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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to believe, and be heartbroken by Woody Allens step-daughters testimony

499 replies

fromparistoberlin · 03/02/2014 09:01

kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/01/an-open-letter-from-dylan-farrow/

I read this last night and it just about broke my heart

I believe her, and I am just so saddened by it

How the hell did he not get prosecuted

brave brave girl, and I feel awful as I have watched and enkoyed his films, even knowing of this murky tale in the background

OP posts:
Lazyjaney · 08/02/2014 21:13

"You'll get someone rushing on now to say, 'but he wasn't actually her step-father'"

And they would be right. And she was an adult when they got together.

But WTF has this to do with the accusations of paedophilia?

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 21:28

We'll said lazyjaney

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 21:29

I think Mia Farrow is the abuser. I believe Moses.

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 21:37

www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/opinion/sunday/woody-allen-speaks-out.html?_r=1

In the interest of balance

bumbleymummy · 08/02/2014 21:37

nooka, I didn't say anything about 'congratulating'. Was that part of your post directed at me?

JapaneseMargaret · 08/02/2014 21:39

"And they would be right. And she was an adult when they got together."

As I say, as if splitting that particular hair somehow makes it acceptable.

"But WTF has this to do with the accusations of paedophilia?"

What...?

steff13 · 08/02/2014 21:42

I don't think that either WA or MF are above reproach. In fact, I think they're both pretty gross. I don't think WA's relationship with SY is evidence that he's a pedophile. I don't think it's unbelievable that MF planted the abuse in Dylan's mind.

I completely believe that Dylan thinks she was abused. She is either an abuse victim, or a pawn used by her mother to get back at WA for leaving her for SY. Either way, Dylan is a true victim.

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 21:44

lazy Soon Yi was 8 iirc when her mother started having a relationship with WA, and 17 when she started having a relationship with him. You are right he wasn't her step father but he was her mother's partner since she was a child.

dinky Moses wasn't there in that attic with Dylan and her father when the alleged abuse took place. It's up to him who he believes but he can't know for sure which one is lying, he wasn't there, Dylan was.

I really feel for him, he either has to believe his sister is deluded and brainwashed and have strained relations with her, his mother and his other siblings who do believe her. Or believe that his father sexually abused Dylan and have no contact with his father and sister/stepmother and step sisters. There are definitely no winners in this horrible mess which ever way you look at it. Sad

steff13 · 08/02/2014 21:50

Soon Yi was 8 iirc when her mother started having a relationship with WA, and 17 when she started having a relationship with him. You are right he wasn't her step father but he was her mother's partner since she was a child.

MF said SY was 19, and WA had little to nothing to do with her prior to them spending time together at MF's behest. He was in a relationship with MF, but they didn't live together, he never spent the night at her home. His relationship with SY is no evidence of any bad behavior toward Dylan.

These allegations came out during their breakup, I find the timing to be a bit suspect. WA may be many things, but stupid he is not. Would he really abuse Dylan and give MF more ammunition against him at that time?

JapaneseMargaret · 08/02/2014 21:58

Once again... Nobody is saying any particular thing is evidence of anything.

Merely that it is being used, as part of all of the available evidence, to help form opinions of the man.

As I have said a couple of times now, Woody Allen lacks credibility. At present, I am giving the benefit of the doubt to Dylan.

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 22:01

mothership Moses stated that his mother MF brainwashed the whole family against WA due to her fury at his relationship with Soon Yi. He was present for the 'brainwashing' which he stated went on year after year. I never said he was present in the attic. Nobody witnessed the alleged incident.

steff13 · 08/02/2014 22:08

Merely that it is being used, as part of all of the available evidence, to help form opinions of the man.

What is the available evidence? I thought this was all conjecture, Dylan's and MF's stories of what happened.

Both WA and MF lack credibility. They are as bad as each other.

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 22:11

dinky If MF believed her daughter it is not surprising that she would continue to be angry at her abuser, it's not the kind of thing you just forget. What Moses describes as 'brainwashing', his brother Ronan sees as justified anger and distress, we can't know which of them is right.

I have done my best to respond to your questions, could you clarify for me your thoughts on WA's relationship with SY? Do you honestly find it perfectly acceptable? I know it is entirely legal, she was above the age of consent and not related to him, but do you not find it at all transgressive that he started an affair with his partner's daughter?

