Morgan Freeman accused of sexual harrassment

[RFayette 🇻🇦]

I'll reserve judgement until i hear all the facts

[Filuwaúrdjan]

That is true, depending on how long it is before the movement subsides. But Morgan Freeman is someone who I wasn't expecting at all. It's also ironic, given that he is the same age as the now disgraced Bill Cosby.

Not sure if comparing the two is particularly helpful - Freeman has been accused of being (has implicitly accepted that he is indeed) what used to be called a dirty old man; Cosby has been accused of a litany of extremely serious offences (up to and including rape and child abuse) and has been convicted on the most serious charges not statute-barred. It isn't that the former is fine or anything, but it's really not on the same moral plane. Conflation serves no useful purpose.

[Calthrina950]

That is true, depending on how long it is before the movement subsides. But Morgan Freeman is someone who I wasn't expecting at all. It's also ironic, given that he is the same age as the now disgraced Bill Cosby.

Not sure if comparing the two is particularly helpful - Freeman has been accused of being (has implicitly accepted that he is indeed) what used to be called a dirty old man; Cosby has been accused of a litany of extremely serious offences (up to and including rape and child abuse) and has been convicted on the most serious charges not statute-barred. It isn't that the former is fine or anything, but it's really not on the same moral plane. Conflation serves no useful purpose.

I wasn't comparing their crimes directly. I was merely noting that both are of the same age, and thus of the same generation. Cosby's crimes are far worse than what has been reported against Freeman (thus far). But the fact of the matter, is that both of these are men who were very widely respected up until the allegations coming out against them.

[Maxwell]

wow I just watched Se7en. That's 2 of 3 main actors that are dirtbags!

[Politician]

Another one bites the dust...

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Not surprised, he's always had a reputation for getting women pregnant and then skipping town while leaving them to raise the kid on their own.  Along with Brett Ratner, Bryan Singer, John Conyers, Bill O'Reilly, and John Travolta, this was among the less surprising sexual harassment scandals to have come out since the #MeToo movement began.  What's more surprising is that Sylvester Stallone doesn't seem to have really come under much fire given all that's already out there about him (google "Sylvester Stallone sex abuse" and you'll see what I mean).

What's been interesting has been how the media has largely ignored folks like Christian Slater, Sean Penn, Bill Murray, Johnny Depp, Dr. Dre, countless athletes, etc who have a relatively well-documented history of violence against women.  Eric Schneiderman is obviously a big exception, but it has been disappointing to see so many known domestic abusers being given a pass.  Even Mel Gibson seems to be being permitted to undergo a bit of a Hollywood "rehabilitation."

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

All men do it.

No, we don't.

[Mr. Smith]

I admit, I'm starting to worry something's gonna come out against Mr. Rogers at this point.

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

I admit, I'm starting to worry something's gonna come out against Mr. Rogers at this point.

I would not mind if he was hit.

[NeverAgain]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.

So, only four women are telling the truth here. Kay.

When one woman comes forward, there is a problem. When multiple women come forward, it is very hard to say that each of them are in a false plot or "misunderstood" the situation. Innocent until proven guilty all the way, but that's in the court room. Harrassment and innapropiate comments have no place anywhere in the workplace if they make employees feel uncomfortable.

We can both focus our attention on less damaging, but still pervasive, issues of groping, innapropiate comments, etc. while still ensuring that more serious sexual assault is treated as the crime it should be. We as humans are smart enough how to say the pervy old man and the rapist may not be equal, but neither is okay.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Statistically speaking, only 6-8% of complaints are false.  As for so-called misunderstandings, I call BS.  If what Morgan Freeman did (ex: grabbing a woman and trying to forcibly pull down her skirt) or making unwanted comments about a pregnant soon-to-be mother such as “I wish I was in the room when that happened because you are ripe” then I don’t even know what to say.  In another case, Freeman was grabbing a production assistant’s butt so frequently that Alan Arkin (who was on set while this was happening) publicly told him to “cut it out.”  What you said isn’t so much an unpopular opinion as an objectively wrong one.  I would genuinely encourage you to do some more research about both this issue in general and specific allegations that have been made using objective sources. 

