It seems to me that a number of different positions have been staked out here, and that the most reasonable ones are the ones that acknowledge the many unknowns that will likely never be resolved, and are admittedly speculating about the probable reality. As I recall from your previous involvement in discussions about sexual assault, you appear to have an omniscient superpower able to assess guilt, which you have no hesitancy to use to assure us of the truth of whatever the accusations may be, apparently regardless of evidence. In light of this background I would say that it’s your case that is weak here. In any case, I would venture that no defense lawyer on earth, with knowledge of these predispositions, would ever clear you to be on a jury.
How can everyone have different facts? Facts are facts. And wouldn’t the people that investigated the charges have had way more facts than anyone else?
The oh poor me I picked the undefendable side of a story and people won’t agree with me. No one is being attacked. commasense posted about being convinced by a Farrow promo piece but doesn’t seem to have much to back it other than “watch a 4 hour doc on a pay channel that most people don’t subscribe to.”
… ya know since you have not watched it along with your claim of total lack of interest in the case, you have zero standing to post anything about it’s validty.
Good thing I didn’t do that then! Whew!
Hmm, don’t know what I messed up there, last comment was in reply to Argument from incredibility is a fallacy
…I mean, do you believe your statement? Do you actually think the figure of 99 percent is accurate? Because I will happily concede that all I did there was copy and paste what you said and just changed the names. I don’t actually believe that either statement is anything but hyperbole and think it’s hilarious you think it’s not worth engaging me when all I did was use the exact same words as you.
It’s almost as if people in this thread can’t help attacking the arguer instead of the argument. I’m going to be extremely charitable here and simply assume that your recollection is faulty because this doesn’t seem to match any discussion we’ve had, and if you recall otherwise I would suggest you take it up in the relevant thread because it has nothing to do with this topic.
Do you think ad hominem statements like this help your case?
I mean, didn’t you literally just characterize those who disagree with you as the “oh poor me I picked the undefendable side of a argument?” Didn’t wolfpup bring in something I allegedly said in another thread to attack my credibility? That isn’t how debates work.
I don’t have to be interested in the case to be able to express my opinion that commasense made a pretty reasonable post and the reaction to that post have been disproportionately aggressive.
I disagree.
So you have nothing to contribute. You’re arguing just to argue. Fine. But I’m not playing. Go ahead, say anything you want. Don’t hold your breath waiting for a response.
…are you conceding the 99 percent figure was hyperbole or is this something you genuinely believe?
I regret that while I was eating dinner and composing in my mind a reply to @mordecaiB’s claim that no one is being attacked, @Banquet_Bear beat me to it with something very close response that I was preparing (but left out @Exapno_Mapcase’s crack about the memory of a gold fish). Thanks, @Banquet_Bear, for your contributions to the thread.
I look forward to rejoining this thread when someone else who has actually seen the documentary comes in to share their views, regardless whether they agree with me (beware!) or offer informed reasons why it shouldn’t be taken seriously.
No, I characterized you, not everyone. commasense hasn’t really put forward any kind of argument other than his first post. As a matter of fact, he has avoided answering any questions people have raised about his original post.
Are you seriously asking this question?
…ya know, I think anyone who starts their first post in a thread with “…ya know” and then condescendingly tells everyone they have to watch a 4 hour show before they can comment on it loses any right to tell posters how to post.
Why do you think it was reasonable? Do you not think the people in this thread haven’t heard this stuff before? Have you ever heard keep an open mind but not so open your brain falls out? Basing your opinion of the case on this show is a good example of that.
Why don’t you rejoin it now and reply to all the points posters have made? Both Fotheringay-Phipps and Exapno_Mapcase took time to reply to your original post and you have ignored almost everything they posted. And why do you think only people who watch this show have informed opinions?
…how could you be characterizing me when I actually haven’t picked a side in this particular argument? How does that work exactly? And how does that fact that you have singled out only me not make it any less of an attack on me? Its still an attack. And what about the other attacks?
Questions? Like this?
Where are the good faith questions here that you think deserved an answer? If someone tells you that “you’re making yourself less educated rather than more educated” why do you think that deserves a response?
Yep.
…ya know, I stand by everything I’ve said in this thread. You don’t have to watch a 4 hour show before you comment on it. But if you are going to condescendingly dismiss the opinions of someone here who actually has watched it then don’t be surprised if you get called out for it.
Why do you think it was unreasonable? They said that they initially believed Allen largely based on the stuff that was said in this thread. They watched the documentary and changed their mind. What is unreasonable about that? It simply means that the Allen defenders haven’t made a case strong enough here to convince them.
Why on earth would that matter?
Are you implying that somebodies brain has fallen out? Is it really so hard to not say stuff like this? This is an attack on people that don’t agree with you. It is an attack on the arguerer, not the argument.
