Did Ed Sheeran Steal Photograph?

Or do all songs just sound the same?

It’s Ed Sheeran’s turn this week to be accused of plagiarizing a song.

There’s been a lot of lawsuits lately involving the music industry. People claim that other artists ripped off their music, whether is be from stealing lyrics, to chords, or harmony. When you’re in the same genre, it’s got to be hard to make music that is completely new. There’s only so many music notes, and eventually, one song is going to sound like another if your lawyer is hungry enough.

Men at Work got done for stealing the riff from Kookaburra sits in an Old Gum Tree, which just smacks of a label going after easy money. The record company bought the rights to the kids song way after each song had been made. (Kookaburra was written in 1932.) The estate of Marvin Gaye sued over Blurred Lines. Chuck Berry sued John Lennon claiming certain lines and melodies for “Come Together” were taken from Berry’s 1956 track, “You Can’t Catch Me.” John Fogarty was sued for plagiarizing John Fogarty, after he left CCR and sold the rights to get out of his contract. His old record label claimed “Run Through The Jungle” sounded too much like “The Old Man Down the Road”. There are plenty more incidences of people being sued for music sounding similar. There’s only so many ways you can string music together and make it sound pleasurable. Otherwise you just end up with Jazz…

So here’s the thing. How many more years can people make music, and NOT have anyone claim it sounds similar? Especially when almost all the hits of the last few years have the same four chords?

For your viewing pleasure, I present Axis of Awesome, with their song 4 Chords. It’s worth the watch, just because it’s great, but it also makes you wonder why none of these people felt like they should sue?

June 7, 2016

Victim Impact

If you haven’t read the Victim Impact Statement yet that was written by the woman who was raped by Brock Turner, please, take the time to do so. It’s on the BuzzFeed Site. Yes, it’s long. 7000 words in fact, but it’s incredibly well written, and very moving. I challenge anyone to read it and not feel some kind of new found empathy for rape/assault/molestation victims. It should be required reading for all people charged with rape, and all their families who try to defend them.

I read some pretty shitty comments on articles related to the Stanford Rapist, Brock Turner. I had written a piece about him yesterday, after his father released a statement, saying his poor son just didn’t feel like eating steak anymore. The Daily Mail picked up my blog post, and while I was reading other articles about him, I was simply amazed at some of the comments. I was amazed at how many rape apologists there were out there, and how many people thought that the victim should just move on. Many thought that since she was unconscious during the assault, and she couldn’t remember the attack, that she was being a cry baby, and shouldn’t be upset at all in the first place. Isn’t that kind of like saying that if your house in robbed, but you’re not home when it happens, that it’s ok, and you shouldn’t really care? Or that when you’re under anaesthetic during surgery, and they amputate your leg instead of removing an appendix, you weren’t awake, and didn’t feel it happening, so it’s all good? No? Don’t think those are good analogies? In each case, something fucked up happened, and you lost something you shouldn’t have. Oh, you think your material possessions are worth more than someone’s dignity or self worth? It’s ok, most people simply can’t comprehend the effect of sexual assault until they’ve lived it.

What I personally connected with in the letter written by the victim was the process of what occurred after the event. She was taken to a hospital, and was subjected to hours of rape kit testing. Her whole body photographed. Her body entered again with instruments. Having to speak to multiple people about the ordeal. Thankfully, I didn’t have to do that. I can’t imagine how hard that would have been. I did experience what happened after that though.

What people don’t tell you when you finally find the balls to start the legal process of getting some kind of justice from your attacker, is that it isn’t just going to be them that is on trial. The victim is also on trial. Maybe more so.

We all know the phrase “Innocent until proven guilty” and the courts, rightly, treat the defendant that way. Even people who have been caught in the act, maybe even on tape, but who plead not guilty, and drag their victims through court, are given the presumption of innocence. Not so the victim. The defendants lawyers will spend an insane amount of time, effort and money to dig up every piece of dirt on a victim. They will research your entire history, looking for anything that could possibly make you look less than trustworthy. They will read your entire FaceBook, Twitter, Instagram feeds, looking for the smallest thing they can bring up. Dare to post a smile on Instagram a month after your attack? Well, shame on you. How could you possibly ever smile again after such an alleged event? Go to a party? Busted! Oh, there’s a picture of you on the beach four years before the attack, and you’re wearing a bikini? Well, you’re just going around scantily dressed and inviting people to hit on you.

