher dealing drugs). I have no sympathy for him anymore.
From a distance, and possibly idiosyncratically, I see Robert Downey’s freedom as being in the movie industry’s best interests. Because the way he keeps on being arrested blows apart that whole Less Than Zero image California has in the minds of moviegoers all over the world. That image built up over the years by people like Shawn Mullins and his nauseating song about Dennis Hopper and David Caradine and all the cool dudes down in the valley. How can any of that be true, you ask yourself, if it’s so easy to get arrested?
I agree the guy is a talented actor, but so what? There are thousands of talented junkies in this country. Very few of them are so fortunate as to have people care enough about that talent to give then dozens of “second chances.”
I don’t care whether you think possession and use of drugs should be illegal or not; the fact of the matter is that it is. If an action is illegal, a person does not have the luxury of indulging in it repeatedly without consequences – and without those consequences becoming increasingly dire. He has violated his probation numerous times and now has no doubt vioated his parole. Heck yes, he should go back to prison; that’s what happens when you violate parole. Parole is a bargain – “We’ll let you out early if you will do X and Y.” Then, when you fail to do X or Y – like leave the drugs alone – back to prison you go, and rightly so.
Yes, he’s an addict. He’s also an adult and the one – the only one – who is responsible for his own actions. And if he cannot conform those actions to the requirements of the law, despite multiple chances and all the help in the world, then he belongs in jail. “The world needs him?” For what, to be on Ally McBeal? His son needs him, and if he can’t clean up for his own child, then he sure as heck won’t do it for the rest of us.
When my brother was using drugs, he ended up in prison. It wasn’t strictly for using the drugs, though, I think there were many other circumstances intertwined. Burglary, mostly. And violence.
Anyway, he got given the choice of a jail term, or rehabilitation. After like two months of prison, he decided on rehab, and it saved him. He’s not only alive and well, but he’s an upstanding member of the community, earning big bucks.
And that happened because he wanted to change. It was all down to his choice. He saw the dead end of drug use, the death of some of his friends, the destruction of the mind and body.
I think Robert Downey Jr doesn’t want to change. He likes it too much. And he doesn’t deserve the third and fourth chances he’s been constantly getting just because he’s talented - if he had any intelligence, surely he’d realise what he’s throwing away? Apparently not - nobody will actually let him see. They keep handing him stuff on a silver platter. He’s blind to the concern and angst he’s causing for others, and the potential destruction he’s causing himself. To him, he wins either way. So why not go down with artificial stimulus.
"The person called 911 and is quoted as saying, “I’d just like to let you know that in room 311 of the Merv Griffin resort, there’s a man that has an ounce of cocaine and a couple of guns, …”
I stand by my OP! I don’t know about the city where this happened but I do know that in other cities 911 calls like this get a lot of people responding.
Umm you do know that the city was Palm Springs. This is where quite a few actors have homes or at least go to get away. It is a relatively small desert town where they are not bugged as much as in LA area.
California now has a law that for the first couple of times you are arrested on drug charges you are sent to a rehab center. Just passed in the last election. Won’t help RDJ since he is on the revolving door plan for his addiction.
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Why do they keep putting Darryl Strawberry’s arrests on the sports pages since he is no longer a sports figure?
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The fact that he can act his way out of a combination safe and yet his career never reflected that is another reason to see Robert Downey jnr as a scapegoat, as some kind of sacrificial victim. I always thought his acting ability rated up there with English actors who come out of RADAR. That’s not to say American actors are in any way inferior - just different. What do I know about it anyway?