BriarRainbowshimmer · 08/02/2014 22:24

I believe her.
Allen has always been suspicious as hell

www.tmz.com/2014/02/05/woody-allen-12-year-old-sex-interview-pedophile/
TMZ dug up the 1976 interview published in People. Then 41-year-old Woody said, "I'm open-minded about sex. I'm not above reproach; if anything, I'm below reproach. I mean, if I was caught in a love nest with fifteen 12-year-old girls tomorrow, people would think, yeah, I always knew that about him."

He added, "Nothing I could come up with would surprise anyone ... I admit to it all."

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 22:27

mothership I have already stated that in my opinion, his relationship with Soon-Yi is unconventional but not illegal. In the context of the accusations I do not think it is relevant as it does not make him a pedophile. There are many successful relationships with huge age gaps. His relationship with MF at the time was 'unconventional' as he never slept at her apartment and it was also intimated by MF herself that she was having 'relations' with Frank Sinatra whilst seeing WA. As has been said before, MF is hardly the most credible person herself.

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 22:37

dinky We all know it wasn't illegal, some of us are less comfortable than you with the 30 year age gap, but because his relationship with MF was unconventional it was ok for him to sleep with her daughter?

It's not MF's credibility that's the question here is it? Two people were in that attic, one of them is lying, the 7 year old or the man in his 50's who has no problem starting an illicit sexual relationship with said 7 year old's teenage sister. Hmm

dinkydoodah · 08/02/2014 22:46

mothership But that's the point - we do not know that DF and WA were in the attic at all. No one witnessed it. Only DF says it happened, WA says it didn't. MF's credibility is absolutely relevant as one of the theories is that she has coached Dylan and potentially implanted a false memory of abuse. I find that much more disturbing than a 30 year age gap.

steff13 · 08/02/2014 22:52

It's not MF's credibility that's the question here is it?

Yes, MF's credibility is absolutely in question. How in the world could it not be?

There is no independent evidence that Dylan was abused by WA. In fact, the only thing close to evidence at all in this situtation indicated she wasn't abused. The absence of evidence of abuse casts doubt on the authenticity of the allegations, thus putting MF's actions and credibility in question.

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 23:26

Please read the full transcript of the court case there's a link from the Huffington post article

Especially page 18 if you don't want to read all 33 pages like I just did.

It completely discredits the accusation that MF coached Dylan, when Dylan first disclosed to her mother MF didn't even know that WA had been alone with her as this wasn't supposed to happen because of the existing concerns about his behaviour towards Dylan.

It concedes that MF isn't a perfect parent by a long stretch but makes damning reading in regard to WA and his attitude to MF's children, both hers and their joint children.

I would be interested to hear the WA supporters response to it.

steff13 · 08/02/2014 23:29

This is the opinion of a judge, correct?

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 23:29

Incidentally dinky WA denied ever having been in the attic at all until the forensic evidence proving that he had was presented to him. Hmm

MothershipG · 08/02/2014 23:30

Yes steff will you read it?

LoveSewingBee · 08/02/2014 23:59

I have no doubt at all that WA is a paedophile. And he is not the only one in the film industry either.

AskBasil · 09/02/2014 00:00
  1. The judge was absolutely categorical that there was no coaching of Dylan.

By the way, sexual abusers often use that tack as a useful defence - that the child they have abused has been coached by another adult to say that. Doesn't mean that's the dynamic here, but ppl ought to be aware that it's an extremely common tactic of child abusers to play this card.

  1. WA was in voluntary therapy re his inappropriate feelings re Dylan.

1 in 4 women are raped or sexually assaulted in their lives, most of them before the age of 18. 85-90% don't report because they know they will be met with the same response some posters have displayed here. Of those who do report, very few will ever get justice. That is the context in which all this is happening. But lots of people will bend over backwards to give men the benefit of the doubt. If you're on a jury, I can quite understand why you would do that - I would myself. But in a pub, at dinner with your mates, on a discussion forum? Why?

RonaldMcDonald · 09/02/2014 00:05

Christ, still the mumsnet amateur detectives....every thread like this has the same hair-splitting fools

They know more than the victim herself....er??
They can speak, with authority, on behalf of the accused??

As we really don't know, why not simply do the right thing and accept what the victim said as a child and says now, that she was abused.
How awful it must be for her.

Why must you all believe that you know more? That you can disseminate more from public information in the form of court documents and salacious gossip than pure stab in the dark speculation.
How deluded.

If we don't know the facts then surely, morally, for her sake and for all other victims we must say we believe her.

Anything else is simply ridiculous and callous

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