James Corden's 'jokes' about Harry Weinstein...

[ordinarywalls]

I'm horrified. Anyone else seen the footage? I genuinely like James Corden, or at least I did when he did Gavin and Stacey. What on earth was he thinking?!

Well they are bad jokes. I would feel terrible. But they are just words. Making a joke isn’t the same as carrying out the crime and the vilification JC has received online compared to that of HW is astounding.

HW did this. With - it seems - the knowledge of the film industry. So what us being done about it? Why are we vilifying JC when he is simply part of an industry which appears to accept sexual harassment of women as part of the job.

For me, JC does not have the capacity to deliver such a joke without it sounding sneery, cruel and puerile. Left in the hands of someone with an ounce of sense and perhaps a better joke writer, it might have paid off. His reputation for being a big arsehole precedes him too.
Wrong man, wrong place, wrong time...just wrong everything.

Why are we vilifying JC when he is simply part of an industry which appears to accept sexual harassment of women as part of the job.

Because any man with a shred of decency would speak out against these disgusting practices, rather than ride in on the same wave, claiming it's not his fault the industry is like that.

But these men knew it was going on. It was an open secret.

'Because any man with a shred of decency would speak out against these disgusting practices, rather than ride in on the same wave, claiming it's not his fault the industry is like that.'

Exactly.

And also, WORDS MATTER. I can't believe either of those things actually need pointing out.

Well they are bad jokes. I would feel terrible. But they are just words.

They normalise it. They make it sound trivial.
Words can be powerful.

Tiny
That doesn't make it ok for JC to make jokes about women being coerced into humiliating situations.

They were not poking fun at HW they were describing what women were forced to do/witness.

And what he said about him shagging Keira knihjtly for 3 days solid etc etc was vile. Who says that about a young woman you are introducing to receive an award who cant speak back as she isn't there?

He is vile.

Words can also be cheap particularly when your PR people are carrying out some online damage limitation.

It’s not about JC. It’s about that industry’s collective attitude to sexual assault.

I disagree. This (bit of it) IS about James C. He chose to belittle the women further; turn it into fodder for titillation. He chose to do that. He could have said nothing. It was a cheap, throwaway gag. It kind of okays the message that actually, it was just a bit of banter/slap and tickle/men being men.

In the 80’s I worked for a senior partner in a solicitors form. He would regularly call me into his office to pull me up on some terminology or spelling and when he had told me that it (I) wasn’t good enough, he’d tell me he could see the outline of my underwear, beneath my clothing. He’d ask what style my bras were, were they lacy/balcony/ push-up. He had a daughter who came in regularly who was a year older than me. I’d stand there (aged 20) blushing and looking at the floor. Now, I know that it was abuse of power because he could; a bit of titillation for the old guy. He probably had a good laugh with his partners in the firm, over a scotch later, at the club. There was nothing funny about it. I left, very abruptly. He’s in his 80’s now. Still a very respected man in terms of the Law Society and community in Manchester. I never spoke out either. It wasn’t done in 1982. But don’t we live in better, more open times now? Aren’t we rightly disgusted by perpetrators of abuse and those who condone it/think it’s a giggle?

This puts JC firmly in the category or misogynistic twat, for me.

But don’t we live in better, more open times now? No.

No way has JC had affairs. Who the hell would shag him??

What an absolutely vile comment

They may be "just words", but words normalise behaviour. They make others feel that the behaviour been spoken about is funny, not serious, acceptable. And then others are more likely to indulge in that type of behaviour. Words like this signal that abusing women like this is ok.

So a comment about JC not being attractive enough to shag is "vile", whereas posts using the same word to describe jokes about sexual abuse are called out for being too extreme?

Right.

Yeah. Let's all leap to his defence. He is a man, after all. And a white man at that. The most beleaguered, misunderstood minority group of our time.

Or you could see that using JC as a whipping boy for this is rather convenient for the rest of white male America.

Actually the post saying "who would shag him" didn't question his attractiveness. It simply said "who would shag him". Perhaps the poster meant who the hell would shag such a person if such horrible character.

I personally find him creepy and repulsive. Not his physical appearance but his general persona. I have certainly shagged people who were physically less attractive and larger than James Corden but they made me laugh, were caring, nice people which makes them attractive.

Interesting that nasty comments on the attractiveness of a man draw strong condemnation here, while yesterday there was an entire thread criticising a confident woman on the grounds of her looks which drew comparatively little. Could this be part of the issue?

I think JC has made a silly error of judgement with the wording of those jokes. But I don't like the individual vilification of people - not least because I think it is not that empowering. If we blame individual people, and leave it as that, we leave the power structures that perpetuate harassment, assault and rape untouched. We need to talk about the structural links between the lack of top women in business and industry and a culture in which women are treated as sexual objects by men; we need to talk about power and its distribution; we need to talk about cultures of leadership and care; and we need to talk about inequality.

Suki, what a horrible experience that must have been. I'm sorry that you went through that. However, we know that similar behaviour still goes on to this day, and that young women at the start of their careers are humiliated by older lechy men and made to feel like it's all their fault. HW is an example of that. We haven't moved on nearly as far as we like to think

I am neither male nor American but much of JCs comments and so called comedy/banter over the years have been vile. He thinks he is above reproach and can say what he wants in the guise of being edgy or quirky. Its not its misogynist crap.
Anyone who defends someone who thinks it's funny to get cheap laughs out of sexual abuse needs to ask themselves if it was thier daughter would be so damm funny?

"Anyone who defends someone who thinks it's funny to get cheap laughs out of sexual abuse needs to ask themselves if it was thier daughter would be so damm funny?"

Do they? So if they haven't got a daughter......?

I guess we've all had a mother if we really need to picture women as actual people.

Yesterday 14:23 PavlovianLunge

JC is deeply unpleasant, the HW ‘jokes’ were inappropriate and offensive. And then there are these comments that he made nearly 10 years ago... metro.co.uk/2017/10/17/james-corden-jokes-about-brutal-sex-with-keira-knightley-at-awards-show-7005924/

was that Emma Watson, champion of women and campaigner for gender equality I saw laughing uproariously in the audience?

And?

Oh lord, the daughter thing again. Women need to be seen as actual human beings, deserving of basic respect and dignity, irrespective of our relationships to other people. You know, the way men are!

Anyone who makes a song and dance about how much they 'respect women' because they have a daughter should be wearing a t shirt that says 'dont get it. Never will'

No way has JC had affairs. Who the hell would shag him??

What an absolutely vile comment

Yeah, THAT's the vile comment. Not the jokes about rape or 'hanging out the back' of Kiera Knightley. Well done. Maybe we shouldn't point out that HW is also physically repulsive because it may be seen as 'fat shaming', eh?