To be the most shocked about the women possibly involved in it all

[Whereareallthegoodpeople]

With Epstein.

Men, i’m pretty much sick of at this point in my late 40’s, adore my Ddad and Dh is one of the good ones, but thinking back to being young and leering men and uncomfortable and scary situations.
But, rumours of women possibly being involved-obviously vile GM, but a supposed supermodel, JE’s personal assistants and women that seemed to work for him, reports of possibly owning adoption agencies etc. If all true, how on earth could women see children and young girls being abused and hurt and actively make that happen?? Where were all the safe people, why did no one notice and say or do anything?

A similar amount of women who won’t report being abused by men I guess?

All people, however evil, had a female mother.
Just goes to show everyone is different.

The general sexualisation and exploitation of "women" (including children aged 16 & 17) was so normalised at this time. The "grid girls" in formula 1, the bikini babes that seem to have been included in the price of every luxury yacht, even the sexualised presentation of flight assistants trying to do an important safety job. It was even commonplace for regular offices to insist that women wore high heels!

Not that overt abuse or violence was ever normalised. But there was a general feeling that plenty of women went into sex work with their eyes open, and got a good deal from it. I can imagine plenty of people not actually seeing anything horrific with their own eyes, and choosing carefully what they wanted to believe.

But of course there must have also been plenty of people who knew the exact details, and who acted to enable that. And I'll admit that it does hit me harder knowing that some of these people were women.

I think you're making the mistake of confusing reasons with excuses.
People wanting to discuss the specific motivation of women involved in these crimes, rather than throwing the lazy and statistically unsupported "see! They're just the same as men! Just as evil!" soundbites, are not giving women 'a free pass'.
As PP said most studies on these behaviours have been conducted on men, for obvious reasons. Women who contribute to these crimes generally have different motivators and different histories leading up to them, and so should be examined separately if we are to understand with a view to prevention.
Patriarchal context and male power over them is one theory people have brought to the table. People don't have to agree with it of course. But at least it's a theory to start a conversation and more helpful than 'they're just evil'.
I means, what is 'evil', are some people born evil? They are evil new babies and their destiny is set? Can't be cured, can't be prevented? Or is 'evil' something that develops as a result of life experiences, mental and psychological health, abuse, societal context and their position within it?
If people are going to accuse anyone wanting to ask these questions as making excuses then how are we to ever understand?

Absolutely.

I think with respect to GM, she was in love with Epstein and was willing to do anything to keep him happy and remain in his life. He was quickly done with her but she knew if she gave in to her demands he would keep her around. Probably a similar vibe with her dad. Epstein was clearly a master manipulator, charismatic and evil.

I also think given her privileged background that she saw the trafficked women and girls as less than, other, unimportant and disposable.

I think AMW is a very useful idiot who didn’t think his rich and powerful friends would betray him, because he is truly very stupid.

All of this is inexcusable, awful, evil behaviour that is unfathomable. It goes to show how contemptuous the rich and powerful are for those they consider to be beneath them. They wouldn’t allow their daughters to be treated like this, but poor people’s daughters? Well they’re fair game. 🤢

Because most of the women had been abused themselves and were therefore also victims. In her autobiography VG says she did procure girls for JE etc, despite feeling very guilty about doing so, because the consequences for her would be more abuse if she didn’t.

I can’t see that Beatrice and Eugenie knew nothing at all about this, you don’t grow up with two parents like that and not get influenced in some way, or see nothing . I was surprised that they were invited by William and Kate for Xmas.

The problem is people fawn and respect wealthy people regardless of their characters. They seem to forget that to get that wealth it often involves exploiting people. It is just part of a greater problem.

My DM is one of those. Seems to hate her own sex and has always revered men, put them on a pedestal and obeyed.

I've often thought why, but cba to ask her (too late now, she has dementia) but I've never thought that could be the reason...that it offered her 'protection'. Makes sense.

No, she had her own flat and lived with her boyfriend. She lived a pretty normal life - cooking, cleaning, shopping, going to the pub, friends, family etc. At one point she stopped working for Epstein and got a job in a restaurant but a few months later he asked her to go back so she did. Epstein paid for her to go to Thailand, on her own, to do a beauty/massage course and she met a man there, fell in love and never went back, (that man became her husband). She called Epstein to tell him she wasn't going back and he just said ok and she never heard from him again.

All of this doesn't make her less of a victim but it does make it much more difficult to convict anyone. How do you prove 'beyond reasonable doubt' that she was forced when she was actually free to say no. She voluntarily went back every time. She had been groomed to think it was ok and possibly even normal.

