(Responding from this blog, because this is the one I’m on the most, and where it’s easier for me to monitor discussions.)
Before we get started, I want people to understand who Lisa Bloom is (taken from Wikipedia):
Bloom received significant media attention after Harvey Weinstein was accused of serial sexual harassment and assault. According to an October 2017 article in The New York Times, Bloom acknowledged advising Weinstein on power dynamics and harassment, calling him “an old dinosaur learning new ways” and asserting that “he denies many of the accusations as patently false”.[28] Bloom’s advising role, which she had held since late 2016,[20] was pilloried in the media for its dissonance with Bloom’s prior representation of sexual assault victims, with some calling her book adaptation deal with The Weinstein Company, signed during Weinstein’s tenure as co-chairman, a conflict of interest.[29][30]
On October 7, 2017, two days after the initial reports and amid mounting criticism, Bloom stepped down from the team advising Weinstein after reported friction with members of The Weinstein Company’s board. Bloom, according to emails purportedly obtained by The New York Times, had proposed promulgating “photos of several of the accusers in very friendly poses with Harvey after his alleged misconduct”.[31] Bloom denied plotting to undermine the accusers;[32] however, The Daily Beast later reported that Bloom had offered journalist Ronan Farrow opposition research on one of Weinstein’s accusers, Rose McGowan, during his reporting on Weinstein.[20] Farrow further claimed that Bloom served as Weinstein’s operative and would report any information she gleaned about his investigation back to Weinstein. “Lisa, you swore, as an attorney and a friend, that you wouldn’t tell his people,” Farrow told Bloom. “Ronan,” Bloom replied. “I am his people.”[33]
The 2019 book by New York Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey contains Bloom’s own 2016 memo outlining the ways she would proactively assist Weinstein in undermining and discrediting his accusers, and the subsequent billing documents for services rendered in 2017, that enumerate further such efforts undertaken on his behalf. Bloom’s assistance to Weinstein included “counter-ops” tactics such as planting articles online that portray his accusers to the public as untrustworthy or “unglued” women, and enticing his victims to sign non-disclosure agreements that would silence them.[34][35]
Shortly after resigning from Weinstein’s team, Bloom allegedly fell victim to “email prankster” James Linton masquerading as Weinstein. Bloom wrote an email in reply to the prankster that “[t]he new round of far more serious allegations were [sic] not made known to me”, specifically calling out Weinstein’s alleged sexual assault.[36]Variety later reported that Bloom “was only aware of accusations of verbal remarks, behaviors, and temper tantrums” when she began advising Weinstein, and was unaware of more serious allegations of rape and sexual assault.[37] Bloom later apologized[38] for her role advising Weinstein and called it “a colossal mistake”.[39]
Bloom also represented former Amazon Studios president[40]Roy Price amid sexual harassment allegations, but said her representation of Price concluded before Price’s accuser Isa Hackett “went public”.[41]The Daily Beast reported that Bloom, while representing Price, had attempted to discredit Kim Masters, The Hollywood Reporter’s Editor-at-Large, to media outlets considering publishing Masters’ report on the allegations against Price. Bloom had allegedly accused Masters of a conflict of interest for badgering Price to advertise on her KCRW show, a charge Masters denied.[20]
Bloom did call her representation of Weinstein a mistake, and if that’s a genuine change, I give her credit for that. But let’s not pretend that her actions were defensible. Maybe we can find better representatives of women’s rights, than someone who represented Harvey Weinstein. Maybe, among the plethora or proper women’s activists out there, we don’t need to scrape the bottom of the barrel and include Lisa Bloom (and people like her) as main speakers in our discussions on women’s rights.
Comparing someone saying they don’t want to hear from Democrats, to someone saying they want you to prove your virginity, is kind of problematic. And frankly, it’s kind of insulting to women/girls who DO actually have to undergo those types of tests or procedures. You’re comparing sexual assault (because that is what a virginity test can be, in theory) to someone saying they don’t want to hear from Democrats. It’s fine to disagree with OP’s statement, but the comparison you’re using is troubling.
