Back in the loony bin

535 e-mails were waiting for me when I returned Wednesday night. As you can imagine, many were spam, many were blog comments but more than enough were little packets of outrage; pictures of Muslims carrying signs warning of retribution billed as a general picture of all Muslims, dire warnings of collapse if we reform health care, little buckets of irrational snickering about Obama and much more. All unworthy of further comment.

Every time I leave the US and come back I'm shocked and have to wait a few days for the numbness to set in and the shivering to stop the way you do when you jump into cold water.

I watched BBC news every day whilst in the UK. We really have nothing like it here. It's dull, reasoned, thorough, polite and controversies are actual and not designed to make facts look dubious and madmen seem sane and well intentioned. Yes, there was much discussion about "reforming" health care and disability insurance, but no shouting, no interrupting, no slogan shouting, no insults, no comparisons with Pol Pot, Hitler or Karl Marx: more like engineers talking about making your car run better by adjusting the spark advance or fuel mixture curve. "Yes sir, we could perhaps remove some people from inability payments but wouldn't we have to provide more money to train them?" I'd forgotten what civility was like.

We're a crazy country, mad, ill informed, aggressively rude, contemptuous of reason, terrified of civilization and of its demands. I'm sick to death of it, sick of talking about it and sick of trying to do something about it -- at least for today.

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

The winner is ...

The time is 5:00 am (you guessed it - a bout of insomnia), and the news was announced just moments ago. Let us hope President Obama can leverage this award into more political cooperation at home and the achievement of peace abroad.

WORST OUTRAGES OF THE WEEK: GENDER DISCRIMINATION, GANG RAPE, AND A CRIMINAL COVER-UP

OUTRAGE #1: GENDER DISCRIMINATION

A new law just passed in Oklahoma will require all physicians to disclose information on women’s abortions to the state Department of Health, which intends to post the collected data on a public website. Starting November 1, 2009, the new law will require the following information:

1) Date of abortion
2) County in which abortion is performed
3) Age of mother
4) Marital status of mother
5) Race of mother
6) Years of education of mother
7) State or foreign country of residence of mother
8) Total number of previous pregnancies of the mother

Plus 26 more questions including the woman’s health insurer (irrelevant), method of payment (irrelevant), and details about the medical procedure (exposing them to blackmail and/or threats).

An invasion of privacy? A violation of civil rights? Not according to supporters of the legislation. Nevertheless, the Center for Reproductive Rights, a former state representative, and several residents have filed a lawsuit. As Echidne points out in her commentary (see A new sex offender site), why are women always the object of legislative harassment, but not those who impregnate them (i.e. men)?

Sources: Huffington Post article here, and Echidne’s commentary here.

OUTRAGE #2: GANG RAPE AND A CRIMINAL COVER-UP

This story is about Jamie Leigh Jones who was gang-raped by co-workers while employed in Iraq by Halliburton/KBR in 2005. After the gang-rape, company thugs locked her in a shipping container, denying her food, water, and a bed for at least 24 hours. If she left Iraq for medical treatment, she was warned, she would lose her job. The Department of Justice refused an investigation. KBR claimed her employment contract indemnified the company from criminal charges, that her only means of redress was binding arbitration … by a KBR arbitrator. Last month, the 5th Circuit of Appeals granted her the right to sue, but it will be years before Jamie Leigh Jones gets final justice in a court of law.

Earlier this week, newly elected Senator Al Franken sponsored an amendment to a defense appropriation bill that stops funding for any defense contractor that denies women their right to legal redress for sexual assault. The measure passed by a margin of 68 to 30.

More revealing was the vote breakdown. All Democrat and all GOP women senators voted for the bill, not exactly an earth-shattering example of partisan division. However, all GOP men voted against. In their worldview, the interests of capitalism far outweigh the rights of women … and trump all crimes of rape. Here is the complete list of male sexist GOPigs:

Alexander (R-TN), Barrasso (R-WY), Bond (R-MO), Brownback (R-KS), Bunning (R-KY), Burr (R-NC), Chambliss (R-GA), Coburn (R-OK), Cochran (R-MS), Corker (R-TN), Cornyn (R-TX), Crapo (R-ID), DeMint (R-SC), Ensign (R-NV), Enzi (R-WY), Graham (R-SC), Gregg (R-NH), Inhofe (R-OK), Isakson (R-GA), Johanns (R-NE), Kyl (R-AZ), McCain (R-AZ), McConnell (R-KY), Risch (R-ID), Roberts (R-KS), Sessions (R-AL), Shelby (R-AL), Thune (R-SD), Vitter (R-LA), and Wicker (R-MS).