With the Andrew situation related to Guiffre, if there is an offence, it would be almost impossible to convict her because she, on the face of it, did it voluntarily. She was excited by the fact she was meeting a prince and asked for the famous photo as she knew her mum was a big fan of the royal family. She has never claimed there was any physical force with Andrew.

This is not the kind of grooming that involved force, violence and captivity. For Virginia at least, it was entirely mental. She was physically but not mentally free.

This is all in her book. It is difficult reading put helps to explain the situation and wipes out the vast majority of the assumptions and made up stories that appear on here and other social media forums.

The idea of sisterhood has been massively oversold to the point where we expect women to naturally look out for and empathise more with other women.

Women have always been happy to throw other women under the bus for economic and/or social reasons without any inherent "evil" at play. I'd say that, like men, women have always cleaved closer to class, in particular, than sex when it comes to affinity and loyalty.

Somehow they seem blinded by all the money, and gloss over terrible things .I suspect they didnt want to be the "Whistle blower" and tended to sweep it under the carpet.Not the same at all. but David Hamilton the 70s DJ.said if he had gone to management about JS ,of whom he had suspicions ,he would have got the sack! Many others suspected as well I expect.

I think we also need to bear in mind that JE groomed people incrementally. I know a couple
of people (academics) who went to his island for a very tedious lunch where they were astonished at how much money he appeared to have given how stupid he was. They did note that a group were whisked away over coffee to look at ‘the art’ which they didn’t think anything of at the time, but now wonder. I expect JE was very very clever at sniffing out people who would
compromise themselves for money or glamour and making them more and more complicit in what he was doing until it seemed ‘normal’ and that they were too involved themselves to withdraw.

I am disappointed to be hearing more about the women than the men. The women, GM etc, behaved appallingly for whatever reasons, but it seems we know more of their names and more of the names of the victims than we do of the names of the men.

Yes, I would like to think the same but I don't, not really. How many generations do you think morals would survive without a society that rewards them? Whether that is through religion or laws. I don't believe that morality is innate, I think it's self interested. And if you remove the benefits of behaving "morally", eventually the behaviour will die out too. As pp have pointed out, this is what you see in societies where the rewards have been temporarily removed. It's just a question of how long it takes for people to revert to self-preservation at any cost.

You might not become a murderer or abuser, but would you definitely stand up and try to stop it at risk to your own life, if society no longer said it was a bad thing to be?

I'm with Hobbes on this. Life, in a state of nature, is "poor, nasty, brutish and short". We forget that at our peril.

What is your question?

It was a regime where Epstein was rich and powerful and surrounded by people who did what he said and talked about what he did in ways that excused it. People who called him out for what he was would be silenced very quickly, sacked, thrown out, paid off, potentially threatened. People would be attracted to his orbit by the glamour money and power and then would join a circle who laughed off his behaviour as Jeffrey being Jeffrey, as being a ladies man, as liking young women. You can see the language between all the men in the emails. They joked about it. And joking excuses and legitimises it. Some would stay because of the money, some might have been frightened to speak out, some might have thought saying anything wouldn't have made a difference. We know some went to the police and not much happened to him initially. Most would have justified what was happening by thinking that the women and girls were there voluntarily. There was less understanding of the mechanics of sexual abuse and less media coverage of it as well. I've talked to men about this case and seen them comment on it online. They focus on the age of consent as if that is the most important thing. So even today people don't understand what was going on. We know women are punished for speaking up about patriarchy and abuse, belittled, minimised, mocked, ignored, silenced so I don't find it especially shocking that women were involved alongside men.

We're literally watching the attorney General who's Jon is law enforcement, who has watched all these videos of the most heinous things being done to children. Knowing exactly who has done what. And is desperately trying to protect the men and throwing the victims under the bus.

There are lots of women who believe men are superior and can treat women and children how they want. There are also lots of women willing to overlook how evil men are for their own gain.

Let’s concentrate on the perpetrators first. Before we go down the “women are responsible for policing men’s behaviour” route.

Often women are gate keepers.

They are responsible for their own behaviour though.

Seems Naomi Campbell was a good friend of JE and GM.
Interesting that she has now bought a baby for herself.

Im inclined to think that is an oversimplification. It seems to go against the idea of evolution to me. If, historically, we were never anything but brutish, we would have died out long ago. The capacity for cooperation, love, fairness etc is imo built in just as much as violence and self preservation..You dont go from hunter gatherer to farmer just by being constantly violent. Those people were.more sophisticated than you think. Read your history and prehistory.

Theres no "possibly involved"

A lot of epsteins facilitators were female. In 2007 he negotiated a non prosecution agreement. all of the named co conspirators were female.

Maxwell was the just the most high profile in a long list...

Its an inconvenient truth.