Neil Gaiman accused of sexual assault

[WandsOut]

www.yahoo.com/entertainment/sandman-writer-neil-gaiman-denies-142813982.html

Story still unfolding in the news

At the very, very least, I would say the behaviour he admitted to (getting naked and canoodling with the new young nanny) is extremely inappropriate and a clear abuse of his position of power (as her employer).

Also, she says that she was known as being someone who preferred women - was I hearing that right?
So Neil was assuming she was lesbian before sticking his fingers in her?

Sounds familiar doesn't it.

Amanda strikes me as a very very vulnerable person. Awful, disliked her immensely, despite her charm, but vulnerable. I think we forget shrewd and intelligent people also have vulnerability.

I feel very sorry for her son.
Money, fabulous home, the best education he will receive and he will be so emotionally stunted by two egocentric parents, both appearing to be very keen on using and abusing people, both enjoy the spotlight and both seem busy more with fulfilling their own needs and desires than parenting a child in the child's best interest.
I believe they have their son raised without screens, including TV etc and that sounds commendable if you're doing it yourself but it very much seems they're outsourcing those rules to others.
It's more for clout than anything else, Imo, if they lacked finances to offload that style of parenting then I imagine that their dc would be watching paw patrol like every other child. Because they aren't having to entertain him solely 24/7 they're able to give the bulk of entertaining him to the paid help, although Amanda may not pay, she may just offer to sing with her ukulele in her oldest bra for the opportunity of being a nanny to her precious son.

Neil strikes me, and I haven't met him as stated but strikes me as a groomer, as someone completely self obsessed and selfish, someone who would fit the criteria for the "it" phrase of narcissist should he have been a given a professional diagnosis. Any man his age who thinks a young woman wants to remove her clothes and have any sexual activity with him within moments of meeting is either so delusional they should be sectioned and diagnosed or, as I believe, knows full well they do not and is nothing more than a predatory bastard who believes by standing in the shadows of his own "ally/feminst" cries has fooled the people enough to be safe.

I don't think people are fooled, I just think people don't want to believe that of their literary idols.
But he isn't mine and I think he's a slimy fucker.

What you've described is a known and codified TRA script from archive.ph/98AmB

I kept waiting for it to be satire. Utterly dystopian

Micheal Sheen,and David Tennant, set off my spider sense,I'm afraid. MS especially strikes me as "after the revolution,Love; now make me a sandwich".

The second wife is never someone 25 years older than him, is she? Almost as if there is such a thing as rich man pattern behaviour.

Indeed. They always say ‘oh, we didn’t plan it, it just happened, we had so much in common’ (which I believe is what MS said re meeting his new wife), but isn’t it funny how it never ‘just happens’ like that with a woman 20 years their senior

I wasnt at all surprised to hear about this, having followed the Amanda Palmer NZ car crash from her point of view a bit. It was clear that she wanted to 'close' the marriage and clear he never would. My overwhelming sense from this is take it as a warning for all the cool girls like Amanda Palmer, yes we have an open relationship, we swing, we play, we're into BDSM, its all great and consensual. But then the kid comes along and you want to 'close' for awhile? Er no, love, he aint ever going back when you've let him have his cake and eat it and you end up abandoned and left alone with the kid while he fucks off and then fucks the nanny, just like all the normal non cool girl women. Must be humiliating for her, I hope she's learnt some leassons and some humility from it.

Listening to it now, he's good at the game of convincing women he's a cool guy and this is all so fun and weird and open while also being incredibly controlling, eg the fact that she wasn't actually paid after a month, and had nowhere else to go, not to mention shit parenting in that the first night she was there to 'nanny' the child was left at a 'playdate' until 11pm when he went to pick him up.

It reminds me so much of being in my twenties and not having the power or confidence to say, nope, this is weird, I'm out of here because older men were so smooth and confident but also you knew on some level that telling them no could potentially be very problematic. The kind of man who is perfectly nice and charming as long as everyone is going along with his version.