What’s your sexual preference? How many people have you been with? Any one night stands? Be prepared to share those details with a courtroom full of people. What color shoes were you wearing two weeks before the attack? You can’t remember? Well, if you can’t remember that, how come you can remember all the other details of what happened that day you were raped? You must just be making it up. Had consensual sex once while drunk with your boyfriend? If you could consent with your partner, why couldn’t you consent with the person you had never met before?

It amazes me how the defence is allowed to badger victims on the stand. They’re allowed to completely emotionally assault the victims, calling them all kinds of names, insinuating all kinds of things, or just outright calling them money grubbing, attention seeking sluts. They don’t have to prove their client is innocent, they just have to prove you’re not believable. You’re not credible. You’re not worthy of being believed. Going to court is the most soul destroying experience. Assuming you even make it that far.

After going to the police, there’s the investigation. Which could take years. Some people find just that part to be so bad, they they rescind their statements. Often when people “take it back” it’s not that it didn’t happen, it’s just that they want it to all go away. They don’t think they’re strong enough to go through with the process. Especially when there’s a huge power balance between the perp and the victim. There may be outright threats, but it could also be small stuff, like your family disowning you, your friends all distancing themselves, the police asking you to make phone calls to your attacker to try to get a confession on tape. Everyone in town who has been questioned in relation to the event judging you. Even if you are able to make it through the initial investigation, it may never even lead to an arrest. If he is arrested, it could take years before a trial, during which time your life’s on hold, waiting, waiting. Court dates are constantly moved, and each time, emotions are crazy. You have to re-live the event over and over. Then, you get to court, and even if the bastard is found guilty, it’s still not over. You still have to live with what happened to you. You have to live with the process, and the trauma of court. If your case was public, you get to have it be the first thing people think of when they think of you. I hope this girl gets to keep her anonymity. People can read her powerful statement, and not have to know who she is. She sounds incredibly strong and brave, and I hope she finds some sense of peace. Others who are public will always live with it, publicly and privately. Two years after Robert was found guilty, and I should be enjoying peace, I’m still dealing with a high court appeal, and the occasional dickhead who decides to hero worship Robert and try to ruin my day by popping up on my social media accounts, applauding the pedophile, and threatening me for speaking up. Imagine if two years after you went to court, you still have to deal with this:

So to all those idiots who think that victims of sexual assault should just be happy that their attacker got a slap on the wrist and should move on, get a grip on reality. The victim can’t just move on. Even if they were unconscious when it happened, they had to live with the trauma of getting through the court process, and they continue to live with the feeling they may never be safe again, or that their whole life is being judged, or that they may never just be their old selves again.

I hope none of those internet trolls have to learn empathy the hard way, or have to read the same type of comments about themselves that they once wrote about others.

June 6, 2016

Brock Turner and his asshole father

His Dad said WHAT?

So by now, we’ve all seen the case of Brock Turner, the college kid who thought it was perfectly fine to rape an unconscious, intoxicated woman on campus. Thankfully, two other people saw what he was doing, pulled him off the girl, and held him down till police arrived. In this culture of people excusing campus rape as just a part of college life, almost like a right of passage, it’s nice to see that two decent people intervened. (Although it turns out they were foreigners, so maybe local kids aren’t learning much) But, it meant that Brock was caught red handed. At this point you’d be forgiven by thinking we’re really making a change in how campus rapes are handled. Instead of pleading guilty after being caught in the act, he hired and expensive lawyer, who tried to find dirt on the victim. They put her through another assault.

Then you read the statement that the piece of shit father released after his son was sentenced to the ridiculously short sentence. Instead of being given the available 14 years, the judge sentenced this rapist to six months, in a country jail. Not even the real big boy prison. I’ve met people who have been locked up here, and they like to distinguish between whether they went to jail, or to prison. In Australia, it’s all pretty much the same. In the US, there’s a HUGE difference. Prison is where bad people go. County jail is the equivalent of the local drunk tank. So after this guy does his petty six months in his day care facility, he gets probation, and has to register as a sex offender.

