Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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:
Bogeyface · 09/02/2014 19:42

Perhaps I should have added a couple of words then Thereal

"Saying that I dont feel that the evidence is stong enough IN THIS CASE to assume his guilt is NOT saying that I disbelieve every child (or adult) who alleges abuse. Some of you seem to think that it is."

I dont require that things are proven to believe them. But I do not wish to be involved in a witch hunt based on questionable evidence and no proven guilt, which is what is happening IN THIS CASE.

ComposHat · 09/02/2014 19:45

I don't think what you are saying is right Margaret

Because of the age that these alleged events occurred to her it is credible that Dylan Farrow has a false memory of the events. So it is plausible that she is either a) telling the truth b) telling what she believes to be the truth, but isn't c) telling what she knows to a lie (unlikely)

Given that Woody Allen was an adult at the time of the alleged events, no one, not even his doughtiest of defenders, is seriously entertaining the idea that he has a false memory of the event. He is either a) Telling the truth or b) Lying.

MothershipG · 09/02/2014 21:06

NotJust We get it, WA is such a big part of your life it just can't be true. Hmm The Salem Witch trials? Really? You're comparing a contemporary case with one that happened 300 years ago? I would like to think we've moved on a bit since then. And please stop going on about memory, maybe call it a false report if you have to, for the umpteenth time this isn't an historic accusation.

I'm afraid that I can't help but noticing how all those who want to blame MF have yet to explain the discrepancies in their theory that the judge highlighted.

Compos no one is automatically dismissing anything but a judge who had access to much better sources of info than all of us said there was nothing to support WA's allegations in that regard. But you're happy to dismiss the judges opinion? As far as I'm aware Moses is the only one of the 11 (is it 11?) children to claim the brainwashing. Please point me to your source if I am wrong. And if MF believed that WA abused one of her children shortly before seducing another she is not exactly surprising if she slagged him off a bit, is it?

WA was proved (forensically) to be lying about his presence in the attic space. Proving that Dylan was truthful/not mistaken/confused about this.

Witnesses confirm he had the opportunity to be alone with her (even though MF didn't know this when Dylan first disclosed to her) so Dylan was truthful/not mistaken/confused about that either.

Bogeyface · 09/02/2014 21:31

Mother The nannies who worked in the house on the day of the alleged assault said that they were pressured into supporting the allegations to the point where one resigned. They both said that WA and Dylan were not out of their sight long enough for an assault to take place.

Those are 2 of the discrepancies. there are many others, but I am on the tab so cant C&P. The article posted above is very interesting, I suggest you read it.

The fact is that there is not enough evidence on which to convict WA, a case was never brought (which it would have been if the evidence was there, without Dylan testifying if needs be). Under UK and US law, WA is innocent.

I am not saying he didnt doit, but I am saying that there are enough holes in these allegations to create doubt. And any prosecution must be beyond reasonable doubt. I am afraid that in this case that will never happen and I am saddened to think that in her haste to destroy her ex, MF may have actually damaged what could have been a good prosecution case if he did in fact do it.

AskBasil · 09/02/2014 21:33

Bogeyface I'm still flogging it because you still are.

I find it odd that other people find it odd that MF seems to have an implacable hatred of WA, as if she should have stopped hating him by now, it was all such a long time ago and shouldn't she have moved on already?

If I believed someone had sexually abused my child and he was still out there being feted and honoured by society while my child was vilified as a liar or pitied as a nutter, I might implacably hate him and I'd be justified in doing so. Why is MF wrong to hate WA if she believes him to have abused her child?

Bogeyface · 09/02/2014 21:46

The hatred she had for WA predates the alleged assault. I would love to know what thread you are reading because to my sure and certain knowledge, no one has said, suggested or implied that she should be over it by now if her child was abused.

AskBasil · 09/02/2014 21:59

Oh, do you forget that you wrote this Bogeyface:

"There are too many discrepencies, which coupled with the absolute hatred MF had and still has for him could indicate that there is something amiss with Dylans recollections, possibly as a result of pressure or coaching from her mother."

