Why Women Sometimes Don't Report Rape or Sexual Harassment
When I wrote for The A.V Club, I tended to get an insane deluge of publicist emails and press releases all competing for my attention. I benefitted from the institutional might and power of The A.V. Club, and when I left for The Dissolve I got a lot fewer publicist emails because let’s face it, if you do not have a sizable audience, publicists don’t give a mad-ass fuck about you.
By that same reasoning, I get a lot fewer emails as the entirety of Nathan Rabin’s Happy Place, but sometimes I get emails and pitches so jarringly, unforgivably wrong that I feel the need to share them with the public. Usually I just share those abominations to my Facebook group the Society for the Toleration of Nathan Rabin, but the latest pitch I received is so awful I feel the need to share it in its entirety, minus a phone number or two:
Dear Nathan,
I thought your audience might find Norm Pattis' controversial commentary on a likely-successful Harvey Weinstein defense of interest.
While everyone is jumping on the Weinstein-touched-me bandwagon, here's the other side of the story. (to be clear, Pattis abhors the crime of rape but in this case...)
You likely know Norm from some of his high profile cases, e.g. NY Millionaire Madam... or his books, including the bestseller Taking Back the Courts.
His comments on this case (see his blog post below) might have some validity and may point toward Weinstein's likely-successful defense.
Can I set up an interview with Norm Pattis for you? Or, provide further information?
Thanks, (Name Redacted)
Call Me, Harvey. I’ll Defend You
Not since Meg Ryan’s fake orgasm sitting across a diner’s table from Billy Crystal in “When Harry Met Sally” have we seen such disingenuous huffing and puffing about sex from Hollywood The starlets are atwitter with allegations of being groped, and worse, by Harvey Weinstein, a man who launched more starlets than, well, forgive me, the Big Bang.
Really, people. Hollywood sells sex. We buy the fantasy. People get obscenely rich in the process. Is it any surprise that, assuming the allegations are at least in part true, those tiptoeing the line between fantasy and reality from time to time crossed libidinal boundaries?
Even Hillary Clinton has come out of retirement, exclaiming in horror about the accusations involving Weinstein, as though Monica Lewinsky’s dry-cleaning bills weren’t her husband’s — the former president of the United States — problem.
Let’s hope this libidinal storm passes, and soon. There’s a world of real problems that need solving. North Korea threatens to incinerate while Trump bloviates.
Americans are dropping by the thousand to opioid overdoses amid suspicions that the American dream is over. The climate delivers fire, rain and death. A tired world migrates from one place to another in a desperate attempt to escape the grim logic of scarcity.
Will prosecutors really spend the intellectual and social capital necessary to haul Weinstein into court? They shouldn’t.
Young starlets flocking to the press to denounce Weinstein have stains of their own to explain. How many were willing to play to get paid? It wasn’t chance that put them within Weinstein’s reach; it was ambition. How much were they willing to give to get the stardom he and his studios could offer? You know the answer.
The courts regard sex offenses with a special horror. Rape is a close cousin to murder. It is a furtive, secretive sort of offense. Special rules of evidence, extended statutes of limitations, a solicitousness of accusers inconsistent with the presumption of innocence attend these cases.
But let’s be real: If a woman was raped, fondled, or otherwise abused in ways inconsistent with her sense of dignity, why would it take years for her to make public the outrage? Fear, you say?
Fear of what? Not getting the starring role, the accolades that come of fame?
The legion of victims all reek of the starlet’s hunger to land the starring role. What’s next, Angelina Jolie in the lead of the new docudrama — “Victim!”? The list of accusers grows with the speed of a line at MacDonald’s on a night two burgers are sold for the price of one.
An accuser — calling them victims suggests there is credence to their claims — who waits years to come forward has made a choice, a calculation. In the cold terms of economics, the marginal utility that comes of complaining is low unless and until they get what they wanted all along — fame and public solicitude.
What circumstances lead a young, attractive woman to spend time alone with Harvey Weinstein? Dare I call it naked ambition? The successful among them now live in mansions paid for by titillation.
And why would a starlet hesitate to claim that Weinstein mauled her? An obvious answer — because she got what she played for.
Prosecutors need to think long and hard about whether to pursue a claim against Weinstein. Politically correct pandering isn’t the pursuit of justice.
I envy the criminal defense lawyer who defends Weinstein against any of these claims. His accusers have dry-cleaning bills all their own to explain Did Harvey get more pussy than Donald Trump ever dreamed of? Probably. Indeed, the starlets now claiming abuse are so brazen I suspect they’d make even Monica Lewinsky blush.