I’d also add that so-called “compliments” (as you call them) can sometimes be pretty blatant sexual harassment.  To use a pretty obvious example, I’ll never forget the time Chris Matthews said to Erin Burnett on air “You are just a complete knockout.  I mean, like, a total ten.  Total knockout.  Why don’t you give us smile, Erin?  You have such a great smile.  Can we zoom in on that a bit?”  If the woman doesn’t consider it a compliment and instead is being made to feel extremely uncomfortable and as though she is being treated like a sex object rather than a professional colleague, then it’s probably sexual harassment. 

I once asked some of my female co-workers at a happy hour years ago how appearance-related “compliments” in the work place made them feel after explaining that I was asking b/c as a man, I knew this was an issue I probably couldn’t understand without doing some listening.  Almost to a person, everyone said appearance-related “compliments”/comments in the workplace from male colleagues are at best extremely uncomfortable and at worst downright offensive depending on what is said (several literally said “it is always unwanted”), but that this sort of harassment was something they had little choice except to pretend to appreciate b/c 1) no one was going to do anything about it anyway, 2) saying it was offensive would cause most male co-workers to dub them a “humorless b!tch” which is apparently one of the most professionally damaging things a woman can be branded by male colleagues, especially if it happens early in her career (at least, according to the women I talked to). 

Come to think of it, it might not be the worst idea to (at an appropriate time outside of the workplace and after providing an explanation for why you’re asking) ask some women who you know how certain types of comments make them feel (assuming they’re comfortable talking about the subject) and just listen without trying to argue for a particular position.  You might learn something that changes the way you think about these sorts of issues. 

Lastly, it seems pretty arrogant for us, as men, to presume to know better than women what is and isn’t offensive to women.  It reminds me of white people who don’t get why African-Americans can use the n-word and white people can’t or gentiles who think Jews should be fine with them making jokes about the Holocaust just b/c we are fine with Jewish comedians like Mel Brooks doing so.  If you know someone finds your behavior offensive/objectifying or that it makes them really uncomfortable and you keep doing it anyway then you’re being (at best, and I can’t stress those two words enough) an arrogant, selfish jerk and the question of how you think they should feel about what you said is beside the point.  You’re making a choice to say “I know I am hurting another human being and I choose to continue hurting them because I care more about saying whatever pops into my head than I do about making sure my words don’t hurt another human being.  If I hurt someone then that’s their fault since they didn’t conform to my personal worldview.”  This isn’t a political correctness thing; it’s a don’t be a misogynistic sketchball thing.  Somewhere along the line America started confusing political correctness with basic human decency, but that’s a topic for another post.

[BenBurch]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty. 

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty. 

I think that you are doing something I often hear people on the left do.  Yes, the Constitution only requires indisputable evidence for criminal trials, like freedom of speech is only technically from the government.  However, I strongly believe in the principles of the Constitution and believe that they should be held up by all private entities and individuals.

[Virginiá]

I think that you are doing something I often hear people on the left do.  Yes, the Constitution only requires indisputable evidence for criminal trials, like freedom of speech is only technically from the government.  However, I strongly believe in the principles of the Constitution and believe that they should be held up by all private entities and individuals.

Wouldn't that mean that, for example, a church couldn't kick out people who came in every day and started talking non-stop about worshiping Satan?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty.  

I don't know; I'm very sympathetic to the MeToo movement but I can't really agree with this logic. The concept of innocence until proof of guilt is one that exists in law, yes, but I think limiting it to courts is rather chilling and causes people to have their lives ruined potentially by hearsay and slander. There was a case in Britain where a man's life was ruined by the press because a tenant of his was found murdered and various journos dug up all sorts of small town gossip about him (mainly on the "he looks weird" side of things) and proceeded to claim he was probably the murderer. There was also the case of the dingo ate my baby mother, who was smeared as a liar and a child murderer to the extent it probably influenced the jury. There are more, but you get the jist.

Not that this discussion is relevant here, given that Freeman has admitted the claims are true.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I think that you are doing something I often hear people on the left do.  Yes, the Constitution only requires indisputable evidence for criminal trials, like freedom of speech is only technically from the government.  However, I strongly believe in the principles of the Constitution and believe that they should be held up by all private entities and individuals.

