Opinion

Bimpe Archer: It has taken enormous bravery for Harvey Weinstein's victims to speak out

Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has denied allegations of rape
Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has denied allegations of rape Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has denied allegations of rape

I’VE been a news reporter for longer than can be numerically possible, given the tenderness of my years *cough*.

That’s a lot of police press conferences at Knock headquarters. It’s a heap of hospital visits on January 1 to see the year’s firstborn. It’s a brave few miles tramping round fields on the Twelfth. It’s a good few hours attending `doorsteps’ on Sevastapol Street.

During those long years, I have also reported on a lot of rape and sex abuse cases. I’ve covered cases where there have been convictions and ones that resulted in acquittals.

Some of the victims’ ordeals were so fresh the police hadn’t even had time to pass the case to prosecutors. Others happened long before I was born.

During that time I have had long conversations with criminal justice professionals and every so often the question comes up for debate: `Would you report it?’

There `should’ be no debate. If nothing else you stop the perpetrator “doing the same thing to someone else”. It’s the classic `victim as saviour’ corollary. The fact that you have been attacked through no fault of your own instantly bestows on you the sole and enormous responsibility to end a monster’s reign of terror.

It’s not really fair when you think about it, is it?

A victim has no responsibility to anyone but themselves to find a way to live with the terrible wrong done to them, to somehow heal.

Speaking out, as victims of Harvey Weinstein have been doing in recent days, is a stupendously brave act.

Dozens of women have now alleged the powerful Hollywood producer sexually assaulted them over the course of several decades.

The list grows daily and includes some of the most famous names on both the silver and the small screen.

To be the first, to challenge the public narrative (what the dogs on Sunset Boulevard knew is another matter) about such a powerful figure in the industry that provides your livelihood is an act of almost unimaginable courage. Will you even be allowed to speak your truth, or ruthlessly silenced? If you do, who will dare to admit they believe you when they too have so much to lose?

We forget that the original `I am Spartacus’ moment became iconic because it was unexpected. Human nature does not naturally tend towards self-sacrifice for the protection of another unrelated member of the race.

However, one by one, the “ladies of Hollywood” heeded alleged rape victim Rose McGowan’s call to arms and either stood in solidarity with their colleagues or, increasingly, came forward with their own tales of abuse.

Yet, almost as soon as they had done so they were facing the second unfair victim expectation – the `Caesar’s wife’ principle, the notion that in order to be a proper victim they must also be a candidate for canonisation.

As McGowan detailed, she was initially told by a (female) criminal lawyer that her allegations of rape would lack credibility because she had done a sex scene in a film.

Dress designer Donna Karan responded to the claims by saying: “It’s not Harvey Weinstein. If you look at everything all over the world today and how women are dressing, what are they asking by just presenting themselves the way they do. What are they asking for? Trouble.”

She later apologised.

Actress Lysette Anthony, who alleges she was raped by Weinstein, has been accused of “trying to make yourself relevant” by adding her voice to the rising chorus of condemnation.

But it is 2017, after all, so victim shaming is not as overt. Instead, those who have been speaking out in their support have become the focus of character assassinations.

Denunciations of Weinstein by Oscar winners Meryl Streep and Emma Thompson have seen them been pilloried for their previous support for convicted sex offender, filmmaker Roman Polanski.

No, it wasn’t their finest hour, but should that render them mute in the face of abuse of power and sexual predation for all time?

It’s interesting that their support for Polanski was of no matter to the same commentators when the two women were not speaking out in support of Weinstein’s victims. Yes, it is a related subject, but equally if their allegiance is repugnant now it was repugnant when they were the toast of the town for their respective artistic endeavours.

Yet, against this background, brave victims continue to emerge.

And, for the most part, it is clear that while speaking out will help others, and fulfil that `victim as saviour’ corollary, it is also helping them.

Because they are placing the years of secret shame where it truly belongs – on the perpetrator.