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

[fromparistoberlin]

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

But pretending there's no real evidence for abuse here is silly.

Nobody has said that.

WA is possibly the worst advertisement for counselling ever isn't he?

His narcissism in still apparently believing that his wants matter more than his own children's needs is not encouraging.

Every person who has an affair or leaves a family never to be seen again, or gambles the family money or takes drugs puts their own wants above their childrens needs. That does not make those people abusers (at least, in the context of this case).

If being selfish is a crime then 99% of the world would be convicted.

Sorry bogeyface that won't wash.

You are minimising the sheer wrongness of what he did. Pretending it's no different having an affair with your children's sister, than with anyone else, is just weird. I bet if one of your friends had an affair with their step child, you wouldn't think it was in the same order as an affair with someone at the office.

Bogey:

But pretending there's no real evidence for abuse here is silly.

Nobody has said that. Yes, they have.

It's a completely unproven allegation, with no evidence whatsoever to back it up, from a mixed up woman from a completely dysfunctional family background, made at an "interesting" time

And if you really can't see the difference between a man having an illicit affair with a teenage step-child when sharing prepubescent kids with her mother, and the bog standard affair scenario on the other, in terms of selfishness and catastrophic fallout for all parties, then to be perfectly honest any sort of conversation between us on this one is pointless, as it would be a colossal waste of time. I don't mean that in an arsey way, as I've seen you make points numerous times on other threads which I've strongly agree with. I mean it completely sincerely: there is absolutely no common ground possible here.

How dreadful that MF allowed incompetent experts to deal with her daughters abuse claims!

I disagree that it is not in the childs interest to pursuit sexual abuse claims. Why would a child ever report anything then? What's the point?

MF didn't appoint the experts, iirc they were court appointed.

The allegation of abuse was reported by the pediatrician because in the U.S they are legally required to do so whether the parent and child wish them to or not.

Dinkydoodah, you clearly don't know what you're talking about. I hope you never find out about the reality of child abuse. Many parents have found that it is not in their child's best interests to pursue a criminal case and I think it's highly improper to sit comfortably on the internet and make ill-informed blanket pronouncements. It really doesn't reflect well on you.

Neither does your determination to somehow blame MF for WA's behaviour. It's actually quite repulsive.

Just seen this from Glosswitch:

glosswatch.com/2014/02/04/dylan-farrow-michael-wolff-and-challenging-narratives/

Mothership I didn't say MF appointed them - please check what I said again.

I am clearly not the expert on child abuse that many here claim to be. I still however maintain that in this case there is no way we will ever know if the abuse took place unless we get a confession from WA. It is sad that many are clearly annoyed by this viewpoint . I though it was a fair reflection based on the evidence.

Ask basil I bow down to your superior knowledge of child abuse cases. That doesn't mean I have to have to agree with it. As for being repulsed by my alleged determination to blame MF for WA behaviour , where have I said this?

Basil she was saying what would be the point in reporting child abuse if the victim knew that nothing would be done? I think she meant to put "what would be the point?", her tense was wrong thats all.

Sadly, its why many women dont report rape, because they know the chance of conviction is very low.
Perfect

Of course i can see the difference. I was referring to your point that his selfishness counted against him. His affair was wrong, the person he had the affair with was inappropriate (putting it mildly) but there have been no allegations of any wrongdoing there under law, merely against moral and social accpetability. So I dont see that is is relevant to the case being made against him by his accusers. What IS relevant are the facts and we dont know the facts which is why threads such as this are wholly unhelpful. They do nothing but whip up hatred against someone who, for whatever reason, has never been found guilty in court of the crimes they have been accused of. Sadly, that is not a view shared by most on this thread.

I still however maintain that in this case there is no way we will ever know if the abuse took place unless we get a confession from WA. It is sad that many are clearly annoyed by this viewpoint . I though it was a fair reflection based on the evidence.

I totally agree with you.

aargh! meant to add

But if WA never does confess I dont think any of the witch hunters would say "well perhaps he didnt do it".

If (and I say IF) MF had intended this to play out this way, as I mentioned above, in order to utterly discredit him for the rest of his life, then she has been very very clever. Whatever WA does now, he will always be in the wrong, even if he never laid a finger on DF.

I would like to say again, I am no WA fan, I find him creepy and irritating and was appalled at his behaviour with his affair. However, that doesnt automatically make him guilty of child abuse.

