Roman in the Gloamin’ – Polanski’s Murky Friends

by Mary Jackson (December 2009)

 

Nobody listens to me, though. Nuance is all the rage, nothing is clear cut, and there must always be two sides to every story.

Kate Harding:

grand jury testimony, Roman Polanski instructed her to get into a jacuzzi naked, refused to take her home when she begged to go, began kissing her even though she said no and asked him to stop; performed cunnilingus on her as she said no and asked him to stop; put his penis in her vagina as she said no and asked him to stop; asked if he could penetrate her anally, to which she replied, “No,” then went ahead and did it anyway, until he had an orgasm.

an interview with Martin Amis, are not common or garden remorse:

November 2009, and to hope he is soon behind bars. You would expect them to take the side of the pleading victim, rather than the man forcing himself on her. You would be wrong. The victim has been pushed out of the way in the stampede to forgive him.

[…]

He can be blamed, it is true, for his original, panicky decision to flee. But for this decision I see mitigating circumstances, not least an understandable fear of irrational punishment. Polanski’s mother died in Auschwitz. His father survived Mauthausen. He himself survived the Krakow ghetto, and later emigrated from communist Poland. His pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered in 1969 by the followers of Charles Manson, though for a time Polanski himself was a suspect.

I am certain there are many who will harrumph that, following this arrest, justice was done at last. But Polanski is 76. To put him on trial or keep him in jail does not serve society in general or his victim in particular. Nor does it prove the doggedness and earnestness of the American legal system. If he weren’t famous, I bet no one would bother with him at all.

That the crime took place in 1977 is said to mitigate it. 1977 is so long ago, Applebaum argues, that the girl is now forty-five. Yes, and it is also so long ago that she was thirteen when it happened. It is hardly ancient history, especially to the victim. Writing in the London Times, philosophy professor A. C. Grayling makes short work of the idea that time erases the crime:

Should the law still seek and prosecute people for crimes committed a long time ago? Let us first clarify one thing about the case of Roman Polanski: the film director was convicted of a crime, and skipped the jurisdiction before he could be made to pay the penalty for it. His is not a case where it is still moot whether he committed a crime or not: he pleaded guilty. Nor therefore is it a case where a “statute of limitations” might apply, that is, a statute saying that a prosecution can only be brought against a person within a certain period after a crime occurred.

[..]

Huffington Post, writes:

Taki, the blot on the Spectator landscape, wins first prize for the most egregious Israel-related non sequitur I have seen in a long time:

Islamic. It might be interesting to see if the apologists for Polanski are also apologists for Islam, enemies of Israel, or both. The following examples are illustrative, rather than conclusive.

First, consider Gore Vidal, who, in an interview with The Atlantic, said of the child rape victim:

say about Israel, their homeland:

cured by meditation:

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