May their wives punish them with the Lysistrata treatment until the end of time.

Source: The Huffington Post.

THE NOBEL LITERATURE PRIZE

This is a quick post to honor Herta Mueller, who just won the 2009 Nobel Prize in literature announced today. She is a member of Romania's ethnic German minority who was persecuted by the Ceausescu regime for her critical depictions of life behind the Iron Curtain. Peter Englund, spokesperson for the Swedish Academy, said this about her work:

"At the same time she has something to tell, partly from her own background as a persecuted dissident in Romania, but also her own background as a stranger in her own country, a stranger to the political regime, a stranger to the majority language, and a stranger to her own family," he added.

What especially caught my attention was this back story swirling around Horace Engdahl, Englund’s predecessor, who told the AP last year that "Europe still is the center of the literary world" and the quality of U.S. writing was dragged down because authors were "too sensitive to trends in their own mass culture."

A curious statement indeed, one I would NOT dismiss casually. My only reservation surrounding Engdahl’s remark is: Why mass culture? It seems Vladimir Nabokov profited from our adolescent reveries in his finest tribute to America, Lolita. These days, maybe what holds us back is the anti-arts, anti-science, and anti-intellectual rabble who have turned our fair land into a cultural wilderness. Maybe Mr. Engdahl has the right idea but merely misses the mark.

My Second-Ever YouTube Video

I'm looking for honest opinions here: I've now made two YouTube videos, and while I'm proud of the accomplishment in making them and enjoyed getting nearly 1000 views of the first, I have yet to get any real feedback.

My first ever YouTube video:

Aside from the technical issues -- I'm just working with a free Windows Movie Maker program here, folks! -- are these effective? Am I fooling myself? Should I get a day job? What?!

Do You Speak Conservative English?

If so, there may be a job for you.

Turns out Conservative Bible Project is going to re-translate the Holy Book, but in a very special way.

The goal of this so-called translation is, as Liberal Values states, "to remove all (...) liberal bias from the Bible."

Here are the principles guiding this extra special project:

1. Framework against Liberal Bias: providing a strong framework that enables a thought-for-thought translation without corruption by liberal bias
2. Not Emasculated: avoiding unisex, “gender inclusive” language, and other modern emasculation of Christianity
3. Not Dumbed Down: not dumbing down the reading level, or diluting the intellectual force and logic of Christianity; the NIV is written at only the 7th grade level
4. Utilize Powerful Conservative Terms: using powerful new conservative terms as they develop;^[4] defective translations use the word “comrade” three times as often as “volunteer”; similarly, updating words which have a change in meaning, such as “word”, “peace”, and “miracle”.
5. Combat Harmful Addiction: combating addiction by using modern terms for it, such as “gamble” rather than “cast lots”;^[5] using modern political terms, such as “register” rather than “enroll” for the census
6. Accept the Logic of Hell: applying logic with its full force and effect, as in not denying or downplaying the very real existence of Hell or the Devil.
7. Express Free Market Parables; explaining the numerous economic parables with their full free-market meaning
8. Exclude Later-Inserted Liberal Passages: excluding the later-inserted liberal passages that are not authentic, such as the adulteress story
9. Credit Open-Mindedness of Disciples: crediting open-mindedness, often found in youngsters like the eyewitnesses Mark and John, the authors of two of the Gospels
10. Prefer Conciseness over Liberal Wordiness: preferring conciseness to the liberal style of high word-to-substance ratio; avoid compound negatives and unnecessary ambiguities; prefer concise, consistent use of the word “Lord” rather than “Jehovah” or “Yahweh” or “Lord God.”

How cool is that?

When the properly educated translators are done with this harrowing job, I would like to propose that they take on other works with a similar goal in mind. Why let good books go to waste?

First (and I'm looking at the pile of my kids' long-discarded books), we need to tackle The Little Engine That Could, where we can retain the properly conservative story, but should change the title to a more evocative The Little Engine That Was Not Afraid of Personal Responsibility, Pulled Itself by Its Bootstraps, and Did Not Wait for Government Handouts.