Now, if you weren’t already seething at the leniency of the sentence, this guy’s father comes out and tries to say that it’s still too much for his poor baby rapist son. He says his boy lost his smile, and hardly eats anymore. He then goes on to say that instead of jail, poor Brock should just be given probation, and he should be used as a type of educator, teaching people about the consequences of drinking and promiscuity.

So, never mind that the girl he raped may never smile again, or have trouble eating. His kid who did the raping is having a hard time being happy, now that he was going to court, because everyone knew what he did. To then say that his kid could teach about alcohol and promiscuity is a total slap in the face to victims everywhere. Instead of saying, “Don’t rape someone who can’t consent” he is saying it’s the girls fault because she got drunk at a party, and she was obviously a slut, and she was asking for it.

So Daddy never taught this kid right from wrong, and is still teaching his kid it’s OK to rape women, by saying it was her fault, and it’s his son who is the real victim here. It was just 20 minutes of “oops”. He’d never hurt anyone before. Never mind this was his first of four years at college. Maybe this was just the start. How many more women would he have raped if he hadn’t been caught?

I wonder if he has a daughter? Would he feel the same way if she was the one raped? Or would he disown her and tell her it was her fault? I wonder what will happen when his son is in jail, if he gets raped. Will daddy blame the rapist, or blame his son for being a pretty boy in jail and inviting it? Will people think it’s ok, because in prison, like college it happens so often it’s just accepted and isn’t really considered a crime?

I know that a parent is supposed to defend their children, but they should also teach their children right from wrong, and this guy obviously never did. Maybe he doesn’t know right from wrong himself, and has a few of his own “drunk conquests” in his past…

Instead of teaching your daughter how not to get raped, teach your sons not to rape.

Written statement from Dan Turner, Brock Turner's father. — Written statement from Dan Turner, Brock Turner’s father.

You can read the impact on the victim in her own statement here. I hope Brock’s father reads it, and realizes that his son is NOT the victim here.

April 15, 2016April 15, 2016

Can someone give me a reason to NOT have a sex offender registry?

It’s a few years now since Derryn Hinch came to the US, trying to get support for an Australian version of Megan’s Law. Unbelievably, it’s still not a thing in Australia. Western Australia has a form of a publicly accessible list, and while it’s a start, I still don’t think it’s as good as the ones I have available here in the US.

At the time Derryn came to the US, I was in Texas. Texas has a phenomenal Sex Offender registry. You can search by name, address, or see the most wanted sex offenders. When we had an exchange student, we were able to look at the map, and see names, photos and addresses for sex offenders on her route to school. We didn’t alarm her, we just told her there was a couple places she should avoid. There was no vigilantism, there was no picketing, there wasn’t burning bottles thrown at people’s houses. It’s just a tool, like any other, that lets you stay informed, and keep your kids safe.

We’ve moved to Florida, and they are way more pro-active here. They put up signs out the front of people’s houses in some counties. There are hundreds of pretty licence plates for cars here, with everything from the space shuttle to manatees on them, but if you’re a registered sex offender, you have one choice. Lime green. Makes it pretty easy to spot a sex offender cruising past a school… Their driver’s licence also identifies them. Schools here make visitors sign in with ID. This clearly identifies an unwanted.

I want someone to give me a valid reason Australia doesn’t have a sex offender registry. A real reason. Not some bullshit excuse about vigilantes. There’s 300 million people here, and everyone has access to the sex offender registry, and there is NO hunting of pedophiles. There’s no burnings at the stake. There’s no vigilantism. I call bullshit on that excuse.

The other excuse I constantly hear is about how some poor 18 year caught sexting with his 16 year old girlfriend ends up on the sex offender registry, and has to pay for life for their one indiscretion, and you know, “kids are kids”. I’m going to call BS on this one too. Every single sex offender tries to play this card. They were all some poor teenager caught with their girlfriend. Nobody ever admits they raped a kid. Matt’s mom had a kid who moved in next door to them, who was on the sex offender registry. In Texas, they’re legally obliged to tell the neighbours they’ve moved in. They tried to pull the whole “it was a misunderstanding with his girlfriend’s parents” crap, but a quick look at the sex offender registry, which actually tells you what the person did, let us know he raped a 12 year old.