The podcast has done a brilliant job of showing the grey areas in the relationship while also making it clear that he was absolutely abusive and coercive and manipulative towards a much younger, vulnerable woman.

Or even the same age...

Searching to see if the Guardian had run the story (they haven't), I found this:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/oct/21/neil-gaiman-interview

From that piece:
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Bullying

Uh. Huh.

DT is infamous in showbiz for being a very big fan of the naughty salt.

I'm getting pissed off seeing people who have absolutely MONSTERED JKR on the basis of hearsay and rumour saying things like "innocent until proven guilty," and "none of us can know what really happened" when it comes to Neil Gaiman. At best, he's a creep. At worst, a rapist. But hey, he never said men can't be women so we can't cancel him.

Bunch of disgusting hypocrites showing themselves up.

I think you've dovetailed two very very different things here. I am not a fan of JKR, I think Gaiman is a creep and probably a predator.

What do you mean by dovetailed? I've compared two things - the monstering JKR got and the defence NG is getting. The same people who are happy to damn JKR as hateful/evil with zero evidence are suddenly the anti-cancel brigade when it comes to NG, despite the damning evidence.

”At best, he's a creep. At worst, a rapist. But hey, he never said men can't be women so we can't cancel him.”

Then those people have never read A Game of You.

Im guessing he’s apologised for that, though.

I've concluded that, for a lot of men in the public eye, being a male feminist is like the old practice of buying indulgences. It works with other left-coded causes too. Remember Weinstein's first reaction to being exposed was to promise to fund an anti-gun campaign. Who's to say that wouldn't have worked, if things had been slightly different?

And so Joss Whedon still gets work, and if the footage of Biden fundraisers is anything to go by, Bill Clinton is allowed out in public again. It's easy to condemn people you don't like or care about, but when it's a politician you've supported - or, much more difficult, an artist you've enjoyed and whose work you've really connected with - that's when there's a challenge.

Neil also has the advantage of being in the world of sci-fi and fantasy writers. I may be wrong, but I don't remember any of them raising alarms about Marion Zimmer Bradley until she was safely dead.

He's spending a small fortune on suppressing the story in the media. He engaged Edendale Strategies and for the past three days the search engine algorithms have been highly manipulated to 'hide' links to stories.

I'm wondering if more women will come forward. The issue I see is that he is evidently an expert in grooming, gaslighting and manipulation. His victims are the same profile - young and vulnerable and inexperienced. He tells them what's happening is 'normal'. He threatens to withdraw his love and attention if they don't do what he wants. They are drawn into what they think is a relationship, and they're doing everything they can to keep his attention. It's super hard to disentangle all of that, especially when you're in it. (Look at how many threads we see on MN with women who have no idea their abusive partner is being abusive.)

I actually think the podcast did a really good job of showing how this kind of coercive relationship works. It was very recognisable.

I wonder if the girlfriend who gave a statement about everything with Neil being 'incredible' is going through the same situation. The profile fits.

The issue I see is that he is evidently an expert in grooming, gaslighting and manipulation. His victims are the same profile - young and vulnerable and inexperienced. He tells them what's happening is 'normal'.

Yep! I met my first bf when I was 17 and vulnerable (I’d just left care), and he was 25. He groomed me into a relationship with him, which I didn’t want. I wasn’t even attracted to him. But he told me what to do, I knew no better, so I did it. I had no idea any of it was abusive. I had no idea partner rape was a thing. He was a police officer, and they protect people from abuse, right? 🙄

It’s incredibly brave of these women to come forward. I’ve been reading through the Gaiman subreddit and it seems like the podcast has done a pretty good job of convincing people, despite some people falling over themselves to discredit the whole thing on the basis of ‘but but but the journalist is a TERF!!’

How do you know this?
It would make sense as the news has been slow to hit the mainstream. However there's rumours abound that many many other women are about to come forward. This could potentially now become huge.

I'm wondering if more women will come forward.

A sobering point made in the podcast is NZ police told the victim if she thought there were others she could find them herself and then they might do something.

So if this emboldens others it can only be a good thing.

edendalestrategies.com