The "still" in there implies that it is somehow unreasonable for a mother to have hatred for a man who she believes abused her child. You also infer that such hatred must reasonably be presumed to mean that she could have fed Dylan false memories. Which is a possibility of course, but again, it's the outside possibility isn't it? Just hating someone because you believe they have damaged your child is more normal and usual and likely, isn't it?

It really isn't the people who are saying they believe Dylan, who are going for the out there explanations. I just think as long as they keep coming, it's worth pointing that out.

AskBasil · 09/02/2014 22:00

And also am not sure hatred is the right word to use here anyway.

We don't know if MF hates WA. She certainly expresses anger about him, but is that the same as hatred? I don't know if she's said she hates him.

Bogeyface · 09/02/2014 22:16

I have a very good memory thank you. The point I was trying to make is is the hatred because he abused her DD or are the allegations because she hates him for having an affair (with her other DD, what a charmer).

In Feb 92 she found out about the affair by finding nude picture of Soon Yi that she had sent to WA. I remember when that came out, I cant blame her for going crazy, I would have done too.

August 92, just before they were to finally sign a child custody and support agreement, the allegations are made, which culminate in MF getting the full custody she had been fighting for and no access for WA. No criminal charges have ever been brought against WA, the prosecutor saying it was because he didnt want to traumatize Dylan, which doesnt ring true to me at all. Also, he will not say what information he had that lead him to say that they had "probable cause" despite WA asking him to publish it.

Please dont misunderstand me, I dont like WA. I think he is a sleazeball and a creep. But that doesnt make him a child abuser.

I dont know if he did it. I dont know if he didnt. But all I do know is that this trial by media/FB/MN doesnt do anything constructive.

Bogeyface · 09/02/2014 22:18

Well not trial but conviction!

ComposHat · 09/02/2014 22:29

Mothership I am not dismissing anything, I am just saying there are inconsistencies on both sides to such a degree that it is no way clearcut who to believe. Do you think this is a clear cut and unambiguous case?

It is getting quite tedious typing the same thing, over and over and over again.

nooka · 10/02/2014 03:18

Given that WA was accused 20 years ago and has been highly successful since then I don't see that this accusation has done him any noticeable professional harm.

Innocent until proven guilty is absolutely how our legal system should be, but we should watch out for saying that until the person accused is found guilty in a court of law the accuser should be assumed to be lying.

In this type of he said she said situation one person has to be lying. Either WA sexually assaulted his daughter, and he is lying or she was lying about being assaulted. You can be totally on the fence, and perhaps we all should be, but if you think he is innocent then you have to think that she is/was lying. Of course either scenario is possible, but the guy was already behaving in a very inappropriate way toward her so it doesn't really seem beyond belief to me.

the quality of his movies is really neither here nor there.

nooka · 10/02/2014 03:21

Oops. Seem to have missed a whole bunch of posts and mine probably doesn't make much sense any more.

NotJustACigar · 10/02/2014 06:35

MothershipG if you want a more recent example how about satanic panic which only subsided in the late 90s. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_ritual_abuse Innocent people went to prison and lost everything due to false accusations not long ago at all.

As much as it would be convenient if every accuser were telling the truth, if children couldnt be easily manipulated and if every memory were rock solid proof those things are just not the case. Have you looked into Loftus's work at all or are you dismissing it out of hand because it doesn't fit your worldview (a dangerous habit!) new.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_loftus_the_fiction_of_memory

BoneyBackJefferson · 10/02/2014 06:55

nooka
"In this type of he said she said situation one person has to be lying."

only if you don't take the entire situation into account.

perfectstorm · 10/02/2014 07:02

The nannies who worked in the house on the day of the alleged assault said that they were pressured into supporting the allegations to the point where one resigned. They both said that WA and Dylan were not out of their sight long enough for an assault to take place.