Here’s the other thing about the US registries. They actually list what the offence was. They don’t name the victim, or go into explicit detail, but you can see whether someone really did get caught with their close to consensual girlfriend, or if they violently raped a child, or a man, or a woman. If you really did get popped for sexting, wouldn’t you want people to be able to see that, instead of just being a general sex offender?

Seriously, there is no reason to object to a sex offender registry. It’s a tool for keeping everyone safe, not just kids. Australia needs to step up and start protecting the innocent, not the offenders. People should be allowed to make decisions on how to keep themselves and their families safe, and you can’t do that without information.

Here’s the interview with Derryn from a few years ago. It’s all still relevant now.

April 14, 2016April 14, 2016

Should you go to the media?

Getting justice can be a long slow road, that sometimes feels like it’s never going to end. For many people, it never does. Their cases are stalled, their investigations halt, and people feel helpless.

Even in my case, people had been to the police before, and nothing had happened. It wasn’t till Woman’s Day and A Current Affair spoke of my story, that justice was eventually found. It wasn’t easy going public, but eventually it led to a court case, Robert was found guilty, and there was a glimmer of hope that if I could take down such a high profile pedophile, maybe others could do the same with their perpetrators. heydad_WD-article

So it’s logical for others to also contact the media hoping they will be able to do the same for them. I think if you’re strong enough to go through it publicly, and do whatever you need to do to take your perp down, then go for it. There’s a few things you need to know before you contact the media though. I’ve had several people message me, very disappointed by the response they got, or lack of a response from the media. I want people to have the right expectations, so they’re not let down again. ACA interview

I’m not going to insult anyone by saying my case was no different. We all know that being a former actress, people were going to be more interested in my case. I wasn’t so sure when I first signed up for Woman’s Day, but it soon became obvious I was delusional thinking I was just a has been nobody was interested in. Hindsight, of course my story was going to be a big one. But being famous isn’t going to be the difference between me and you getting your story on TV. The biggest hurdle when it comes to media is that they need at least three people to back up a story before they can air it. Without three people corroborating a story, it leaves a network open to defamation and lawsuits, something a media outlet won’t risk. There are ethical standards they must meet, and even I had to sign a bunch of legal paperwork before any of my stuff was aired. Other people backed up my story, and we could proceed. There was a lot of nervousness, because it wasn’t just Robert we were going against. His partner, Robyn, was highly regarded in the industry, and an attack on Robert was also an attack on Robyn. Point is, when you go to the media, make sure you have at least two other people who are willing to back up your story. If you have any photographic evidence, written evidence, anything at all, make sure you let them know. They are powerless to help you without it. Unfortunately, they need as much evidence as the police do…

So I’m not saying don’t go to the media. I think the media is there for all of us to use, not just former child actors like me. But just go in with realistic expectations, so that you’re not disappointed if they can’t help you.

derryn hinch

Make sure you’re prepared for what can happen if your story does get aired. Every pedophile with internet access will attack you. All the social media trolls will attack you. You can never make it go away. Once it’s out there, it’s out. You might find it helps to bring forward other victims and witnesses, but it can also go against you if there ever is an actual court case resulting from it. Still not saying don’t do it, but I want you to be prepared for all the possibilities. – I wasn’t.

Late edit: It’s really hard for the media to deal with minors, or even people who are now adults, but were minors when the abuse occurred. It’s illegal to name a child victim, even as a parent. Remember how my name was all over the place, and then it disappeared? Once Robert was charged, I was officially a victim, and they had to suppress my name. There’s all kinds of legal minefields when it comes to kids. Each and every case is different, and it will depend on whether the reporter thinks they can do your story justice with what you have available. No reporter wants to make your case more difficult, which can happen if not done right.