You have failed to make the case as to why this is so.
Modnote: This is well past the idea of attack the post and not the poster. Your post and posts by
@mordecaiB are not allowed in GD. Please stop immediately. You want to debate the what the Op is about, that is fine, you want to mock other posters, please proceed to the pit.
Yeah, that’s about the main reason I think Allen didn’t do it. Pedos don’t just abuse once and go “Glad I got that out of my system!” That just doesn’t make sense. That and the New Haven report, Moses’ testimony, and Mia Farrow being a psycho, as well as some other things lead me to believe Allen’s side.
That said the whole thing is just sordid and sad. I’m sorry for all the children, Dylan and Moses and the rest. Allen wasn’t a pedo but he was a creep and probably a bad father. Mia appears to be a lunatic. It must have been a terrible family to grow up in.
And that said, at the risk of threadshitting, why does anyone care? I mean I get sordid celebrity gossip and I’ll admit that I engage in it myself, though I feel slightly ashamed when I do. But people seem to be treating it like it’s An Important Issue of Our Time. If people watch this documentary because they find it fascinating in its lurid details, like the whole tiger king thing, that’s fine. But the fact that people seem to feel some sort of duty to watch a four hour “True tales of Tinsel City” so that they can get to the truth of this is bizarre to me, even if it were an even handed report. It’s just a sad tale that at the end isn’t going to affect anyone outside of the family
Actually, it’s a good question. I think at least part of the answer is that Allen is an important figure in the entertainment industry, and these accusations have had major real impacts on his work, and consequently, on those of us who enjoy his work. It has seriously affected funding for his films, and the ability of his films to generate income. It has affected his access to acting talent – at one time, A-list actors were falling all over themselves and willing to work for scale for the privilege of being in a Woody Allen film; now, many are refusing to work with him at all. It’s even affected Allen’s access to publishers. It also raises questions about the morality of being found guilty in the court of public opinion based solely on accusations without any corroborating evidence, and indeed even in the presence of exonerating evidence.
The other side of the coin is that none of these documentaries or books or other forms of public soul-searching is going to resolve the issue, so they’re all essentially futile. But the questions are indeed important – both the specific question about Allen, and the larger question about our cancel culture.
Moderating
I get that this is probably meant as a rhetorical flourish or similar, but don’t post deliberately false statements that are meant to elicit a response.
This is what interests me about the case.
I was guilty of doing this myself once, when I was absolutely positively certain that Gary Condit killed Chandra Levy. Since then, I have not been sure of anything. I am not even 100% certain that OJ Simpson killed Nicole Brown anymore.
It’s absolutely this. Woody Allen is an enormously important figure in modern cinema. His influence is all over movies (and TV, which is increasingly kind of the same thing.) His movies change careers; actors benefit from being in his films. They get Oscar nominations (gotta be well over a dozen different actors) and huge boosts to their reputations. Filmmakers beyond counting are influenced by his work. His best movies - Hannah And Her Sisters, Annie Hall, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Manhattan, Purple Rose of Cairo - are masterworks.
If Allen abused kids, to remove his films from the canon of American cinema would gut it. People would feel gross watching his movies. (I’m not taking a position on whether they should feel that way; they just would.)
I can’t think of a figure in the movie industry who’s under a serious cloud of suspicion who compares to Allen’s importance. An actor like Kevin Spacey is not 1/100th as important to cinema as Woody Allen.
Roman Polanksi comes to mind, with the difference that the allegations against him seem to be much more substantial and better proven than in Allen’s case.
Polanski is a pretty good comparison though he’s now pretty much not a figure in the USA anymore.
Harvey Weinstein is obviously a huge figure in movies, but not an artistic one.
I totally agree with your assessment of Woody Allen, but I would argue that Polanski is not at all an equitable comparison. Polanski was a decent director, but Allen was incredibly prolific as an all-around filmmaker, writing, casting, and (until his later years) acting, and attracting great talent, and many of those prolific films were, as you point out, masterpieces. I don’t think there’s any comparison, but I’m not really up on much of Polanski’s work, so there may be a bit of bias there.
There’s also no comparison in that Polanski was actually convicted, whereas Allen’s situation of course is extremely murky, with a strong possibility that he’s being railroaded by a vengeful lunatic.
To my knowledge he was mainly a financier and distributor, certainly not a creative figure. The world will be just fine without him.
That’s true and is a direct consequence of the allegations against him and their impending prosecution.
I certainly did not mean to give the impression Polanski is Allen’s equal. He’s a major and influential director, so it’s a similar situation, but obviously Allen is the greater figure.
As to the allegations, there is no serious doubt in my mind Polanski is guilty of rape. We have contemporaneous eyewitness testimony to that effect. The charges against Allen are, to say the very least, dubious.