Then let's move on Margaret Wise Brown's Goodnight Moon -- it definitely has to be translated into Conservative English. Why, the whole book is written in feminine rhyme! How emasculating! And all this banging on about cows jumping over the moon, spoons running away with dishes and other blathering nonsense gives our kids inappropriate ideas about life in a right-minded society.

Next on to Grimm Brothers' Fairy Tales, which are just crawling with pinkos. Actually, the term fairy would have to be taken out immediately due to its liberal homosexual connotations. Brothers also has to go -- it's too close to comrades and we can't have that.

Oh my... So many books, so little time...

I think it would be useful to create a Conservative English Dictionary, which would streamline translators' work and make the project follow more smoothly. Some obvious inclusions in it would be substituting peace with war; love with contractual obligation -- or slavery, even better; poor with lazy bums; etc.

This way we can reawaken our love -- pardon me, our contractual obligation for classics, which desperately need some conservative sprucing up. For example, the insufferably long War and Peace by Tolstoy would read like a breeze when renamed as War and Why It's Good for You, and with some additional tweaking throughout.

I can see an enormous potential here. The sky, or perhaps The Communist Manifesto, is the limit. Just imagine how much fun it will be to translate that!

Cross-posted at The Middle of Nowhere.

RYAN

Ryan Larkin (1943 – 2007) was a Canadian animator, artist, and sculptor who rose to fame with the psychedelic 1969 Oscar-nominated short Walking and the acclaimed Street Musique (1972). He was the subject of this Oscar-winning film, Ryan.

At the National Film Board of Canada (NFB), Ryan learned animation techniques from the ground-breaking and award-winning animator, Norman McLaren.

In recent years, Ryan was plagued by a downward spiral of drug abuse, alcoholism and homelessness, but found himself back in the limelight when a 14-minute computer-animated documentary on his life, Ryan by fellow Canadian animator Chris Landreth. Ryan died of lung cancer in 2007.

STOP SADISTIC AND SEXIST CYBER-BULLYING … NOW!

Internet predators and trolls are known to have a callous disregard for fellow human beings. They troll for sport, amusement, and narcissistic gratification. They use these forums as billboards for graffiti, name-calling, off-topic rants, taunts, and the cyberspace equivalent of road rage. Some predators sink to the level of sadism.

One of our beloved writers, Shaw Kenawe of Progressive Eruptions, has just been diagnosed with cancer. This is her second bout in as many years. She survived a previous bout … without health insurance.

Not merely this recurrence, Shaw has suffered other setbacks as well. Earlier this year, her sister passed away. She worries about another family member who is gravely ill. All told, this has been a very tough year for Shaw.

Understandably, she supports healthcare reform among other liberal causes … sentiments that have turned her into a magnet for attacks by right wing predators. Not just any attack, but low, vile, cowardly, sexist attacks such as this from a blogger who calls himself bluepitbull:

Friday, October 2, 2009
Progressive Eruptions, the reality

I've finally figured it out. I thought there was much more to Progressive Eruptions. Perhaps hallucinogens and Pink floyd. But here it is:

Progressive Eruptions is one natural, eternal orgasm for Shaw Kenawe dedicated to obama. Her obsession with him and her apologies are indicative of this …

She would be all over Barney Frank (she loves the accent), but I think she still has enough of an attachment to the real world to know that she is not his type.

Posted by bluepitbull at 3:25 PM

Whether or not bluepitbull knows about her travails is quite beside the point. Any would-be cyber-bully or troll would be wiser to think before they flame. Bloggers are not nameless, faceless objects for shameless stereotyping, but caring people who live, work, pay taxes, contribute to the common good, and suffer the same problems of living as the rest of humanity … regardless of party, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, or ethnicity.

Bluepitbull is not merely a predator, but a serial predator. He has subjected Shaw to a pervasive pattern of harassment here, here, and here. How low can a he go!

So bluepitbull, unmanly coward that you are, the time is long overdue to clean up your act, apologize to Shaw, and stop the sadistic and sexist cyber-bullying … NOW!

And please, everyone who visits, leave a kind word of support for Shaw and best wishes for her recovery.

AND NOW THE GOOD FROM POLAND!

While a rather bad Pole is hogging all the headlines, I want to take a moment to draw attention to a good man of Poland who is much more worthy of some media attention.

