To be put off watching anything by Neil Gaiman

Ffs.

Autism runs in a our family (DF, DH, DS)

Funnily enough, somehow managed not to sexually assault anyone.

It's so infuriating that cretins like this even think it is an excuse, shows they know fuck all about autism.

Not being able to pick up on non verbal cues does not = assaulting women.

Autism now. I am so sick of these predatory men.

Okay not quite the point I was making,
but otherwise agree with everything you said.

Absolute nonsense that we need the same standard of proof to deprive someone of their liberty, and have an opinion about the truth of allegations. He's admitted to some vile stuff, and I believe the other women who have come forward.

He's a great disappointment to very many people, and I don't want any of my money going in his direction.

I got the ick first when he left his family and buggered off to have his me time during covid. I thought I liked him for years. Turns out I only liked Terry Pratchett and the greatness of good omens was likely predominantly not down to Gaiman. I did watch the second series, as 1 was so like the book, and hated it. It seemed almost entirely filler and being smug that it was misdirecting us plebs watching.

The internet suggests that he got the actor playing Anansi written out if American Gods and then being so awkward it got cancelled before the final series.

I don’t much like him or his writing style. But for things like Good Omens (the book) I’m not going to stop liking them. You can like the art without liking the artist.

Do you mean what I just wrote?

You quoted me there - I've read about the accusations and Gaiman's response, ie about the one accuser having a medical condition that causes false memories. If I completely accept what he says - that nothing illegal occurred, it was all consensual - I still believe his behaviour was wrong. So I won't be watching the rest of Good Omens or The Sandman or buying any more of his books. My choice in this matter isn't reliant on him having done something illegal.

The NDA signed by the woman who lived in a property he owned doesn't cast him in a good light either.

If anything makes it to court and I was somehow on the jury I would absolutely uphold innocent until proven guilty, but that's not the situation I'm in. The situation I'm in is do I feel comfortable reading his books or watching his shows? And the answer is no.

Was that written by AI?

I think you are bang on with your adherence to the legal principle “innocent until proven guilty”. However there is some nuance here that is missed in this context. Presumption of innocence is crucial because in instances of getting it wrong in cases of sexual violence (which can and do include the death of the victim sometimes), would mean a loss of liberty for the accused. So absolutely it should meet the legal bar of beyond reasonable doubt to convict someone.

However nobody is advocating throwing the accused in jail without trial, and no “trial by media” as distasteful as they may be carries with them a prison sentence nor a death penalty. However given the nature of crimes such as these in how difficult they are to prosecute, as it essentially boils down to a he said/she said argument can be impossible to prove past bar of required evidence.

Consider if you will the sister to the criminal courts: the civil courts. Now in a civil trial the presumption of innocence is still there, BUT and this is crucial, the standard of proof is on the balance of probabilities. Rape and sexual assault unfortunately exists in a difficult space. It absolutely is serious enough to warrant custodial sentences, but that given that the burden of proof is so high to reflect the potential sentences that can be handed down many rapists walk scott free.

Clearly this state of affairs is untenable as this makes rapes in an overwhelming number of instances de facto legal even if de jure it is illegal. So where do we go from here? I like you find trials by media or in the court of public opinion often inaccurate, distasteful and often politically motivated.

What I propose to address it is this: we pass a law enabling victims of rape and sexual assault free legal aid to pursue the perpetrators through the civil courts. This would achieve a number of things that are currently not happening: More perpetrators would be found at the very least culpable in a legal context, with the very richly deserved loss of reputation. It would have the knock on effect of changing the cultural conversation and attitudes towards rape as more women would be believed. It might over time act as a deterrent to the more savvy and manipulative predators. We may need to tighten up regulations surrounding Non Disclosure Agreements. So in cases where it is settled out of court it couldn’t be legally enforceable in instances of alleged sexual misconduct should victims decide to disclose any details of any settlements.

I have served on a Jury myself, and it was my nightmare scenario to be faced with a rape/sexual assault trial where I found the victim to be credible and likely their accusation true, but there simply not be enough evidence to vote guilty. Thankfully I was not faced with such a case, but it did give me pause to consider how we badly need to have this most serious of crimes carry some sort of consequence, and what I posted above is the best I could come up with.

@swimsong said Are you not even reading the replies?

You mean like these ones, yes?

So many turn out to be deeply predatory and misogynistic,

It read like it was written by a sexist pig, hardly surprising he has turned out to actually be one.

Classic beta male behaviour.

Right now I don't want to continue watching Good Omens 2 or The Sandman (I'm behind on watching them). I certainly will not read Calliope ever again, I haven't watched that episode yet and doubt I ever will.

Classic beta male behaviour. Hoover up the girls who are clearly misfits with low self esteem. As long as they’re young and fawning, men like NG (rich, white, powerful, charismatic) exploit their lack of boundaries then move on with no consequences.

I don't think that 'white' has anything to do with it.