July 8, 2015July 8, 2015

Kids on reality TV

The Child Labor Reality

I’ve gotten into heated discussions with people over whether kids working in the entertainment industry is comparable to child labour. The way I see it, if you’re working, you’re considered labour, so any kid working is child labour. Others try to say I’m insulting the child labourers of third world countries, because their PC definition of child labour is restricted to kids working in factories in places like Bangladesh or Honduras. Sure, kids working in third world countries have it rough, but if you think that kids working on TV are all living a life of luxury, and making a huge amount of cash for later in life, you’re sadly mistaken.

Some places like California have laws set up for kids, many places don’t. So while your ten year old can’t go work at a store, or even on the family farm, you can send them off to work on a movie set, where contrary to popular perception, the work is much less than glamorous. Filming can be long, hard, and tedious, and sometimes even dangerous. You might be working outside in snow in winter, or in the heat of summer, with no AC, or even shade. You might end up working with a sex offender, and good luck getting anyone to do anything about that. Animals normally have a handler, and laws to protect them, making sure they get breaks for water, and to rest. Kids in most states do not even have that.

Now, there’s a huge crop of reality shows based around kids. These ones have even less protections. Most reality shows are scripted, and it’s not just cameras following kids around. Jon from Jon & Kate talked about how they would do retakes if the shot wasn’t right, and they might have the kids up at 2am, outside in the snow, trying to film. He got tired of it, and wanted to protect the kids. Kate didn’t care, she was making money, and getting famous. Even better, the kids were exempt from their own contracts in the beginning, so all the money was going to the adults.

I could argue the child labour issue of kids in the media till I’m blue in the face, but it’s probably just easier to let Paul Petersen do it. He’s my personal hero, and he’s been fighting for kids in the industry for years. Paul started A Minor Consideration, and here he is on CBC radio, discussing the laws. It’s about 12 minutes long, but very worth your time.

Listen here: http://www.cbc.ca/player/Radio/ID/2671225973/

A Minor Consideration is there for all current and former kids in the industry. If you’re a product of the industry and need help, contact AMC. If you want to help out, you can make a tax deductible donation, or attend our first ever Gala event in August. All money raised goes to helping fight for the rights of the innocents of the industry.

www.aminorconsideration.org

June 26, 2015

Love Wins!

Gay Marriage now legal in all 50 States

Congratulations America. I had woken up this morning to news of three separate terrorists attacks, and as I looked at the yellow countries affected on the map, which were all fairly close to Italy, where I’m about to head on vacation, I was starting to feel nervous. The online news showed me uncertainty in Greece, also on our travel list.

As I was watching the news, fearing more doom and gloom, as they talked about Obama heading to speak at the church in South Carolina that was attacked, the TV popped up with BREAKING NEWS, and finally, something good in the world.

The Supreme Court of the United States had finally reached a decision on Same Sex marriage. A country that claims to separate church and state, but usually doesn’t, finally had an epiphany, and listened to the majority of its constituents. They finally made Same Sex marriage legal in all 50 states. Congratulations America. I am very proud of you. You have joined other forward thinking countries in recognizing the rights of all people to love and marry.

Ok Australia, it’s your turn. Do me proud.

July 10, 2014

The Judge said What?

Judge Garry Neilson said What?

A Sydney judge has compared incest and paedophilia to homosexuality, saying the community may no longer see sexual contact between siblings and between adults and children as “unnatural” or “taboo”.

District Court Judge Garry Neilson said just as gay sex was socially unacceptable and criminal in the 1950s and 1960s but is now widely accepted, “a jury might find nothing untoward in the advance of a brother towards his sister once she had sexually matured, had sexual relationships with other men and was now ‘available’, not having [a] sexual partner”.

He also said the “only reason” that incest is still a crime is because of the high risk of genetic abnormalities in children born from consanguineous relationships “but even that falls away to an extent [because] there is such ease of contraception and readily access to abortion”.

Ok, so it’s awesome that people no longer view gay sex as taboo. I’m glad he recognizes that. However, everything that comes out of his mouth after that just scares the shit outta me.

Does he really think that two consenting adult males who engage in sexual activity is the same as an adult male having sexual relations with a male child? Is he OK with an adult male having sex with a 10 year old boy, because gay sex is no longer taboo? Does he not understand that gay sex has nothing to do with pedophilia? One can be gay, and have no interest in little boys. One can be interested in little boys, and have no interest in consenting adult gay sex. One has absolutely nothing to do with the other.