You said:

"How dreadful that MF allowed incompetent experts to deal with her daughters abuse claims! "

It actually sounds a bit mad. Really, it does. Like you're determined to find any little fragment of cause to pin it all on MF. When MF had no control whatsoever over who the court appointed or who WA appointed. Why would you say something like that?

" Whatever WA does now, he will always be in the wrong, even if he never laid a finger on DF."

I doubt it. He's just received a nice gold award. The abuse allegations have been out there for 20 years and it hasn't affected his ability to pursue his career and work with some of the most respected actors in the world. Doesn't sound like he's considered to be in the wrong to me.

askbasil sorry you are getting rather confusing.
You said I blamed MF for WA behaviour - where did I say or imply this?

You said How dreadful that MF allowed incompetent experts to deal with her daughters abuse claims!

I replied saying they were court appointed, I.e. MF had no control over them, it wasn't up to her to allow or disallow anything, it was out of her control. And anyway how would she know they were incompetent? They weren't reporting to her and I don't think she's ever claimed any expertise in the therapeutic investigation of child abuse?

Sorry I worded that badly. What I should have said is that you appear to be looking to blame MF for the whole abuse fiasco, by seizing on any random thing that can point to her being at fault. So "How dreadful that MF allowed incompetent experts to deal with her daughters abuse claims!" sounds like the utterance of someone who is absolutely fixated on finding out how dreadful MF is, while steadfastly setting her face against any notion that WA may be dreadful.

Hope that's clearer.

bogeyface I have to say I agree with you on WA. I do think he is extremely odd and definitely despicable for his behaviour with Soon-Yi. I don't think the family unit before this affair was conventional/ normal anyway but his actions tore the family apart and are unforgivable. That said, it is separate to the abuse accusations but it does make for uncomfortable conclusions to be drawn and I do understand that.

mothership the judges report from the custody battle which many on here have quoted from stated that the abuse investigation was poor as I recall??

I don't believe her. I don't believe that is a 'heartfelt' letter at all.

To me...it reads like a badly written story. It's clunky and focuses too much on the 'little' details with sentences designed to shock, such as 'sexual relationship with my sister'.

She contradicts herself. She says that for as long as she could remember, WA had been doing things to her she didn't like...that she used to hide from him. Then goes on to say she thought everything was 'normal' and was astounded when MF did not confirm that her dad also did it to her.

It just doesn't have the ring of truth to me. At all.

She contradicts herself. She says that for as long as she could remember, WA had been doing things to her she didn't like...that she used to hide from him. Then goes on to say she thought everything was 'normal' and was astounded when MF did not confirm that her dad also did it to her.

That isn't actually a contradiction. It's a very commonly expressed emotion amongst abuse victims where the perp is a parent or close relative: that they hated what was being done, but thought that it was normal and therefore they were to blame for minding.

There is also a huge volume of evidence to support Allen having been very physically intrusive with Dylan, with numerous witnesses. Allen himself agreed to have therapy for it. There are also witnesses that Dylan would lock herself into bathrooms to escape him. That doesn't prove that she was sexually abused, but it does mean her statements as presented above were truthful.

There are witnesses? And evidence?

Yet no one did anything at the time? No one had any idea at all something was amiss?

Not of sexual abuse, no. Of emotional (in Dylan's case including constant inappropriate non-sexual touching), yes, ample evidence, and numerous witnesses - he was never meant to be left alone with Dylan at all, because he was so smothering and obsessive. He'd been in treatment with a therapist for it for two years, and the nanny at the time has written a memoir in which she talks about Farrow's failure to protect the kids from his behaviour towards them. And the judge in the custody case observed that the single greatest criticism anyone could reasonably level at Farrow was her failure to protect the kids from Allen. She supported his adoption application, without any mention of his by then two years of therapy over his parenting, because he had no bond or patience with his son on the one hand, and made constant inappropriate demands of his daughter and showed no respect for her personal space on the other.

That doesn't mean he sexually abused Dylan Farrow. It does mean that when she says he constantly did things to her that she hated and she tried to avoid, she's saying what everyone contemporaneously agreed, including even the New Haven team and his own paid therapists, in terms of Allen's having no respect for boundaries concerning her. So yes, to that extent she's being truthful. Provably so.