Nobody is suggesting we lock him up and throw away the key without a trial. We are saying they the things he says himself he did are pretty grim. Many manipulative predators manage to stay on the right side of the law, doesn’t make them nice people who I want to give money to.

Well quite. So many turn out to be deeply predatory and misogynistic, but seem to think if they say the “right thing” it’ll all stay neatly hidden.

Always found he had a creepy vibe and was always disappointed that he had a guest role in Arthur!

I suppose you have to remember he started out as a comic book writer. I mean he was the thinking man’s comic book writer but still it’s a medium that encourages a very male adolescent form of storytelling.

I used to love Sandman though. I’ll be pretty disappointed if these allegations are true.

I don’t think it’s a matter of reasonable or unreasonable - your feelings are your feelings. I look at these things differently, though, especially if it’s something like TV or film where many people contributed to the creative process.

I think of TV and film - where one work is made by many people - as something like a person whose traits come from many ancestors. Sometimes people have awful ancestors, but that doesn’t make them personally awful, even if you can tell very clearly which ancestor a particular trait is from. I can’t stand my husband’s dad. He’s a serially adulterous, allegedly-recovering alcoholic who doesn’t deserve to be related to my favorite person on the planet. But there are aspects of my husband - hobbies, facial features, even food preferences - that obviously come from his dad, and I don’t look at those aspects and revile them. They’re part of his DNA.

In any adaptation of a work by Neil Gaiman, Gaiman is a big contributor to the adaptation’s DNA. But I don’t think of the work as being Gaiman, and therefore something to automatically reject. I’ve read maybe two books by him, and watched the Coraline movie once, so I don’t have any big emotional investment here. But I’ve gone through this whole process with a beloved film where one of the principal actors turned out to be, though not criminal, pretty unsavory.

Books can be more difficult, because they’ve got one author. (Good Omens exempted, in this case.) But if I previously enjoyed a book, I tend to have the attitude that the morally horrible author doesn’t deserve the power to “take it away” from me. Why do I have to lose something because of someone else’s sins or crimes? I didn’t commit them. The author deserves adverse consequences, not me. I might decide to never buy a new copy of a book so the author doesn’t financially benefit, but I wouldn’t refuse to read it again.

People have different mindsets towards these things, though, and as long as you’re not trying to shame anyone who does still like Gaiman’s work, I don’t think you’re unreasonable.

On the face of it I agree it's off-putting. But as a pp said - he's not yet been found guilty, so I suppose we need to wait for a judgement.

But honestly, some of the greatest authors have been absolute shits. Evelyn Waugh was a horrible, horrible man but a complete genius as a writer. Charles Dickens emotionally abused his wife and was creepily selfish and controlling over his very young mistress. Tolstoy admitted to taking advantage of (may have been a euphemism for raping) peasant girls on his estates when a young man.

It's a slippery slope when we start conflating the writer with their art. We'd have no-one left (except Beatrix Potter perhaps!) if we did that.

Disliking and being disgusted by the person is something I can 'sometimes' separate from their art. Thinking here that much we do and have watched, enjoyed, read, is often produced by damaged and thoroughly unlikeable individuals, with truely awful lives. I also think that those that cover up and condone, until someone blows the whistle, on this behaviour are just as unlikeable and dire and perhaps have a great deal to answer for, especially to those damaged by the behaviour! Maybe the issue is why so many are able to do as they do and get away with it for so long. I will still watch what has been produced by his imagination but I will wonder if who he is led to what he produced?

I remember a thread on here a while ago. It was about a children's book which had some questionable parts.

I believe Gaiman's contribution was a page about Mrs Santa Claus and how kind she was. He mentioned how 'kind' she was about 20 times in three paragraphs.

It read like it was written by a sexist pig, hardly surprising he has turned out to actually be one.

Are you not even reading the replies?
They've been astutely tossing the 'But this is TRIAL by SOCIAL MEDIA!!' nonsense into the bin.

Maybe, instead of parroting an already trashed trope, you could have a go at effectively and comprehensively engaging with and challenging the thoughtful critical responses to it?

Ditto Saville.

It’s a good job I’ve never really liked his writing, and therefore screen adaptations of his work. I feel let down by Susanna Clarke though who is a good friend of his, whose books I adore.

Classic beta male behaviour. Hoover up the girls who are clearly misfits with low self esteem. As long as they’re young and fawning, men like NG (rich, white, powerful, charismatic) exploit their lack of boundaries then move on with no consequences.

Amanda has gone really silent in the past year or so, and for such a bolshy over-sharer, her silence has been deafening and it speaks loud NDA volumes imho.

She will have had no choice but to button it because of her love for her young son.

Narcs love breaking strong women down.

In her autobiography, she wrote a chapter about how NG completely ignored her the first time she was really poorly around him.

She uses word salad to justify and excuse his shitty behaviour but for me that would have been the only red flag I needed to split.

Or based on an admission Gaiman has made? Did you miss that bit?