Neil Gaiman Accused Of Sexual Assault Pt II

[hihelenhi]

As we're nearly at the end of the first thread, let's make sure we keep the topic current.

There have been five women now who have spoken to podcasts about the predatory behaviour of Neil Gaiman.

First thread here:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5112128-neil-gaiman-accused-of-sexual-assault

My teenage Good Omens-obsessed son and I have had the same conversation. DS (who thank god believes the women and won't go near anything that would give NG a penny ever again) says surely, in the years since Pratchett died, something would have come out if it was going to.

I so hope he's right. It would genuinely break my heart if Sir Pterry turned out to be another 'women aren't proper people' type.

I prefer not to idolise blokes. Especially powerful famous blokes.

That's a very typical of the Guardian - I notice they've done this with other stories. They'll wait until there's a denial before they report something. And I don't know whether this is for legal reasons (ie they're wary of repeating a libel), or because they don't like running stories that have been broken by other outlets, or simply because they have more sympathy with the abuser than with the victims.

TP lived for 25 years after Good Omens was published, not 5. And yes, because of libel laws lapsing things always come.out after people die - and I've never heard a peep about him.

Good Omens was published in 1990 and TP died in 2015 so that’s actually 25 years of TP not working with NG. For whatever reason.

Thanks!! I thought it was longer but my googlefu failed and I didn’t really check.
Yeah, 25 years is definitely long enough to work with someone ag
if you wanted to.

Maybe he just didn't like collaborations? Bit of a stretch to say it makes TP a great bloke.
The truth is we don't know.

TP from the things he said, always struck me as a moral and wise person, but not one who would pull punches or play nice in a fake way. Of course you can’t be sure if you don’t know someone (or sometimes even if you do) but I too really hope he was the straight-up person he seemed to be. NG seems very unlike that, happy to engineer a persona and encourage fans to feed his ego. I can imagine TP distancing himself from that if or when it became apparent.

However there is something dodgy-seeming about the whole fantasy/comics scene - the conventions, relationships between stars and fans, obsessive fandom (sometimes maybe linked to ND) that can be easily exploited, and a lot of misogyny floating around. Obviously not everyone who’s involved in it is dodgy but I have met some horrible, horrible men who are involved in that world. One of them is an NG defender and fanboy. Ugh.

TP didn't work in the time of social media, which has allowed a lot of people to posture all day and be predators.

People keep downplaying the Scientology, which is just what Scientology would want. I believe they've been advertising on Mumsnet.

Always remember they're a business.

IIRC the Tortoise podcast mentioned NDAs. Totally normal in consensual relationships!

And strangely not mentioned at all in the Guardian report.

They are a bit of a smoking gun, I'd say.

Yes, very good point @Fenlandia If you don't want people telling other people what a complete arse you are, it's generally easier to just not be a complete arse.

Fed up with the Guardian's coverage of violence against women. There's a war on women while the Guardian prattles on about wild swimming and male feelings.

It's being on Mumsnet that has made the transparency of that statement a lot clearer to me. No wonder men don't like women getting together and comparing notes.

Making out it was definitely consensual, because he's got sexy texts from the women, and he's letting everyone know he's got those texts. He's obviously never seen the cup of tea analogy, despite his 'feminist' credentials.

And hey, all this abrupt, unlubricated anal sex with vulnerable young women I barely know, but have power over, notwithstanding, it's my emotional unavailability that's making them come up with these accusations. Poor things. All ten of them. My bad for not seeing that might happen. Must do better.

“I was emotionally unavailable while being sexually available' - just sounds like they came along and helped themselves, doesn't it? Availed themselves of his passive availability. and are now pissed off because, as pp have said, they all adored him and he didn't love them back. Thoughtlessness innit.

I'm not sure whether to refer to him as Comics Jimmy Saville or Graphic Novel Andrew Tate at this point. He disgusts me.

IIRC the Tortoise podcast mentioned NDAs.

Yes and ISTR this was all done through having legal people or staff contact the women to persuade/arrange, so other people were involved too, hardly just a misunderstanding. Caroline, the older woman, says he paid her off to the tune of 300k.

In April 2021, Gaiman informed Caroline that the land he’d promised her was no longer available. That summer, she stopped responding to his attempts to engage in phone sex and Gaiman increased the pressure on her to leave his property. One night in December 2021, Gaiman’s business manager, Terry Bird, called Caroline and offered her $5,000 to move immediately if she’d sign a 16-page NDA agreeing to never discuss anything about her experience with Gaiman or Palmer or to take legal action against Gaiman. Caroline recalls saying to Bird, “What am I going to do with $5,000? I need therapy. This is maybe $300,000.” Looking back, she says she didn’t know how she came up with that number, but Gaiman agreed to it, and she signed. (Gaiman’s representatives say Caroline initiated the sexual encounters and deny that he engaged in any sexual activity with her in the presence of his son.)

If hypothetically a person was a witness in court proceeding and asked a question under oath which was covered by an NDA, they would have to break the terms of the NDA (a civil matter) or be in Contempt of Court (a criminal matter), right?

I wonder about that too. PTerry’s words on Gaiman (blurb for GO if I recall correctly) could be interpreted as pretty ambivalent about his character. It always felt off how he positioned himself as Pratchett’s mouthpiece after his death.

Am also wondering how long it will take for NG to pull the ‘struggling with his gender and has always known he was trans since he was a little girl’ get out of jail free card. He’s wriggling now, hence the odious post he’s made in his defence.

Yes - clearly he had all ideas of consent broken from him by upbringing in Scientology.

and then refused to have any kind of therapy.

and broken women love broken men to fix.

If hypothetically a person was a witness in court proceeding and asked a question under oath which was covered by an NDA, they would have to break the terms of the NDA (a civil matter) or be in Contempt of Court (a criminal matter), right?

I think so but most of these were made in other jurisdictions so not clear on the legal position there.

Just catching up on this thread after reading the belated coverage in Guardian and BBC this week. Am appalled (as I am often recently) about how light touch the BBC report is. The New Yorker article is excellent and revolting. That poor kid.

On NDAs, I think I read somewhere that NDAs are unenforceable in respect of gagging someone from talking about criminal offences in the state of NY. I don't think such a provision exists in UK but I wish it did.

Article in today's Times.

https://www.thetimes.com/article/16612755-3bf0-4ede-a5e3-d92c258f6067?shareToken=eaf5b1ae5b216db7737354c59cc07b18

“The literary crowd that had a hell of a lot to say about Harvey Weinstein before he was convicted has been strangely muted in its response to multiple accusations against Neil Gaiman from young women who’d never met, yet — as with Weinstein — tell remarkably similar stories,” wrote Rowling.

That's interesting RoyalCorgi, you've just made something I have had a vague feeling about snap into focus:

There was a rape case in France which involved two Irish rugby players [who were playing for French teams at the time], around the same time as the Pelicot case. Absolutely horrific details. The Irish newspaper which is most closely aligned with the rugby community [i.e. well-to-do middle class] reported the guilty verdicts, leaving out the awful details, and gave great prominence to the fact that 'Mr X is appealing the sentence'.

I think that's similar to waiting for a denial to report something. They report (because they can't not report it) that someone has been charged with and convicted of a crime, but highlight the fact that he has appealed, thereby maintaining some sympathy for the guilty party.

I'll be on the lookout for other examples of 'ignore it until there's a denial or an appeal', now you've identified it Thanks RoyalCorgi!

Was it the Guardian who had all the sob stories about the convicted rapists in the Pelicot trial?