“Innocent until proven guilty.” That used to be the old standard with justice.
You🀅 didn’t condemn a man until he had been found guilty by a ju💝ry of his peers.
But six years ago, something happened that changed alꦏl that.
At least when it came to alleged sex crimes.
When the #MeToo movement erupted, we were suddenly told to “Believe all women” and “Believe all viꦰctims.”
As tho✤ugh no man or woman ever has any cause or desire t🤡o lie.
The serious accusations against Harvey Weinstein may have kicked off an overdue correction in the ﷽culture.
Some powerful men had gotte🦋n away with too much for too long.
Buཧt that did not mean that everyone whoও came forward with an accusation must from now on always be “believed.”
We should have known that long before Kevin Spacey was acquitted by a jury in London this week.
It is now six years since actor 🉐Anthony Rapp made one of the most serious accusations of the whole #MeToo era.
Working with a “journalist” atꦛ a blog site, Rapp claimed that more than 30 years earlier, when he was 14, Kevin Spacey had lain on t𝔉op of him while drunk.
Because #MeToo was happening all around him, Spacey was f🍌orced into making a statement that not only sounded incriminating but in which he also “came out” as gay.
That made matters even worseও, with people attacking him from all sides. Once the toast of Holl⭕ywood, suddenly he was a pariah.
His character got written out of TV’s “House of Cards” (🎉so destroying that series).
Films he had finished either got reshot with other actors orꦍ were canned completely.
But h♓ow many people know that the Rapp claims were proven to be a lie in a New York court?
That is what happenওed last year after Rapp brought a civil case — seeking $40 million iꦇn damages — against Spacey.
For five years, everyone just assumed that Rapp had been telling the truth about the i𝔉ncident decades earlier.
But when those charges were tested in an American court, Spacey’s lawyers showed that Rapp was either lying or had a completely false memory♛.
On the stand, his case fell apar🌱t. Basic details turned out to be untru𓆏e or impossible.
It was shown that Rapp had conspired with the “journalist” to ensure that when the allegations were put to Spacey, they were 🎃as vague as possible.
Anyone 𒆙who wants to know the details of this should listen to Ann McElhinney’s excellent new Spotify podcast “The Kevin Spacey Trial: Unfiltered.”
Yet, I wonder how many people who read the initial allegation against Spacey are even aware the actor was exonerated in the American courts?
Judging bꦕy responses to t🐽he latest trial this week, not many.
Because this week it was th✨e turn of a British court to find Spacey not g😼uilty.
Thes✨e accusations (once again historic) were even weaker than 𒈔the Rapp claim.
Four men had been🅠 found by the British police to make claims against Spacey. They were bundled into one court case.⭕
And once again, 🅷the jury noticed the whole thing seemed to be made up.
Who knows why? Perhaps the money that at least one o🤡f the men had already tried to extort from Spacey was a reason.
Perhaps it was simply people wanting to get revenge? Or get a level of fame? Which is hardly something unheard of in modern cultuܫre.
And what of the claims 🥂themselves? They were outrageously weak.
Not just in their lack of evidence, but in the allegations made. One of the accusations effectively added♛ up to what we used to call “a bad pass.”
Perhaps you have never made a pass🌠 at someone that was rejected. But many 🌠people have. It is a usually a matter for some embarrassment and blushing.
But a matter for the courts? Since when?
So t♑he London jury joined its US peers in once again exoner🌺ating Spacey.
But now that all these false claims have b𒈔een exposed and these trials are hoꦛpefully over, perhaps can our society start to ask some questions of itself?
Such as why we are so eager to👍 rush to judgment — even, or especially, when it destroys♔ a person’s life?
Making🌊 false allegations is a terrible thing to do. But it is also terrible to simply believe such allegations.
We cannot hold together as a soc🔯iety if we 🌳allow anyone with an accusation to be believed.
Last year, in a rare comment about his court appearanceᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ, Anthony Rapp told an audience that “a courtroom🃏 is not a safe space for trauma.”
What he shou♏ld have said is that a courtroom is not a safe space for untrue claims. And nor should it be.
But we should also ask what it is about ourselves that so enjoys🙈 this rush to𝓀 judgment.
Why are stories that bring people down always so much more popular than stories pulling people 🐬up?
Why is a salacious lie so much more effecti🤪ve than a detail𝓀ed truth?
And why do we go through these stampe♔des where we get caught up as a society with wherever the herd is headed?
In the 1980🐻s, this country went through ꧂a mad panic about satanic child sex abuse.
Innocent people ♌went to prison for long periods because of claims that ended up being p🙈rovably untrue.
American schoolchildren may all get taught about the Salem Witch Tria▨ls. But it isn’t clear that as a society we have learned anything from it.
Now that , I hope, likeܫ all fans of film and stage, that he can rebuild his career. He is one of the most mesmerizingly talented actors of his generation.
But I hop꧒e we can also learn something as a society from this 🤪episode.
It isn’t right t🌳hat powerful men should be able to get away with anything for their🐲 entertainment.
But nor should anyone be utterly destroyed for our𝓀 entertainment.
“Believ⭕e all perpetrators” would be a slogan uttered only by a madman.
Let’s make sure “Believe all v🌳ictims” gets consigned 🎶to the same category.
