# Neil Gaiman accused of being serial sexual abuser **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 5, 2024, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781 "2024-07-05T19:48:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 31
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/601 "2026-02-06T21:13:13Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Polanski committed rape on underaged girls One girl. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Gaiman did nothing of the sort. Rape is rape. Gaiman did a _lot_ of rape. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Having a kinky sex life is not a crime. Rape, on the other hand, is. > [@DrDeth](#): > > There seems to be a lot of doubt now on that. To you, maybe. I have no doubt at all. > [@DrDeth](#): > > And no criminal action at all. Good thing this is not a law court, isn’t it. > [@DrDeth](#): > > So if folks did that, that would be Slander. Gaiman is free to try and sue me. > [@DrDeth](#): > > No criminal complain has even been filed vs Gaiman Scarlett Pavlovich _tried_ to lay a charge and the New Zealand police (and Amanda Palmer) screwed her over. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/602 "2026-02-06T21:17:24Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > > [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > > > The truth is a valid defense, and once you have someone in court, you can go after them and you might not be constrained by the same laws of evidence as in criminal trials. > > True, but Polanski was arrested and plead Guilty. And it was for sex with underaged girls. No criminal complain has even been filed vs Gaiman, and even so, “underaged” does not figure in it at all. > So there’s no doubt Polanski was much worse. I was not addressing any comparison to Polanski. I was strictly addressing your mention of a crime, incorrectly identified as slander, for which a person might get sued if they wrote that Gaiman is or has been a rapist. My point was that, although not brought up on criminal charges, if Gaiman sued someone for defamation, that person could present all the evidence they wanted that pointed to Gaiman’s guilt, something that he might not want addressed in an open public forum. p.s. the past tense of “plead” is “pled.” ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/603 "2026-02-06T21:18:59Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > One girl. Other possible victims. > **[Roman Polanski's Alleged Sexual Assaults: What You Need to Know](https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/roman-polanskis-alleged-sexual-assaults-what-you-need-to-know-117579/)** > > As a fourth woman comes forward with rape accusations against the legendary director, a breakdown of his alleged crimes. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Gaiman did a _lot_ of rape. No evidence of that. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Scarlett Pavlovich _tried_ to lay a charge and the New Zealand police (and Amanda Palmer) screwed her over. Cite? > [@MrDibble](#): > > Gaiman is free to try and sue me. You arent talking about just you, you are suggesting the term “rapist” be universal. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/604 "2026-02-06T21:24:26Z")
Ursula Le Guin was the author in residence for a week at the Clarion Workshop. She was a wonderful person, extremely approachable, and utterly wise and serene. I’ve been in the field of f&sf for over a half century now. I will tell you without naming names that many, many of your favorite writers in the genre are not good people, although they inhabit a sliding scale from unpleasant to despicable. I don’t have enough proof to say that is true of every creative field known to humanity, but I strongly believe that to be true. Being merely human myself I find that I make my decisions case-by-case without any overarching moral principle. I can’t even imagine what possible morality could apply to all of them so that I could simply say yes or no. Humans don’t work that way. Even fanatics find reasons to make individual exceptions. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/605 "2026-02-06T21:24:48Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Other possible victims. Not in his criminal case. > [@DrDeth](#): > > No evidence of that. Testimony _is_ evidence. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Cite? [Cite](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/feb/04/neil-gaiman-accuser-files-civil-lawsuit-rape-sexual-assault-allegations-ntwnfb) > Pavlovich’s lawsuit states that she filed a police report in New Zealand, accusing Gaiman of sexual assault, but she alleges “the police took no action because Palmer refused to talk to them”. > [@DrDeth](#): > > You arent talking about just you, you are suggesting the term “rapist” be universal. Gaiman is free to sue anyone who goes along with me, too. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/606 "2026-02-06T21:24:55Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > p.s. the past tense of “plead” is “pled.” Nitpick: In legal contexts, “pleaded” is the convention. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/607 "2026-02-06T21:28:05Z")
Thank you, I stand corrected. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/608 "2026-02-06T21:29:58Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I will tell you without naming names that many, many of your favorite writers in the genre are not good people, although they inhabit a sliding scale from unpleasant to despicable. As long as you don’t have anything negative to say about Harlan Ellison, I’ll be fine! ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/609 "2026-02-06T21:30:11Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Cite Your own cite says 'alleges"_. Pavlovich’s lawsuit states that she filed a police report in New Zealand, accusing Gaiman of sexual assault, but she alleges “the police took no action because Palmer refused to talk to them”._ There apparently is no record of this. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/610 "2026-02-06T21:45:12Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > > [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > > > p.s. the past tense of “plead” is “pled.” > > Nitpick: In legal contexts, “pleaded” is the convention. Only down south. “Pled” is the proper form farther North and across the pond. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/611 "2026-02-06T21:46:05Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Gaiman did nothing of the sort. Having a kinky sex life is not a crime. I am offended by this comment. I have a lot of friends with “kinky sex lives”. I have a friend who used to help organize the local BDSM convention. What Gaiman is accused of doing is rape. What Gaiman has admitted to doing is sex with lots of young women who were not in a position to say “no” without serious consequences. That’s not “kink”. That’s abusive behavior. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/612 "2026-02-06T21:48:36Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Only down south. “Pled” is the proper form farther North and across the pond. Some day the world will catch up with us. 😁 ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/613 "2026-02-06T21:54:01Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > I think Caroll was more autistic awkward than pedophile, most likely. I think he struggled to relate to adults. Yes, although I have read that his early biographers downplayed the extent to which he enjoyed the company of adult women, in an attempt to preserve his reputation (which, to modern sensibilities, has somewhat backfired). > [@](#): > > However, as he grew older, he acquired many lady friends. This sometimes led to mild controversy. Victorian social life was highly formal, and it was thought improper for eligible men to have unchaperoned adult female friends. > > During his youth he had been unable to spend time alone with respectable women, but after he passed what Victorians considered to be the age of “romance,” he openly went on holiday with woman friends, and gathered a sizeable circle of admiring ladies around him. Source: > **[The Mystery of Lewis Carroll](https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-mystery-of-lewis-carroll/)** > > The author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, which sees its 150th anniversary this year, remains to this day an enigmatic figure. Jenny Woolf explores the joys and struggles of this brilliant, secretive, and complex man, creator of one of the... …from whence also: > [@](#): > > His nude images of children seem controversial today, but nudes of both sexes and all ages were acceptable as valid artistic subjects then, and in fact, some of the child images of his respectable contemporary, [Julia Margaret Cameron](https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/julia-margaret-cameron-in-ceylon-idylls-of-freshwater-vs-idylls-of-rathoongodde), seem far more startling to the modern eye. > > However, his love of children and his admiration for child nudity are sometimes taken to be evidence that he was a paedophile. It is impossible for anyone to know the definite truth about the sexual life of another, particularly someone long dead and from a different culture. But again and again, children who knew him, including those photographed nude by him, remember him with real love and affection, in recollections that indicate he did not in any way behave like a paedophile. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/614 "2026-02-06T22:24:09Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > As long as you don’t have anything negative to say about Harlan Ellison, I’ll be fine! Other than being famously short tempered and angry, there was the time he grabbed Connie Willis’s breast at the Hugos. > **[Connie Willis, Harlan Ellison, and the Inside Scoop](https://scendan.livejournal.com/586135.html)** > > Here’s the thing. When Harlan Ellison took it upon himself to grab the spotlight at the Hugo Awards by grabbing the breast of the Guest of Honor, Connie Willis, it wasn’t funny. Nor was it clever. Nor was it satirical. Nor was it a joke... ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/615 "2026-02-06T22:45:25Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > As long as you don’t have anything negative to say about Harlan Ellison, I’ll be fine! Harlan was another teacher at Clarion. He can’t be fixed on a one-dimensional scale. He needed at least six. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/616 "2026-02-06T22:48:41Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Other than being famously short tempered and angry, there was the time he grabbed Connie Willis’s breast at the Hugos. I was only half-joking. I knew he was a colossal asshole but I didn’t know about the grabbing. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/617 "2026-02-06T22:53:52Z")
Read the introduction “Ellison Exegesis” by J. Michael Straczynski to the 2024 book _The Last Dangerous Visions_. I knew that Ellison was a liar and unpleasant. I learned in that introduction that he was also crazy. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/618 "2026-02-06T23:17:41Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I was only half-joking. I knew he was a colossal asshole but I didn’t know about the grabbing. All I needed to figure that out was reading one of his short stories, which I genuinely wish I had never read. (_I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream._) Cool story. Scarred for life. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2026, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/619 "2026-02-06T23:57:11Z")
Yeah, i gotta say, i assumed from his fiction that he was an asshole. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2026, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781/620 "2026-02-07T02:08:52Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Yeah, i gotta say, i assumed from his fiction that he was an asshole. I’m sure his many nonfiction writings would give you a similar impression 😀 (though I enjoyed many of them, he writes with a lot of charisma). I actually like reading Ellison, but I can’t imagine enjoying hanging out with someone that hyper-opinionated and difficult. He had an opinion on everything and his lifelong “suffer no fools” mantra comes off as insufferable. Apparently he could be pretty generous and loyal to his friends - he apparently still had some at the end of his life. One of those complicated guys like the late Joe Strummer. But like him frequently an abrasive asshole with nobody to blame but himself for his various shitty reputations. Well, I guess that and his undiagnosed until late-in-life bipolar disease. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781.md?page=30) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/neil-gaiman-accused-of-being-serial-sexual-abuser/1003781.md?page=32)