Marek Edelman, 23 years old at the time, was the last surviving leader of the ill-fated 1943 uprising in the Warsaw ghetto against the Nazis. It would be the first civilian armed resistance against the Nazis and while they were ultimately defeated, the resistance fighters were able to inflict heavy losses on Hitler’s army. Most of the leaders of the revolt were rounded up and committed suicide rather than wait for whatever the soldiers had in store for them.

Edelman with a small group of other fighters managed to use the sewer system to get to the other side of the city and then organized resistance units while hiding from the Germans. He spent the war years being quite the thorn in Hitler’s side.

Edelman became a cardiologist after the war and his wife became a pediatrician. She took their son and immigrated to France following the communist backed anti-Semitic purges of 1968. But Edelman himself refused to leave his homeland preferring to stay and continue the fight for freedom for Poland.

Edelman spent his life fighting for human dignity and freedom and against communism and I’m glad he lived long enough to see Poland regain its sovereignty. He died Friday at his home from natural causes; he was 90 years old.

“Man is evil, by nature man is a beast," he said. Therefore people "have to be educated from childhood, from kindergarten, that there should be no hatred."

Can you imagine this statement coming from a man who had suffered so much? He understood that sometimes you have to fight, but the goal should always peace.

Dobranoc, Pan Edelman, may you live in memory forever. A true Mensch.

"Sex," Fame, and Polish (but not only) Hypocrisy

I try to stay away from celebrities and tawdriness as much as possible, mainly because of my pretentious and uppity elitism, but also, to a lesser extent, because the affairs of celebrities are supremely boring.

This case, however, is irresistible for its strange twists and turns, as well as a whiff of both Polishness and uppity elitism with its abominable hypocrisy. I'm talking of course about the saga of Polish director Roman Polanski, who was finally arrested in Switzerland on Saturday and faces extradition to USA. Or maybe not, as his lawyer vows to fight it.

For those who live underwater and away from mass media, a brief recap of Polanski's situation: in 1977 he drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl, and was able to plead guilty to a lesser charge of unlawful sexual intercourse. Afterward, the judge in his case, one Laurence Rittenband, allegedly reneged on his plea deal, which scared Polanski enough to flee to the welcoming bosom of Mother Europe. Polanski was on the run from justice for over 30 years. For more background on Polanski's case, see this.

What's surprising, among many surprises here, is that he periodically lived in Switzerland, undisturbed by authorities, so questions are being raised about the timing of his arrest. Some clear-eyed observers even suggested that this is a gesture of good will on the part of the Swiss, intended to placate Americans angry about Switzerland giving financial shelter to our domestic financial terrorists whiz kids. A strange coincidence no.1: Polanski's arrest came two days after the death of Susan Atkins, who murdered his second wife, Sharon Tate, during a Manson-led and inspired drunken orgy in 1969. A strange coincidence no.2: one day before Polanski's arrest, Poland adopted a new tough law requiring castration for pedophiles (more about it later).

Polanski's arrest has ignited an international debate again, and many law experts and film buffs have weighed in with sympathetic opinions, hoping his case will be dismissed. Among those pleading for leniency is his victim, now 45-year-old Samantha Geimer (previously Gailey), who settled with Polanski, years after her rape, for somewhere around a quarter of a million dollars for "emotional distress." Geimer has asked numerous times for the case against Polanski to be dropped, saying that dredging it up causes her undue stress and pain.

But Polanski never really admitted to his crime, claiming both that the victim lied to him about her age and that the "sex" was consensual. Of course he never expressed any remorse. In fact, he has absolved himself of responsibility, as seen in the footage of the documentary about him, where he says, defiantly, I like young women, let me put it this way. I think most of men do.

Maybe. But a 13-year-old girl is not a woman, not psychologically, and certainly not legally. Polanski knew this very well when he drugged and raped Samantha. He was 44 at the time and very much attracted to young teenage girls. This is what Samantha looked like as a teen (left).

As to consensual, a 44-year-old man who drugs a 13-year-old (or anyone, for that matter) and forces himself on her, while she is crying and protesting, can hardly make this claim. See this for a transcript of Samantha's testimony in court.

It is not unreasonable to suspect that Gailey was not the only child who fell victim to Polanski's forbidden urges. Pedophiles are not reformable, and are known to be repeat offenders. Not long after his escape to Europe, Polanski was photographed parading around in company of very young, likely underage, females.