Then there’s his comments on women. So he thinks it’s OK to fuck your sister, as long as she’s been with a couple guys before you? So many jokes about Tasmania come to mind, and suddenly, none of them are funny. I can’t believe this guy thinks it’s all good to look at your sister, think, yep, she’s obviously up for it, cause she’s been with a couple guys, had a kid, so if I want me some, I can just go get it. If I get her knocked up, I’ll just take her to get an abortion.

What planet does this guy live on? Even if a woman has had a relationship with a man and is no longer a virgin, that doesn’t mean that she is therefor open to any man to have sex with her. Does this Judge have a sister? I’m terrified for her if he does. What if he gets horny one night and thinks he can just have her?

This man needs a serious background check. Someone needs to dig in and see if he’s a member of NAMBLA. Anyone who thinks that a woman is just there to service a man, relative or not, doesn’t need to be sitting on the bench. If you can’t understand the difference between consensual sex, incest, and “oh hey, you’re not a virgin, so quit your whining”, needs some serious evaluation.

I hope this guy is disbarred. He needs to be forced off the bench. They need to go back and look at all his past cases, and see if he’s been unduly lenient to sex offenders and those charged with incest.

So grateful we’ve got the Royal Commission going on, and people are finally understanding the full effect of sexual assault on kids.

Let’s get ready for National Child Protection Week, 7th – 13th September 2014 by getting rid of this guy.

Read the Sydney Morning Herald article here. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/judge-compares-incest-and-paedophilia-to-past-attitudes-towards-homosexuality-claiming-they-might-not-be-taboo-anymore-20140709-zt0v2.html

Thanks to Louise Hall for the article and bringing this guy to our attention.

May 2, 2014

Victim Impact Statements

Sentencing and Victim Impact statements

I was watching twitter last night, waiting to see details of what I would be missing in court. I’m back in Texas, and couldn’t attend the start of the sentencing. I had only written my Victim Impact Statement several hours before, and emailed it to the DPP. I had been putting it off. It was incredibly hard to write. Way more confronting than what I expected. I left me feeling raw and exposed. It was a big milestone for me though, because I actually asked one of the people in my office, a former police officer, if I should write it at all, and when he said yes, I took a deep breath and asked if he would help. I’m not good at asking for help. He knew how hard that was for me. He warned me that it was going to be tough, because this wasn’t so much about Robert, as it was a confession to myself. It was going to be hard admitting all those feelings on paper, to say that it has affected me. I’ve been good at hiding it and pretending everything is OK. I had to actually sit down and really think about the ways Robert has changed my life, and acknowledge it.

I only wrote 2.5 pages. My 1SG only had me change a couple words, and flip one sentence, and thought it was good. I didn’t show it to anyone else here though. I worried about it being read out in court. They all were, and while I was worried, I think afterwards I was glad people could see what an impact Robert has had on all of us. I was reading the live tweets. I was outside with Matt, and all he heard was, “Oh God”, and turned around to see a tear rolling down my eye. I read him the line from one of the other girls. It says, “As a child, I never wanted Santa to come into my room at night to leave presents”

I think this may be one of the saddest things I’ve ever read. I don’t believe in God, but I love Santa. To think a child was so terrified of people they didn’t even want Santa to come at Christmas is just fucking heartbreaking. I’m sure Robert is too arrogant to care that he broke little pieces off all of us, but I hope he was listening yesterday. I hope when he gets back to prison, he understand our words. I hope he comes to understand the meaning of No Means No, and what it’s like to be terrified of being assaulted by someone else who is higher up the food chain in prison.

I was watching the tweets, and Jodie told me “Very intense stuff. Lots of parallels between different victims’ statements re: effects and feelings”. One man had such a profound effect on so many people. I wonder how many other girls he has destroyed. There were more of us. Some came forward and couldn’t get charges, some chose not to be a part of the process. Some are still living in denial, because that’s easier for them. I won’t judge anyone. People have to deal with it the best way they know how.

While Robert wasn’t sentenced yesterday – he comes back on the 16th for the final sentencing, Max Clifford also went to court yesterday.

