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Some Essential Reading About Harvey Weinstein and The Women Who Brought Him Down

Mira Sorvino in “Chloe & Theo.” The Oscar winner is among the many actresses who have come forward with a Weinstein horror story.

One week ago The New York Times published an explosive story about Hollywood titan Harvey Weinstein. Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey’s story detailed how the producer had “paid off sexual harassment accusers for decades.” More shocking and disturbing details emerged in Ronan Farrow’s piece for The New Yorker, which told the stories of many women who had been harassed and sexually assaulted by the man who has been thanked more times than God in Oscar acceptance speeches.

In the days since we’ve seen many important, excellent pieces of writing about Weinstein, the toxic culture that made his behavior possible, and the women who have come forward with their own nightmarish encounters with one of Hollywood’s most powerful men. Here are some of the highlights, but there’s plenty of amazing stuff besides what’s listed here, and this conversation is far from over.

“Why I Spoke Out Against Harvey Weinstein” (Mira Sorvino, Time)

“It is time for the culture to shift — the age-old tradition of the monied and powerful imposing themselves sexually on the vulnerable and the weak. The Droit du Seigneur must end. And it must end now. This is not a partisan issue. It is not relegated to Hollywood, or red or blue states. Almost every woman I know has some harrowing tale of harassment or sexual assault, and almost every one of them has not gone public for a variety of reasons, including shame and fear.”

“How Men Like Harvey Weinstein Implicate Their Victims in Their Acts” (Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker)

“Stay silent and you have acquiesced to whatever happened. Tell a friend and nothing much will be done. Come forward to an authority figure and you’ll face unfair consequences: people will be uncomfortable around you, perceiving ulterior motives; people will look for reasons that this happened to you, specifically; maybe you simply won’t be believed. There will be retribution — the power dynamic in these situations makes it a foregone conclusion. Men like Harvey Weinstein prey on women who are inexperienced enough that they can be penalized if they say no and implicated if they give in. There is no good exit from a hotel room with Harvey Weinstein.”

“Harvey Weinstein Is Gone. But Hollywood Still Has a Problem.” (Manohla Dargis, The New York Times)

“It is the perverse, insistent, matter-of-factness of male sexual predation and assault — of men’s power over women — that haunts the revelations about Mr. Weinstein. This banality of abuse also haunts the American movie industry. Women helped build the industry, but it has long been a male-dominated enterprise that systematically treats women — as a class — as inferior to men. It is an industry with a history of sexually exploiting younger female performers and stamping expiration dates on older ones. It is an industry that consistently denies female directors employment and contemptuously treats the female audience as a niche, a problem, an afterthought.”

“How Do You Solve a Problem Like Harvey Weinstein?” (Stephanie Zacharek Time)

“That code of silence protected Harvey Weinstein for an unconscionably long time. The day the New York Times ran its exposé, when Weinstein offered that initial ‘I just didn’t know any better, this is just how we did things in the old days’ defense, that thunderous sound you most certainly heard was the audible eye-rolling of women around the world. Even in the days of Darryl F. Zanuck, Harry Cohn and Howard Hughes — men who were said to extract sexual favors from a woman in return for career advancement (or even just one measly part) — there were plenty of men who knew better. There’s enough shame in being a man who thinks it’s O.K. to conduct yourself like a caveman. That, even as he was allegedly apologizing, Weinstein seemed to be off-loading responsibility for his behavior — essentially standing there in his short pants with his lollipop, blinking in disbelief that women could be so damn uncool about everything — makes that behavior even more monstrous.”

“The Fall of Harvey Weinstein Should Be a Moment to Challenge Extreme Masculinity” (Rebecca Solit, The Guardian)

“There is a solution, but I don’t know how we reach it, except in a plethora of small acts that accrete into a different world view and different values. It’s in how we raise boys, in what we define as erotic, in how men can discourage each other from the idea that dominating and harming women enhances their status. Perhaps it’s in young men in power learning from the fall of Roger Ailes, Bill Cosby, Bill O’Reilly, and now Harvey Weinstein — and myriad Silicon Valley executives and more than a handful of academics — that women have voices and, sometimes, people who listen believe them, and the era of impunity might be fading from view. Though the change that really matters will consist of eliminating the desire to do these things, not merely the fear of getting caught.”

“Harvey Weinstein’s Biggest Enabler? A Culture That Assumes Sexual Harassment Is Simply How the World Works.” (Christina Cauterucci, Slate)

“The casting couch may be unique to Hollywood, but the idea that sexually flattering aggressive men is the price women must pay for career success is present in every field. I know women who work in higher-ed fundraising who have to smile and submit when they’re too slow to slip away from big donors who are known for their lingering hugs and sloppy kisses on the cheek. In Silicon Valley, women sit through their superiors’ suggestive rants about their open relationships and sexual proclivities. In broadcast news, they laugh politely when the chairman comments on their legs. For as long as women have been in the workforce, this has been their cost of earning a living alongside men. This gender dynamic used to be openly encouraged. Now, it’s grudgingly accepted. If any real good is to come from Weinstein’s downfall, it must be destroyed. Men will sexually harass women as long as their well-meaning peers can credibly say that it’s just how the real world works.”

“I’m a Coward” (Liz Meriwether, The Cut)

“Just FYI, if you’re ever working in the movie business, and someone says ‘welcome to Hollywood’ to you, that person is truly the worst. It’s bad ‘Entourage’ nonsense. Hollywood isn’t a magical place that exists in a dreamscape. Hollywood is made up of the people who work here, and we are all (for the most part) human beings capable of making choices. Men who witness other men doing these things to women also have to make difficult choices. They are cowards too. I don’t know, maybe some of them feel guilty too. This guilt is how the system works. This is how the powerful stay powerful. It reminds me of the short story ‘The Lottery’ by Shirley Jackson, where everyone in the town has to throw a stone so everyone is to blame. Silence is as destructive as it is contagious. If we tell ourselves that no one and everyone is to blame — if we shrug our shoulders and say ‘welcome to Hollywood’ — nothing will ever change. All of us cowards need to take this moment to think about our choices and speak out in whatever way we can. The women who are standing up and actually pointing fingers are unimaginably brave.”


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