Another twisted aside: Polanski's wife, French actress Emmanuele Seigner, is younger than his victim. Seigner (below right, with Polanski in Paris, 2007) was an adult of the ripe age of 23 when they married. Polanski was 56. They have two children together, a son and a daughter.

The documentary I mention above, Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, directed by Marina Zenovich, paints an extremely sympathetic portrait of Polanski as a victim of miscarried justice. While Zenovich seemingly acknowledges the awfulness of his crime, she is clearly in awe of Polanski's talent and less than objective in her assessment. She calls him misunderstood and endlessly fascinating.

As Bill Wyman of Salon.com writes, In "Wanted and Desired," Zenovich casts Polanski, whose face repeatedly fills the screen with a Byronic luminosity, as a tragic figure, a child survivor of the Holocaust haunted by the murder of his wife, the actress Sharon Tate, at the hands of the Manson family. His friends are uniformly supportive: "This is somebody who could not be a rapist!" one exclaims.

When interviewed about the movie, Zenovich made this strange statement: If it was a violent rape I wouldn't have made this film. She added that it was a tragedy for all involved. It's not for me to judge.

I am dumbfounded. So, say, if knives, ropes, and swinging fists were used, it would have been a reprehensible rape for Ms. Zenovich, enough so that she would not make an apologetic movie about the perp. But since it was only alcohol and drugs, it was acceptable enough? Besides, how was it a tragedy for all involved? And how is it not for her to judge? She is deluding herself if she thinks that she is not offering a judgment by showing such a one-sided portrayal of the story. This is as an advanced and incurable case of celebritis as I have seen.

But of course Zenovich is not alone in putting lipstick on this particularly ugly pig. During a discussion about the case on The View, Whoopi Goldberg said this:

I know it wasn't rape-rape. I think it was something else, but I don't think it was rape-rape.

Boy, I tell ya... And people wonder why Janes and Joes Schmoes don't trust and don't like the Hollywood types. The gulf between the librul, rotten-to-the-core Hollywood and non-nonsense Main Street has just widened with the Polanski's case, probably to unbridgeable proportions.

To put things in perspective for Ms. Zenovich, Ms. Goldberg, and other celebrity-stricken Polanski's defenders, let's recall what the man did exactly:

(...) Roman Polanski gave a 13-year-old girl a Quaalude and champagne, then raped her… Before we discuss how awesome his movies are or what the now-deceased judge did wrong at his trial, let’s take a moment to recall that according to the victim’s 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.

I dunno, to me it sounds and looks like rape-rape.

The bizarre, if not downright psychopathic, reaction of the political and artistic elites to Polanski's arrest continues. The French are up in arms:

French foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner (co-founder of Doctors without Borders, EM) and Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand both sharply criticised US and Swiss authorities over the arrest, which came as the Franco-Polish director arrived in Zurich to receive an award.(...) Mr Mitterrand said on Sunday that Polanski, director of Rosemary's Baby and an Oscar winner for The Pianist, had been "thrown to the lions over an ancient affair that doesn't make any sense." To jail him, he added, was "absolutely dreadful." Mr Kouchner said: "This affair is frankly a bit sinister ... Here is a man of such talent, recognised worldwide, recognised especially in the country where he was arrested. This is not nice at all."

Huh? I'm as uppity an elitist as they come, so I can tell you what's absolutely dreadful, sinister, and not nice at all: drugging and raping kids (or anyone, for that matter), and not feeling any remorse for it, that's what.

But of course the French (who may have other motives for defending Polanski) are not alone. The film community (which has been silent about many pressing issues facing our nation), has spoken loudly and clearly on behalf of the pedophile and law-evading fugitive.

As Reuters reports, the Zurich Film Festival jury accused Switzerland of "philistine collusion" with U.S. authorities and wore red badges reading "Free Polanski," and Debra Winger, president of the Festival, which was to give Polanski an honorary award, said the following: We hope today this latest order will be dropped. It is based on a three-decade-old case that is all but dead but for minor technicalities.

Whoa. One would think Polanski is some human rights advocate, imprisoned for standing up for the voiceless and dispossessed. A Gandhi, almost. So let's just remind ourselves, again, before we start shedding tears here, that he is an unrepentant pedophile, who drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl and then ran from justice.