Also implying there’s a “punishment” in OP’s statement is farfetched. Obviously, when OP says people aren’t “allowed” to talk about rape culture (etc.), they don’t mean literally. No one is going to haul someone’s ass to jail for speaking out of turn. OP is voicing frustration at a particular political group and they’re saying they’re not interested in hearing what those people have to say. That’s not a “punishment”. There is no real concrete consequence, apart from people having to face criticisms if they say something stupid, or just being ignored. That’s not “punishment”. It’s just…people choosing not to listen to opinions they don’t like. Which is what…everyone does. And I get that it frustrates people; I get told on a regular basis to shut up. But that’s not a punishment, per se.
I’m not going to speak for OP, but I can tell you why *I* reblogged the post. This post isn’t about not understanding why people would vote for Biden. (I think we all understand why someone would do that. Believe me, we are bombarded, hourly, about all the reasons someone is voting for Biden. We hear you.) It’s about whether or not it’s appropriate or productive to have rape apologists in discussions about sexual violence.
Personally, I don’t have a problem with people voting for Biden, so long as they [a] aren’t rape apologists who attempt to smear Tara, and who [b] actively and publicly take a stand against rape, no matter who is doing the raping. (I’ve been publicly saying this forever, and I’ve been consistently saying it.) But also, as a person who runs a moderately popular news blog, who gets hundreds of notes a day, I have yet to run into a single Biden voter who falls into that category. And if I did run into one, that’s like a fraction of a percentage of people who I interact with. That’s not a number that’s going to drastically change or alter my overall experiences on this site.
Obviously, people who vote with Biden, but acknowledge he’s a rapist, do exist. Lisa Bloom is a real person (but also from glancing at her tweets, she’s not really critical of Biden at all, she never talks about the allegation, she isn’t actively calling for him to suspend his campaign and allow literally any other candidate to step up to the plate, so she’s not someone I choose to politically ally with; but that’s my metric, people are free to elevate whatever voices they want to; I don’t think I’d be a fan of Bloom’s politics in general, so I’m not going to validate her opinions over the opinions of people who are routinely silenced and/or killed by the very politics she appears to support; people can call that a “purity test”, but every single motherfucking person tends to elevate the voices they agree with, and ignore the voices they don’t; interesting how it’s only leftists who are criticized for doing this). But she’s an exception to a rule. At least, she is for me. Maybe you have different experiences. That’s fine and understandable, but I can’t substitute your experiences for my own.
I haven’t personally (on this social media platform) met a Biden voter who ISN’T a rape apologist, who doesn’t attempt to smear Tara, who will actually engage in good faith discussions. (I’m not saying they don’t exist. Who I encounter isn’t representative of the wider population. But what I post on this site, is aimed at people I encounter on this site, unless otherwise stated.) So no, on this social media platform, I have no problem making the broad generalization that Democrats have had absolutely nothing productive to bring to these discussions.
Even Bernie Sanders (who isn’t a Democrat, but he works his ass off for the party) kind of proves my point. I think we can all agree that Sanders isn’t some misogynist. But the fact that he’s completely silent on this rape allegation speaks volumes. I get that he’s in a politically difficult situation. But women (and men) are put in personally difficult and violent situations every goddamn day, which is perpetuated by the rape culture we live in, which is further perpetuated by people’s selective attention when it comes to rape allegations. Which is why it’s important to speak out WHENEVER you see this shit happening. This became personal for me; it was within the last few months that I had to deal with my first instance of sexual harassment (it was nowhere near as bad as what Tara, and so many others, had to deal with, which is why I don’t tend to talk about it, but it was scary and made me feel unsafe and afraid to go work; and I was in a relatively GOOD situation, where my boss and coworkers were supportive; and the weird thing is, I don’t even know if the guy who was doing the harassment KNEW what he was doing was harassment, so there were all these feelings of guilt involved because I don’t want to get someone in trouble who means well).
His response (or lack thereof) is incredibly painful, for me. And he’s been silent for so long now that at this point, If he were to talk about how sexual violence was a big problem in our country, I’d probably kind of scoff at him. “Like really, bro? You never fucking talked about Biden’s rape allegation, and now you want to talk about sexual violence? Are you kidding me? Maybe take a seat and let people who HAVE been consistent on these issues lead the conversation.”