That's not true. I know it's often repeated and thus people assume it must be, but if you look at the actual evidence, it's plain not true.

One of the nannies was WA's employee, and fired by MF. She then filed a deposition - which she later withdrew, without explanation - in which she said that she had not herself been present on the day in question, but she had talked with one of the nannies who had been who told her she'd felt pressured etc etc. That is the lone example of a nanny siding with Allen, and as she was paid by him, no longer with the family at the time, not present on the day, contradicted by those who were, and later withdrew the statement anyway, I can't see her evidence as worth much.

One of the nannies who was present that day wrote a memoir a year or two after the end of the custody case, which describes in detail how toxic WA's behaviour to Dylan was. Apparently Dylan would lock herself in the bathroom for hours to avoid him, and she developed an absolute obsession with never being unclothed around anyone nor seeing anyone else unclothed, which worried people. The nanny is clear that she has no idea if Allen abused Dylan or not, but she confirms that Allen disappeared with her for 20 minutes and that this worried her as there was an unwritten household rule that he never be alone with her because he was so obsessive about her and she was scared. She said in a sworn deposition as well as in her memoir that she didn't tell Farrow this at the time, so when Farrow first said Dylan had disclosed abuse, it was in a context where Farrow believed there had been no unsupervised opportunity for it to occur. She was also asked to put underwear on Dylan that day because she had somehow appeared without any.

She further says Allen was emotionally abusive to everyone, especially Mia, and a bad father. She also criticised Farrow... but not for her mothering skills. She criticised her for exposing her kids to Allen's emotional abuse, and particularly in allowing Allen to adopt Dylan aged 6, despite his being in treatment at the time for having inappropriately intense feelings for and demands upon her.

The other babysitter, Alison Strickland, was not an employee of either side: she was the nanny of a friend of Farrow's, and there that day with her own three charges. She didn't say anything to Allen's nanny, and Allen's nanny never claimed she had. She gave a sworn deposition that she'd caught Allen with his face down in Dylan's lap while she stared at the tv with a vacant expression, and it made her so uneasy she talked to her employer about it that evening. Sophie Berge, the French tutor, testified that she'd told Mia Farrow Dylan had no underwear on that afternoon. Farrow told the nanny, Kriste Groteke (who wrote the memoir) to please put some on the child.

Finally, Allen entered into therapy 2 years before the accusations, explicitly because his behaviour with Dylan was seen as inappropriate, smothering and intense by the family therapist who was brought in to treat Satchel/Ronan. The problems with his behaviour towards Dylan weren't suddenly invented. They'd been flagged up for a long time and were in fact seen as serious enough that Allen accepted treatment in dealing with them.

The full transcript of the judgement over the custody suit is here as has been linked already.

It's uncomfortable reading.

Lazyjaney · 10/02/2014 07:17

"So do you think our automatic response to a woman who says she has been raped should be "I don't believe you" LazyJaney?"

WTF do you get that from? Derail, much?

This is about the inadvisability of mindlessly believing someone who is saying she has been abused, but where there is significant known baggage behind the accusation.

MothershipG · 10/02/2014 08:22

Compos
You mention an article you think I should read, happy to do so, but I can't find the link would you mind reposting?

I am sorry you are finding us all so tedious Hmm
To retype something I have said several times - I don't claim it is clear cut, I don't claim it would reach the standards of proof required by a court of law but on balance (and I repeat I do rely heavily for this on the court document and the opinion of a judge, who had access to better more reliable evidence than us) I feel Dylan's accusation is not farfetched, so I see reason to disbelieve her, or come up with convoluted and unfounded theories to put the blame on her mother.

Just a little correction to your good memory, SY didn't send WA the pictures, he took the pictures of her naked and with her legs apart.

To get back to the crux of it this is why Dylan restated her accusations...