Joining Polanski's apologists are other Hollywood (and not only) big names, who have prepared a petition demanding his release. The petition is signed, so far, by 138 celebrities and industry people, including Woody Allen (now there is a surprise), Harvey Weinstein, Pedro Almodovar, Martin Scorsese, Monica Bellucci, Tilda Swinton, David Lynch, Jonathan Demme, John Landis, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Wim Wender, Salman Rushdie, Bernard-Henri Levy, Milan Kundera, Isabelle Huppert, Diane von Furstenberg, and is backed by France's Societe des Auteurs et Compositeurs Dramatiques (Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers). It states, in part:

"It seems inadmissible (...) that an international cultural event, paying homage to one of the greatest contemporary filmmakers, is used by the police to apprehend him. (...) The arrest of Roman Polanski in a neutral country, where he assumed he could travel without hindrance ... opens the way for actions of which no one can know the effects."

Sigh. Actions of which no one can know the effects? Folks, the guy drugged and raped a 13-year-old and then fled the country to avoid prison. He should be held responsible for his crime, period. What mysterious effects do you have in mind? Unless by this you mean that predators and criminals cannot hide in supposedly neutral places and evade the law forever. But that should be no mystery to you or anyone, I hope.

Meanwhile, Harvey Weinstein is trying to recruit more supporters for Polanski. As his company told CNN, We are calling every filmmaker we can to help fix this terrible situation.

Again, and I know I repeat myself and bore you to death, the only terrible situation here is that an admitted and unrepentant pedophile has been on the run for over 30 years, enjoying freedom, fame and wealth, and abusing who knows how many other victims. Was Mr. Weinstein trying to fix that in the past 30 years? No, I didn't think so.

One of the many bizarre twists of this case is the fact that Mia Farrow, who starred in Polanski's Rosemary's Baby, and years later accused her own long-time boyfriend, Woody Allen, of sexually abusing their adopted children, has consistently defended Polanski in the media.

But wait, there is more.

Joan Shore, co-founder of Women Overseas for Equality(!) and a Polanski fan, wrote a blog post for HuffPo titled, Polanski's Arrest: Shame on the Swiss -- read it, it's a full-blown apologia for the perp and a classic example of blaming the victim.

Another HuffPo blogger, writer and film critic John Farr wrote a post titled, Leniency for Polanski. In it, he argues, unbelievably, but predictably, that Polanski should be forgiven because 1. he is a genius, 2. he's suffered so much in his life, 3. his victim wants him released; 4. he's paid for his crime (no explanation how), and 5. he is reformed (i.e., is married and with no other accusations of abuse -- as if that ever mattered in cases of pedophiles). Oh, and 6. it was a long time ago.

Under the onslaught of critical comments from HuffPo's readers, Farr has revised some of his most egregious statements already, including one about "seduction" that supposedly took place on that fateful day in 1977.

Perhaps the most mind-boggling, to me, reactions to Polanski's arrest have come from the Polish political and artistic circles. Polish politicians have spoken on Polanski's behalf:

Poland and France intend to make a joint appeal to Switzerland and the United States to have Polanski released from his detention, Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski told the Polish news agency PAP. Sikorski said he and French counterpart Bernard Kouchner also plan to ask Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to offer Polanski clemency.

A semi-relevant aside: Radek Sikorski is a Polish neocon, who worked, for years, for American Enterprise Institute and The National Review. He is married to American journalist, Anne Applebaum, who penned an impassioned piece in defense of Polanski for The Washington Post. It is relevant to mention it since neocons tend to be socially conservative and one would expect them to condemn a child rape and its perpetrator. One would be wrong.

Among Polish luminaries speaking out in Polanski's defense is film director Krzysztof Zanussi, who called Polanski's rape victim a "young prostitute," and Polanski, a victim of a sinister plot concocted by the "prostitute" and her mother to extort money from him. In a Polish TV talk show, Zanussi said the following (translation mine):

Zanussi: If (Polanski) were not so famous, the fact that over thirty years ago in Los Angeles, which is a city of particularly loose morals, he used services of some underage prostitute, because that's what it likely was...

Interrupted by a female journalist, Monika Olejnik: No, no. This was a 13-year-old girl, she was not a prostitute. It was not for money, so it was not prostitution.

