The Reaction is Out of Control


If Salman Khan is found guilty and convicted, we expect producers of his ongoing films to suffer. But nobody asks for his already released or completed films to be taken off the stores or TV channels or the Internet, right?

But that’s India. Contrast that with what happens in Hollywood these days, laments Lionel Shriver:
“Artists’ misbehavior now contaminates the fruits of their labors, like the sins of the father being visited upon the sons. So it’s not enough to punish transgressors merely by cutting off the source of their livelihoods, turning them into social outcasts, and truncating their professional futures. You have to destroy their pasts. Having discovered the worst about your fallen idols, you’re duty­bound to demolish the best about them as well.”

Worse, this happens without even waiting for a court verdict. Just an accusation can set this chain off:
“In numerous instances during the #MeToo scandals, accusation has stood in for due process, and criminal offenses like rape (Cosby and Weinstein) and unwelcome advances (Keillor) have been thrown indiscriminately into the same basket.”

Actors are deleted from movies and replaced by others, if they weren’t the main characters. (If they were the main characters, the film is doomed). In animation movies, their voices are replaced with others’ voices. How excessive is this reaction? For contrast, just see how outrageous this sounds:
“If you’re convicted of breaking and entering, the judge won’t send bailiffs around to tear down the tree house you built for your daughter and to pour bleach on your homemade pie.”
It reminds me of how communist countries erased all photos and achievements of traitors.

But it isn’t as if any crime triggers this excessive backlash:
“Only a restricted range of misbehaviors qualifies one for being disappeared: any perceived intolerance of minorities, and any delinquency to do with sex. Other misdeeds are less likely to be career ending: fraud, tax evasion, or drug possession, say.”

And there’s no end in sight to this madness, says Shriver:
“Herd behavior is by nature mindless. Parties to modern excommunication never seem to make considered decisions on the merits for themselves and in consideration of the depth of the relationship, but race blindly to join the stampede.”
Even though:
“The party that really pays for the new puritanism: the arts consumer.”

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