But the survivors of sexual abuse who have reached out to me – to support me and to share their fears of coming forward, of being called a liar, of being told their memories aren’t their memories – have given me a reason to not be silent, if only so others know that they don’t have to be silent either.

ComposHat · 10/02/2014 08:32

Sorry mothership I think you are getting me confused, I haven't mentioned any articles in my post.

I am not bored by any group of indiviuals, I am specifically cheesed off by you asking the same or nearly identical questions, expecting a different answer.

TheRealAmandaClarke · 10/02/2014 09:37

this thread is truly depressing.
I come across people in RL through my work who will ignore a child's disclosure of sexual abuse. In those cases the deniers have something to lose, the accused is usually known to them (and the child, saldly, is often their own, but they still choose to believe the adult saying that the child is mistaken, or malicious, or has the phenomenally underexplored false memory syndrome)
I honestly but naively believed that when faced with people they don't know, that posters would tend to believe the child rather than require objective evidence.
I am sad to see that is not the case.

Obviously I am in agreement with what mothership and basil have said.

Nomama · 10/02/2014 19:19

Thanks for the considered response a few pages back, MothershipG. I am happy to agree to disagree and am also relieved that we can come to that conclusion politely :)

I take your point about my ''all men are evil wotsits' comment and would like to clarify - I was a Greenham Common woman (OK, child, I was very young), I am a post modern feminist, sod burning a bra I need the damn things. Because of this I do not and cannot view male/female as different. I will not give automatic credence to the 'men are powerful women are weak' idea. I don't live my life that way and find women who do to be dangerous to other women... I think that sentence will come across completely wrong. I mean those who persist in holding up women as automatic victims in need of special protection.That is, imo, extremely damaging.

So some of the leaping at WA and for MF has annoyed me - the automatic assumptions have annoyed me. I will always explain (usually in a very patient voice) just how one of those uber misogenistic men have got it wrong, but I will also take on the woman who inists she has been hard done simply because she is a woman.

I hope that helps clarify me and my posts. I am with Victoria Coren, firmly and uncomfortably stuck on the fence. Partly due to the inadequacies of the legal teams of the time, partly due to the whole Hollywoodisation of the story and partly because, as a psychologist, I sometimes find myself seeing all sides and not being able to come down on one side.

Fortunately, in real life (in my own every day, real life that is, I appreciate that sounds woring too) I am perfectly capable of deciding and acting.

AskBasil · 10/02/2014 20:14

"This is about the inadvisability of mindlessly believing someone who is saying she has been abused, but where there is significant known baggage behind the accusation."

A) It's not the people who believe Dylan who are being mindless,

B) What baggage are you talking about here? The 2 years of inappropriate behaviour WA had already displayed around the child who disclosed?

C) So what do you think our response to a woman or child who discloses that she has been raped or sexually abused should be?

Nomama I find it depressing that you think believing a woman who has consistently stuck to her version of events from when she is 7 years old, is the result of automatic assumptions. On the contrary, in our society disbelieving anyone who says they have been raped or sexually abused, is the result of automatic assumptions. On the whole, believing them is the result of having been educated out of automatic assumptions.

bumbleymummy · 10/02/2014 23:28

"believing them is the result of having been educated out of automatic assumptions"

I don't see how automatically believing someone is the result of being educated out of automatic assumptions.

Lazyjaney · 11/02/2014 06:53

"believing them is the result of having been educated out of automatic assumptions"

More like being trained to have unthinking reactions.

AskBasil · 11/02/2014 09:57

Hmm.

Not very convincing.

Going against the prevailing wisdom is being untrained, not trained. I don't automatically believe anything, I believe the correct default position re people who say they were abused as children, is to believe them unless there are extremely good reasons not to. That the person they say is the perpetrator of that abuse is a nice bloke or a great artist, isn't a good enough reason. Believing someone as a default, isn't the same as throwing someone into jail without a trial, though some people seem to believe that.

I found this this morning, really sad and thoughtful about why believing is so important.