Zanussi: In this world, there are many things that are done not for money but for fame, for career. (...) I know (Polanski) as a man who escaped the ghetto, who is tragic and has those "dark chapters" in his life. I think if he were not famous, this matter would not have had any traction today. (...) I don't believe in the victim's innocence. She does not appear to have been there by accident. In this circle of people, who would do anything for career and money, it seems that the intent of the mother, who was involved in it, was an attempt at blackmailing Polanski. At taking anything from him that he could give. And he did not give it, and that was his mistake. He could have paid them off and he didn't. Maybe he was too proud for it, too Polish.

Holy crap... First of all, there isn't anything "Polish" about this behavior, I just have to say this. At least I hope there isn't -- because if that's Polish, then Poles are screwed (no pun whatsoever).
(Another aside: I can tell you from personal experience of having grown up in Poland that there is -- or was, back in my day -- a pedophile on every street corner. And those who do not operate on street corners can be found in doctors' offices, schools, churches, and in any other place frequented by young people. Yes, I'm talking about the abusers in position of authority, who remain as untouchable as their victims stay nameless, bearing silent scars for a long time, if not forever.)

Second, it is painfully obvious that Zanussi, who, btw, is one of the most renowned and respected Polish film directors, has no clue about details of the Polanski's case (at least I hope so, because if he does know the details and still says these things, it makes matters worse). That does not stop him from offering his unequivocal defense of his friend and smearing the reputation of his child-victim. That's not Polish, any of it.

But then one wouldn't know it perusing Polish media. For Zanussi is not alone in his ignorant and harmful defense of the famous pedophile. A well-known Polish actress, Dorota Stalinska, said this (translation mine):

First of all, it was not rape, but consensual sex with an underage girl. We know that a 13-year-old girl may look 20. I have a 20-year-old son. He could tell you how 13-year-old girls behave and how they provoke and jump into beds not only of 20-year-olds, but of 40-year-olds. 13-year-old girls seduce grown men. It's the same in Poland and everywhere else. Zanussi is right.

And then there is Lech Wałęsa -- you may remember him as the founder of Solidarity, the first president of post-socialist Poland, and the Nobel Peace Prize winner. Wałęsa too defends Polanski:

(Polanski) is a great person, he's done so much for Poland and the world. He also could have sinned. Make sure he really did sin. If he did, you can forgive him this one. I will do everything I can to defend him. (...) I am his friend.

How Christian, to forgive the sinner and forget the victim. Ugh.

This is disheartening. I can see that not much has changed in Poland in matters of sexual abuse and treatment of the victims. In these respects, Polish social mores, if not the law, are still in the Middle Ages.

This quote, however, really takes my cake:

Polanski has already "atoned for the sins of his young years," Jacek Bromski, head of the Polish Filmmakers Association, told The AP. "He has paid for it by not being able to enter the U.S. and in his professional life he has paid for it by not being able to make films in Hollywood."

Um... You're kidding, right? Not being able to make films in Hollywood is the heart-breaking punishment for child rape and 30+ years of evading justice?

But, wait, it gets stranger yet.

The day before Polanski's arrest, Poland approved a law making chemical castration mandatory for pedophiles in some cases, sparking criticism from human rights groups. Under the law, sponsored by Poland's center-right government, pedophiles convicted of raping children under the age of 15 years or a close relative would have to undergo chemical therapy on their release from prison.

"The purpose of this action is to improve the mental health of the convict, to lower his libido and thereby to reduce the risk of another crime being committed by the same person," the government said in a statement.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk said late last year he wanted obligatory castration for pedophiles, whom he branded 'degenerates'. Tusk said he did not believe "one can use the term 'human' for such individuals, such creatures.Therefore I don't think protection of human rights should refer to these kind of events.".

So there we have it, a curious -- or not -- double standard. Pedophiles are considered degenerates in Poland now, undeserving of human rights. Except when they are famous filmmakers with powerful friends, that is.

An inescapable lesson from Polanski's saga so far: if you are going to rape a child, don't be a plumber or auto mechanic; be famous and rich. Then justice will be slow and lenient for you, and people will forgive your crime. Nah, they'll be clamoring to speak out in your defense.

P.S. In yet another strange twist to this already twisted story, one of the defense witnesses in Polanski's case, interviewed by Zenovich for her documentary, recanted his statement regarding Judge Rittenband.

Cross-posted at The Middle of Nowhere.