According to the New York Times... "During Ms. Goodman and Ms. Wolov’s surreal visit to Louis C.K.’s Aspen hotel room, they said they were holding onto each other, screaming and laughing in shock, as Louis C.K. masturbated in a chair. “We were paralyzed,” Ms. Goodman said. After he ejaculated on his stomach, they said, they fled."
Those who stretch the definition of sexual assault to absolve themselves of responsibility for their own choices, or who wilfully ignore the self-evident facts of human nature whenever they conflict with the false rhetoric of their political doctrines, are doing the cause of women’s safety no favors at all. Chastened and humbled by the life lessons I learned too late, I want no part in it. — Lexa Frankl
I want to address the stories told to the New York Times by five women named Abby, Rebecca, Dana, Julia who felt able to name themselves and one who did not.
These stories are true. At the time, I said to myself that what I did was okay because I never showed a woman my dick without asking first, which is also true. But what I learned later in life, too late, is that when you have power over another person, asking them to look at your dick isn't a question. It's a predicament for them. The power I had over these women is that they admired me. And I wielded that power irresponsibly.
I have been remorseful of my actions. And I've tried to learn from them. And run from them. Now I'm aware of the extent of the impact of my actions. I learned yesterday the extent to which I left these women who admired me feeling badly about themselves and cautious around other men who would never have put them in that position
I also took advantage of the fact that I was widely admired in my and their community, which disabled them from sharing their story and brought hardship to them when they tried because people who look up to me didn't want to hear it. I didn't think that I was doing any of that because my position allowed me not to think about it.
There is nothing about this that I forgive myself for. And I have to reconcile it with who I am. Which is nothing compared to the task I left them with.
I wish I had reacted to their admiration of me by being a good example to them as a man and given them some guidance as a comedian, including because I admired their work.
The hardest regret to live with is what you've done to hurt someone else. And I can hardly wrap my head around the scope of hurt I brought on them. I'd be remiss to exclude the hurt that I've brought on people who I work with and have worked with who's professional and personal lives have been impacted by all of this, including projects currently in production: the cast and crew of 'Better Things,' 'Baskets,' 'The Cops,' 'One Mississippi,' and 'I Love You Daddy.' I deeply regret that this has brought negative attention to my manager Dave Becky who only tried to mediate a situation that I caused. I've brought anguish and hardship to the people at FX who have given me so much The Orchard who took a chance on my movie and every other entity that has bet on me through the years.
I've brought pain to my family, my friends, my children and their mother. I have spent my long and lucky career talking and saying anything I want. I will now step back and take a long time to listen.
I also took advantage of the fact that I was widely admired in my and their community, which disabled them from sharing their story and brought hardship to them when they tried because people who look up to me didn't want to hear it. I didn't think that I was doing any of that because my position allowed me not to think about it.
when you have power over another person, asking them to look at your dick isn't a question. It's a predicament for them. The power I had over these women is that they admired me. And I wielded that power irresponsibly.
Recruiting casual acquaintances as an audience for masturbation is not criminal, and if you agree to watch, it isn't an assault either. It isn't an exercise over the audiences career. It's a fetish; a personal kink. — Bitter Crank
Who one can recruit will depend on how attractive (fame, body, money...) one is. This is all in bad taste as far as polite society is concerned, but then polite society has found even non-missionary-position sex in bad taste. — Bitter Crank
Well, he was there and he did it and he says he did have power over them and what he did was wrong. I presume he knows more about the situation than you do. I don't consider it a sexual assault either by the way but he put them in one hell of a shitty position, and in the end humiliated them. And if he did that to a woman I cared about, I'd want to break his fucking neck. Of course, being the law abiding citizen I am I would do no such thing. O:) — Baden
(I like his apology by the way and I don't think this should end his career. There's a world of difference between him and rats like HW.) — Baden
PR stunt. He is trying to get them off his case so that he can continue with his life. Would you not do the same and try to calm the waters before another 30 women show up. — Sir2u
How many people like to have sex out in public because they like being watched. — Sir2u
PR stunt. — Sir2u
If a few hundred thousand ugly wrinkled up (but mobile) old people were to go to Washington, undress, and begin having group sex on the Capital Mall, and elsewhere -- on the Capital Steps, in congressional office anterooms, in Abe Lincoln's lap, National Public Radio's studios, and all around the White House, — Bitter Crank
Those who ... wilfully ignore the self-evident facts of human nature whenever they conflict with the false rhetoric of their political doctrines, are doing the cause of women’s safety no favors at all. — Lexa Frankl
I'm not a big fan of C.K. He's not my cup of tea, most of the time.
Social media inveighing social justice by a viral mob — Cavacava
If your response to a campaign to show just how widespread shitty sexual behavior in society is is to wrangle over definitions, you've completely missed the point. — StreetlightX
A particular problem is the duality of the oppressed: they are contradictory, divided beings, shaped by and existing in a concrete situation of oppression and violence. ^
Any situation in which "A" objectively exploits "B" or hinders his and her pursuit of self-affirmation as a responsible person is one of oppression. Such a situation in itself constitutes violence, even when sweetened by false generosity, because it interferes with the individ ual's ontological and historical vocation to be more fully human. With the establishment of a relationship of oppression, violence has already begun. Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence? How could they be the sponsors of something whose objective inauguration called forth their existence as op pressed? There would be no oppressed had there been no prior situation of violence to establish their subjugation.
Violence is initiated by those who oppress, who exploit, who fail to recognize others as persons—not by those who are oppressed, exploited, and unrecognized.
I am struck by your being "troubled" by the "power" of the abused! Almost as if your whole world is threatened by the empowerment of women.
I am troubled by the power of a viral mob, how it envelops people's lives and pushes its participants in a blind manner. This is not justice, it is guilt by allegation and that is not just. — Cavacava
How can that be justice...did Carl Sargent get his just desserts? — Cavacava
An innuendo is a hint, insinuation or intimation about a person or thing, especially of a denigrating or a derogatory nature. It can also be a remark or question, typically disparaging (also called insinuation), that works obliquely by allusion.
People aren't nice, when you get right down to it, and shitty, creepy behavior is going to be a fixture in human relations -- across the board -- for a long time to come.
After we have eliminated everyone who ever behaved in a shitty, creepy manner, who will be left? You? — Bitter Crank
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