And look, Sanders’ response, of silence, is kind of the best response I can hope for, coming from a Democrat (most are just saying they believe Biden; words cannot express the hatred I hold for those people). The amount of misogynistic hatred and abuse I have had to endure ever since Tara became a national story, because I have the audacity to talk about it, is terrible. I can deal with it, but it doesn’t mean I want to. It doesn’t mean I welcome it. My personal comfort on my personal blog overrides whatever theoretical right people have to talk about whatever the fuck they want in whatever insulting and deeply misogynistic way they want.
If that type of gatekeeping offends you, then I don’t know what to say. These are my personal blogs. While I do my best to embrace free speech (to the annoyance of many on the left, who thinks more government censorship is a good thing), the 1st amendment doesn’t reign supreme on my tumblrs. I can ignore and discredit whoever I want. I can tell them they’re not welcome on MY spaces. (Even so, I still rarely block people. I usually put up with it, which is more pro-free speech than 95% of people on this site. But I guess that’s not good enough for people.) I want to be able to have discussions about sexual violence without people attempting to derail the conversation. And sadly, when dealing with Democrats, it’s been impossible. And that’s worth noting.
Discussion IS a good thing. But Democrats are actively trying to smother any discussion of this topic, which is why I hate their presence on my posts. Their presence on my posts does the OPPOSITE of fostering discussion. I wish that weren’t the case.
People can have whatever standards they want on their blog, but for me, if you’re not talking about Biden’s allegation in a critical way, then I don’t want to hear from you (on this topic).
So yeah, I generally agree, discussion is good. But I also think that you’re mistaken in your belief that what I (or leftists) am dealing with is people who want to have discussions. They don’t.
When they insist on their right to talk about rape, what they are insisting on is their right to smear victims of rape. Or to shame other people into voting for a rapist. Or to lie about a rapist’s record. Or to tell people to never say anything bad about their rapist.
These people don’t actually care about rape. They just want the right to shit all over people who do.
Just saying. There are a lot of people on this site who blog about women’s rights, but are eerily silent when it comes to the Biden allegations. At best, they might make some singular post saying, “Yeah, it sucks that Biden’s a rapist,” but then never really talk about it again. (At worst, they straight up smear Tara.) Yet they talked about Kavanaugh nonstop. My issues aren’t that y’all are voting for Biden. My issue is your silence. Y’all can’t conveniently excuse yourself from discussions about Tara’s rape, and then insist on your right to be included in discussions about rape later on, when you decide it won’t harm your political candidate. Social justice isn’t a game. It’s not done when it’s “convenient” for you. Talks about rape are ALWAYS inconvenient, for the victims. So yeah, rape apologists or deniers or ignorers can kindly shut the fuck up. Let other people who take this shit seriously speak for victims and lead the movement.
You present your argument as though we’re trying to shut-up people who want to talk about social justice. But I don’t think you understand: these people DON’T want to talk about social justice. And frankly, that kind of applies to Lisa Bloom too. I don’t know her personally. I don’t follow her. But yeah, she sure as hell doesn’t represent my version of social justice, even though she’s one of the “good” Biden voters. She’s political opposition to me. I’m not going to tear her apart for it (I’ve got bigger fish to fry), but I’m also not going to pretend I want to hear from her or that her opinion holds any value. She’s a rich white woman who doesn’t support M4A (she wants “affordable” healthcare, or “access” to healthcare, which we all know is bullshit), which IS a woman’s issue. She supposedly represents women who have been sexually assaulted or harassed by powerful men (her record on that is…questionable, but whatever, that’s what her claim to fame is), yet I don’t see her volunteering to represent Tara, if Tara wants / needs representation in the future. Her regretful tweet about believing Tara and voting for Biden is nice, but also could be virtue signalling, when taken in complete context with her other actions. For some, that will be enough. But for others, it won’t. And don’t think it’s a purity test, any more than literally every single other person has purity tests (no one listens to 100% of people; we all have people we choose to ignore because we deem their opinions as useless). Only they don’t call them “purity tests”, they call them “standards”.
I’m just really tired hearing about how people are soooo upset at the way progressives are critical of Democrats, but are silent when it comes to the way the Democrats have smeared Tara Reade.
*This doesn’t excuse the behavior of the GOP and right wingers, who are also hypocritical and have a far worse record on women’s issues. They’re worse than the Democrats in every way. But also, not every single post needs to be about how they’re worse. So I’m not going to focus on them here.
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