Wouldn't that mean that, for example, a church couldn't kick out people who came in every day and started talking non-stop about worshiping Satan?

Yeah, it’s a ridiculous standard.

[BenBurch]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty. 

I'm not an idiot, I know that.  It's just that we shouldn't be so quick to assume.  I despise Morgan Freeman and his political beliefs, but we ought to be careful before automatically assuming somebody did something they possibly didn't. 

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty.  

I'm not an idiot, I know that.  It's just that we shouldn't be so quick to assume.  I despise Morgan Freeman and his political beliefs, but we ought to be careful before automatically assuming somebody did something they possibly didn't.  

Morgan Freeman literally admitted that the accusations were true.  With all due respect, what more proof do you want?

[Horus]

Not surprised, he's always had a reputation for getting women pregnant and then skipping town while leaving them to raise the kid on their own.  Along with Brett Ratner, Bryan Singer, John Conyers, Bill O'Reilly, and John Travolta, this was among the less surprising sexual harassment scandals to have come out since the #MeToo movement began.  What's more surprising is that Sylvester Stallone doesn't seem to have really come under much fire given all that's already out there about him (google "Sylvester Stallone sex abuse" and you'll see what I mean).

What's been interesting has been how the media has largely ignored folks like Christian Slater, Sean Penn, Bill Murray, Johnny Depp, Dr. Dre, countless athletes, etc who have a relatively well-documented history of violence against women.  Eric Schneiderman is obviously a big exception, but it has been disappointing to see so many known domestic abusers being given a pass.  Even Mel Gibson seems to be being permitted to undergo a bit of a Hollywood "rehabilitation."

We get it, all straight men are perverts.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Not surprised, he's always had a reputation for getting women pregnant and then skipping town while leaving them to raise the kid on their own.  Along with Brett Ratner, Bryan Singer, John Conyers, Bill O'Reilly, and John Travolta, this was among the less surprising sexual harassment scandals to have come out since the #MeToo movement began.  What's more surprising is that Sylvester Stallone doesn't seem to have really come under much fire given all that's already out there about him (google "Sylvester Stallone sex abuse" and you'll see what I mean).

What's been interesting has been how the media has largely ignored folks like Christian Slater, Sean Penn, Bill Murray, Johnny Depp, Dr. Dre, countless athletes, etc who have a relatively well-documented history of violence against women.  Eric Schneiderman is obviously a big exception, but it has been disappointing to see so many known domestic abusers being given a pass.  Even Mel Gibson seems to be being permitted to undergo a bit of a Hollywood "rehabilitation."

We get it, all straight men are perverts.

Because that’s totally what I said

[BenBurch]

Unpopular opinion: #MeToo has become a total witch-hunt, and I would bet that well over 50% of allegations are false or a legitimate case of misunderstanding.  If someone compliments you, that's not harassment.  Let's go after legitimate cases of sexual assault and not worry about a joke or an off-handed comment, even if it is ill-advised.

Innocent until proven guilty, and all that.

That's only with regard to criminal punishment for actual crimes.  It applies strictly in regard to a criminal trial.  Even civil trials use a preponderance of evidence standard (i.e. is there a 50.000001% or more chance that ____ did what they were accused of)  It doesn't mean we should generally just assume in day-to-day life/when deciding whether to hire people that everyone is innocent unless proven to be guilty.  

I'm not an idiot, I know that.  It's just that we shouldn't be so quick to assume.  I despise Morgan Freeman and his political beliefs, but we ought to be careful before automatically assuming somebody did something they possibly didn't.  

Morgan Freeman literally admitted that the accusations were true.  With all due respect, what more proof do you want?

Oh, he did?  Whoopsee.  My bad.  I didn't know?

[GM Team Member and Deputy PPT WB]

I can smell you

I'm sorry I had to

In all seriousness, this is saddening news. I wonder who else that's well-loved will turn out to not be as pure as we all thought.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I can smell you

I'm sorry I had to

In all seriousness, this is saddening news. I wonder who else that's well-loved will turn out to not be as pure as we all thought.

Bill Murray.  Honestly, I’m shocked more hasn’t been written about him yet given how much is already out there.