Weinstein’s defense? Consent. All of us aided and abetted.
Case closed.
Incidentally, if you need to specify that your client “abhors the crime of rape” in an email, don’t send that email. Hell, drop that toxic, obnoxious fucking client, particularly if that “abhors the crime of rape” has to be followed by a “but”, as it clearly does here, because, let's be honest, Pattis clearly thinks these women are all sluts who had it coming, and is disappointed in the gullibility of anyone who feels otherwise. C'mon, if they didn't want to get groped and raped, why did they even become actresses in the first place? Clearly, in Pattis' mind, if you want to act in film, you are implicitly consenting to sexual abuse from powerful men.
I did, in fact, find Pattis’ comments newsworthy. That’s not because he’s right but rather because he accidentally provides a lot of insight into why women don’t report sexual harassment and sexual assault.
Pattis pretends to give this matter consideration when he writes, “Let’s be real: If a woman was raped, fondled, or otherwise abused in ways inconsistent with her sense of dignity, why would it take years for her to make public the outrage? Fear, you say?”
He then goes on to further answer this dishonestly and disingenuously question: “Fear of what? Not getting the starring role, the accolades that come of fame? The legion of victims all reek of the starlet’s hunger to land the starring role. What’s next, Angelina Jolie in the lead of the new docudrama — “Victim!”? The list of accusers grows with the speed of a line at MacDonald’s on a night two burgers are sold for the price of one.”
Let me start off my response to Pattis with an unmistakable, “Fuck you. Fuck you, you condescending, witless, arrogant, toxic rape apologist piece of shit. Fuck you and everyone who thinks like you. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.”
Let’s be real: If a woman was raped, fondled, or otherwise abused in ways inconsistent with her sense of dignity, why would it take years for her to make public the outrage?”
Yeah, fear’s a good place to start. Women who have been assaulted and sexually harassed are understandably terrified of not being believed by the police. They are understandably terrified of having to re-live and re-experience their trauma over and over as they tell the story of their sexual assault to police officers and lawyers and judges and reporters.
They’re scared that even if they go forward and press charges in a prompt and timely fashion and do everything we’re told rape victims must do in order to be taken seriously, there’s still a very good chance that their harasser and/or rapist not only won’t suffer negative consequences, but they also might, I dunno, be elected President of the United States or be honored as one of the greatest Americans of the 20th century, as Bill Cosby was before everyone stopped pretending he wasn’t clearly a serial rapist of women.
They’re afraid of the slut-shaming and judgment that comes with going forward with a sexual assault accusation. They’re afraid that a rape case might drag on for years and extol a terrible physical psychological cost. They’re scared of having to tell the story of their assault to their parents and boyfriends and girlfriends. They're scared of having their sexual histories made public, along with any history of mental illness, drug use or erratic behavior.
Lastly, they’re scared that by doing the painful, difficult, agonizing work of coming forward with their experiences being sexually harassed and assaulted by one of the most powerful and terrifying men in show business some piece of shit lawyer will write some snide, condescending, self-regarding horse shit commentary about how the women coming forward at great personal and professional peril are all opportunistic whores concerned only with their careers, images and bank accounts, and consequently should be booed out of society so that men like Weinstein can be welcomed back with open arms.
They don’t come forward because some snarky piece of shit will think it’s such a hoot that a man sexually terrorized an industry for a period of decades that a line like, “What’s next, Angelina Jolie in the lead of the new docudrama — “Victim!”? The list of accusers grows with the speed of a line at MacDonald’s on a night two burgers are sold for the price of one” isn’t just appropriate and hilarious but something that must be shared with the public.
They don’t come forward because there are assholes like Pattis and a disturbing number of people like him who see all women who come forward with allegations as inherently guilty—of greed, of calculation, of being impure, of not being a perfect victim—and men like Weinstein as inherently innocent, as guilty of nothing more than doing business the way business has always been done.
Women are scared to come forward because monsters like Pattis see being sexually assaulted and harassed as the cost of doing business in Hollywood, and nothing more. Pattis sure seems convinced that everyone accusing Weinstein is a shameless, lying, amoral attention whore crying rape for publicity’s sake—because God knows no one has it easier or better in our society than women who come forward with sexual assault allegations—when he’s the one using this tragedy—and that’s what it is—to promote his pathetic, disgusting legal career, reprehensible books and unconscionable editorial.
In conclusion, fuck you, Norm Pattis, and the horse you rode in on. Also, I am not interested in your thoughts on this or anything else.
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