He was sentenced. He has been given eight years. Max’s charges were also historical, and much shorter than if he were to be charged for offenses now. It was interesting to read snippets of the statements that were given in his case too. I had stated that because of Robert, I could never go back to the industry. One of Max’s victims had similar sentiments: A woman who appeared as an extra in the James Bond film Octopussy had given up on pursuing her career after she was abused in the early 1980s, the court heard. “She aspired to be a stunt double in films but could not follow her dream after what happened to her,” Ms Cottage told the court.

Both sets of girls told of how they would never forget what happened, how they had been robbed of their innocence. How they had their happiness stolen from them. I’m glad that laws have changed, and that sentences are longer now. Victims have to live with it forever. Why should the bastards only get a couple of years?

I told Matt yesterday I just wanted this to all be over. I don’t want to wait another 2 weeks. He said it’s been 4 years, what’s another 2 weeks? I know in the long term, it won’t make much difference. Maybe it’s good, because now Robert has 2 weeks to sit in his cell and think about all the things we said. But I do look forward to when I don’t have to worry about seeing it on the news. When I don’t have to sit glued to my desk, watching it all unfold. I know I could just step back, but I can’t. I know that Robert will always have a part of my soul, but I’ll be glad when he no longer has a part of my daily dealings with life. I’m sure there’s a few of us that are looking forward to the 16th. I know he won’t get a long sentence. It’s all historical. I do hope they give him the maximums for those old sentences though. Maybe then, he can live the rest of his life being affected by us, they way we’ll all have to carry a piece of him to our graves.

November 5, 2013November 5, 2013

The name and shame debate

Should all pedophiles be named and shamed?

When I first went public, as in to the media, and not just people around me, I talked about the abuse, and I even said who it was, but the media chose not to name the perpetrator. This caused much controversy, and a lot of heated debate.

Many people believed I should name and shame or shut the fuck up. I was told that by not coming out with a name, I was damaging an entire show, that everyone who ever worked at seven was under suspicion. That I was irresponsible and damaging people’s lives and careers.

Corey Feldman is talking about his abuse. He wrote a book detailing his abuse, and what it was like growing up in Hollywood. He too is copping flack about not naming names. He originally put the names in his book, but the publisher decided to remove them, and his lawyers have advised he NOT publicly name them.

There are two reasons you don’t just run around naming alleged pedophiles.

Number one is the litigious aspect. If you can’t prove it, if you can’t afford better lawyers than them, if you don’t have people backing you up, you’re going to be sued and possibly charged with defamation. Not naming initially gives you a chance to have other people come forward, to corroborate your statement. When I went public, look at how many people came forward, not only as witnesses for me, but other victims. I knew there were others, but I didn’t know who they were. (I still don’t know who they are.) I wouldn’t have known where to direct police. I couldn’t have remembered every potential victim or witness. But by going public, I allowed others to say, Me Too! There’s also the very real threat of retaliation. If you go super public, and then you wind up dead in a ditch somewhere, people are going to know you probably didn’t have an accident…

There’s lots of former child stars who suddenly end up dead outside a nightclub from an overdose when they start mumbling about abuse. I named my perpetrator when it was legally safe to do so. Unfortunately for Corey, and other actors in the US, there’s a statute of limitations. He actually did talk to police back before it ran out. Their police chose to ignore it. – Sounds familiar…

The second reason, and this was actually the one that mattered to me:

When you talk about what happened to you in the industry, in general, without naming names, people do raise their heads and look around. People do start to look at everyone with suspicion. Parents start to wonder who is working with their children. This is NOT a bad thing. People who push their kids into the industry should be looking at everyone who works with their kids, and keeping their guard up. Parents should assume that the industry is NOT a safe place for kids.

Before I went public, everyone was worried about potential offenders. Once he was named, everyone just went back to their business, thinking OK, we know who that one person is. We’ll keep our kids away from him, and they’ll be safe.

No, they won’t. There’s way more than one pedophile in the business. By naming ONE person, all these parents have let their guard down, and are exposing their kids to potential harm. By not naming the offenders, Corey is letting people know that there are some seriously high ranking people in Hollywood who are dangerous predators, who are after your kids. Parents need to keep being vigilant, and not focus on just one person.