(A CNN anchor took victim blaming to a new low by suggesting to one of Cosby’s victims that she could have prevented the assault if only she had bitten his dick off.) And so on. And hey, she was drunk/dressed wrong/out too late/should have known better, what was she thinking going there, of course she was asking for it, obviously it’s her fault this nice boy is in trouble now. Let’s not let one incident ruin a young man’s entire life. There are too many reasons why rape culture is insidious, but it is largely due to widespread, reflexive excuse-making and victim blaming. Would Seminole apologists have different thoughts about the victim in the Winston case if the perpetrator had been Miles Davis? Would the people who view the quarterback’s victim as a gold-digging opportunist have more sympathy for her had her assailant been a jazz musician they don’t care about? had done so? Either way, you’d probably be fit to kill. What if the victim were a stranger, the attacker a friend? Where do your loyalties fall now? How would you feel if a football player raped you or someone you love? How would you feel if your favorite musician/comedian/etc. Polanski and Woodman? Who cares, long past their prime.Īnd yet I treasure the 47 Miles Davis cds on the shelf. Give these people their just deserts! Jerry Sandusky? Buggering priests and the bishops who protect them? Castration is too good for them! Cosby? Old and in the way. I generate high dudgeon when I read about schools sweeping campus rape under the rug to protect the institution. Just like Miles’ people protected him.īut I’m self-righteously appalled at the special treatment doled out to athletes. He’s so good at what he does, and so many people have come to depend upon him for their own success, that of course they protect him. I’ve watched Winston play a few games, and I get it, I really do, I understand why the coaches and athletic directors and university presidents and the diehard fans are so willing to suspend their judgment. Gittes, most people never have to face the fact that at the right time and the right place, they’re capable of ANYTHING.”) I hold these truths to be self-evident as I sit here listening to Miles Davis, and oh by the way, I watched part of Chinatown (again) just last week. I like to consider myself a moral person, one who would never do such a thing, harrumph, and how horrible that the police have seemingly conspired to protect this young man from the hand of justice, won’t someone consider the victim(s?), is football really that damned important where are our priorities? They let those guys get away with anything. And according to at least one accuser, he’s a sexual predator. Heisman Trophy winner, leader of a championship football team, star baseballer, and hero to many in my adopted hometown – none of which I give two tiny shits about. The rest are technically not guilty, if not quite innocent.Īnd then there’s Jameis Winston. The only difference from the others mentioned here: he pleaded guilty to rape – before he fled the country to escape punishment – and is thus the only one of this group to actually carry a legal finding of guilt. Polanski made some brilliant movies and raped a child. And yeah, he has nasty cloud over his head, too. I owe that debt to Woody Allen, not to mention admiring his work for 40 years. My ongoing devotion to the old classics began that night. That night, I stumbled across a movie on TV called Casablanca. My first Woody Allen movie was Play it Again, Sam. And it’s beginning to seem that he has been a serial rapist most of these years. Fat Albert, driving in San Francisco, his brother Russell. If number of plays and space on the shelf mean anything, Miles is certainly one of the top three musicians in my little world.Īnd he was an admitted wife beater, and according to some, a rapist.Stories I was told by a musician who knew Miles are Rick James-level stuff. My widely shared opinion: he’s the musical equivalent of Picasso, Joyce, Jonas Salk, Einstein, &c. And I really wish I had not stumbled across this particular two and two. Pudding Pop – while I was listening to Miles Davis, just minutes after our local fishwrap announced yet another postponement to the Jameis Winston sexual assault hearing. I read this Ta-Nehisi Coates piece in The Atlantic - a writer’s mea culpa regarding the rape allegations swirling around Mr. Each of these things is just like the other,īill Cosby.
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