You are correct, my apologies. That was another poster.
Don’t fool yourself into thinking you aren’t making any claims. You most certainly are…and they are just as unsubstantiated as many other claims on this thread.
However, contacting the Club and following leads from that contact might even have raised doubts about this claim, and given the lie to the idea that the alleged behavior was some kind of “open secret” or “common knowledge” around the Club 45 years ago, which is what I feel most strongly about.
It wasn’t.
Don’t confuse the COTH article with the COTH forums. The article doesn’t discuss any “open secret” or “common knowledge” That is from this thread.
BTW - your comment “it wasn’t” is making a claim, just in case you still thought you weren’t making any claims. You have said that because you didn’t know, then it couldn’t have been common knowledge. Perhaps you knew every single thing that happened at the club…and everything that was discussed in hushed tones or openly…but I kind of doubt that. Even Susie admits Jimmy was a “ladies man” and that the times were different and you could get away with a lot more. His obituary said he was a ladies man…and he kind of proclaimed it from his golf cart, apparently. Perhaps not everyone knew that he liked young girls, but enough people knew he was a womanizer that it garnered him a reputation.
Heck, I have one of his videos and it left me wondering if he was dating Susie…which I thought was way inappropriate given the age gap…and it was before I knew they had been a couple. She may have been of age in the video, but he was still almost 40 years older than she… Yick.
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:rolleyes: 1. That wasn’t Two Lea…which you now know…and 2. That isn’t what LordHelpus said at all. :rolleyes:
Isn’t it great that you and I have different interpretations of what people have said, as you pointed out earlier in the thread? Cause I think it’s great that I don’t think the same way you do about this issue.
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[QUOTE=RugBug;n10104170
Don’t confuse the COTH article with the COTH forums. The article doesn’t discuss any “open secret” or “common knowledge” That is from this thread.
[/QUOTE]
The article may not use the term “open secret,” but Beth Rasin’s introduction does, and specifically refers to Flintridge. As the Managing Editor of COTH, she would appear to be ultimately responsible for its journalistic standards, one would think, and supervised the preparation of the article in some way.
I stand by my previous post completely, and all my opinions. Expressing an opinion is somewhat different than making a claim. Especially claims of misconduct or criminality or willful ignorance of those.
As for your own opinion that the age difference between Williams and Hutchison was “way inappropriate,” well, you’re entitled to it. Especially if you never knew either of them or witnessed their committed and successful relationship for the last decades of his life. Many, many others did. And if you’re not old enough or experienced enough to have seen or understood other such relationships – or learned yet to withhold such judgments based on superficial appearances.
Judge not that ye be not judged.
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Wow.
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^^^ This. 100%.
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You are totally right, it’s just still really disappointing in a youre’not-a-monster-but-this-still-ruined-my-impression-of-you way. :concern:
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I must confess that I’m perhaps too personally invested to see this objectively.
You see, I have a bigger bone to pick with the people around me who swept this under the rug. I knew it the nasty men hitting on me was wrong. I told people. I asked for help. They had a reason to look the other way. So we can call those guys sickos. But what’s the excuse that the other “normal” adults have for standing by and watching this happen? I can’t find a good reason that a knowing adult would allow a child to be sexually harassed can you?
But then and now, people are trying to mitigate the outrage about pedophilia. And that sets my teeth on edge because the terms are different now, but the outcome is the same.
As far as I can tell, the benefits of discussing this widely and being quite blunt about what these healthy, competent adults are co-signing is a necessary correction precisely because folks wanting fair and rational and balanced treatment of all parties remind me of the people in my childhood who also thought of themselves as good people who would, in fact, mete out justice.
Of course it was easier to not have to raise an alarm if you could find a way to minimize what the perp was doing. It is not comfortable for anyone to nail a pedophile to the wall. That being true, what do you want to do about that, you healthy on-looking adults? That’s the bottom-line question.
And so I want to make two things clear. 1. There is no neutral position. Not doing something is, de facto, doing something to determine whether or not sexual predation continues. 2. I want to blunt enough about that-- more specifically, allow the pendulum to swing as far as it is current-- so that those responsible, on-looking adults feel morally uncomfortable in those positions of not saying anything… in the name of being fair minded and rational.
And I’d like us all to get to the point that it would not be natural or even conscionable to publicly trot out the “Lolita hypothesis” as one’s first response to how this went down, as Judy Richter did. Perhaps I am sheltered, but I can’t imagine that the desire and action taking to sleep with a much older man in trade for a horse show ribbon is the rule rather than the rare, strange or even fictional exception. I don’t know many 17 year olds who would choose this. Do you? So that strikes me as an incredulous claim. And if that is so, I can’t see why that is a culturally-acceptable form of victim-blaming to do. Or more to the point, I’d like that to stop, too. It never should have happened in the first place… if we are being honest with ourselves about the thoughts, motives and minimal power of minors.
I mean, we’d never say of a horse we didn’t know “Meh… that stubborn SOB was asking to be beaten… he could have chosen to do as I ask, he just willfully decided not to.” We carefully refrain from over-estimating a horse’s understanding. We never attribute a motive to him that seems beyond his kind nature or cognitive ability. To over-estimate a horse’s power and to attribute malice to him… and then to punish him as a result is seen as ignorant and cruel. Yet it’s culturally possible to propose, right out of the box, that molested juniors at Flintridge hold the right combination of power and motive such that they caused their own molestation? How is it that an accomplished horsewoman would give girls less credit and care than an could animal? Let that question sink in and see if you still want to rationalize that kind of behavior.
In short, if enough people just walking around in the world are clear about the fact that this stuff happens and that they have (or should take for themselves) the power to play a role in stopping it, then I think the pendulum will be in balance again.
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I am glad they are leaving it up, too. These perps had a choice.
That’s not to say that Sex Addiction isn’t a Real Thing. It is. But there’s treatment for that (that is getting better and better) just as there was/is for Alcoholism.
I don’t care who y’are-- the badge of Sexual Predator is an earned one. You get to wear it after that, along with whatever other medals you earn.
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well, the story is such that I think he is kind of a monster for, as a married man or an older man, leveraging power over an vulnerable young employee in such a way. It is NOT the same as child rape of course! I didn’t mean it was as bad. But I will never think of him the same way again. You take a job with a supposedly happily married man, you don’t think he is going to proposition you then fire you if you decline the honor.
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Or, like, ANY man. Amiright?
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Yeah, we wish!
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Poor TwoLea, sooooo invested in your version of events and so threatened that your Age and Experience might be questioned. Reading through your deflection and defense is really very sad. You self identify as a young person who wasn’t on the social or monetary level of many at the Illustrious Flintridge and yet you feel this compulsion to continue to stand by your Club. Denial doesn’t make it so…the Earth simply is not flat… No matter how you often proclaim it to be.
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I think the ad hominem bit of this is below the belt. And you are so condescending. No matter what you think of TwoLea’s opinion, I think you didn’t fight fair and owe an apology.
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Condescending? Ad hominem? I am utterly contemptuous of two lea’s entire line of " reasoning" . There will be no apology. I hope that is entirely clear.
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Do tell. Really do tell.
Or you just spill, or you just not comment with but GM did this!!! Because it sounds like your defending people.
Why not you
There was a narrative that circulated via PM several years ago summarizing serious allegations against GM and claiming that he was under investigation by the sex crimes division of the NYC DA’s office. No idea if there is any truth to this, but the fact that the rumors have such durability makes one wonder…
Seems inevitable that at some point there will be a male version of the #me too revelations.
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