Harvey Weinstein Says #MeToo Was Greedy Women Chasing Payouts: ‘March to the Money Pile’. By Maer Roshan at The Hollywood Reporter.
From an interview with Harvey Weinstein in jail at Rikers.
At the apex of his career, Harvey mostly got a pass for appalling behavior. He was an A-list Hollywood producer with his mitts on magazines, theater, publishing and politics. He palled around with prime ministers and presidents. Then, in 2017, a set of blockbuster stories — in The New York Times and The New Yorker — revealed his history of sexual harassment and abuse, precipitating his dizzying fall from grace. …
His six years of incarceration had failed to inspire any genuine contrition. The world may have branded him a monster, but Harvey still considers himself a victim — crucified for a bygone era of Hollywood sins. When pressed, he concedes that his behavior may have been loutish, pathetic and even abusive. But he insists he’s no rapist — just an oversexed schmuck who made some stupid moves and accidentally launched a global social movement.
Unfortunately for him, three successive juries have disagreed. Since the first news stories appeared, close to 100 women have come forward to publicly accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct …
Q: There are dozens and dozens of women who tell a variation of the same basic story. You followed them to their hotel rooms or trapped them in yours. You forced them to have sex with you. You got furious or retaliated when they turned you down. You claim that none of this is true. But what accounts for the uniformity of all these reports? Why do you think all these people are so willing to lie about you?
Weinstein: For a lot of reasons. But mainly because there’s money involved. You know, one woman got half a million dollars. Another got paid $500,000. A third got $3 million. All anyone had to do to walk off with a check was fill out a form that said I sexually assaulted them. So they filled it out, and the insurance company eventually paid out tens of millions of dollars. And Disney, too — Disney didn’t want a public fight, so they just paid people to go away. It becomes a bandwagon effect. People can say anything they want about me, and it’s in the public record. But very few of these stories have been litigated in court. …
Did I make a pass at some of these women unsuccessfully? Did I overplay my hand? Yes. Was I pushy or overly seductive? Yes to all of that. Look, I should never have gone out with the people I went out with. I was married to a fantastic woman who had no idea what I was doing. I lied all the time. I improperly used my staff to hide these things. But did I ever sexually assault a woman? No. I never did that. …
The thing I was doing wrong was not sexual assault. It was cheating on my wife. I was desperate to keep that secret from her. I did not want Disney to find out. I did everything to protect myself from that kind of scandal. …
I didn’t push anybody. I didn’t physically move anybody. …
I’m just going to say Rosanna Arquette, Gwyneth Paltrow, Angelina Jolie — they just exaggerated. They wanted to be part of the club. And they destroyed me. …
When Alyssa Milano said “Me too,” she didn’t mean #MeToo about Harvey. She said “Me too,” and then everybody said #MeToo about me. Every woman I was with, every friend that I had. It was a march to the money pile.
So twentieth century. Now that society is largely feminized, looking funny at a woman can be a crime if she doesn’t like it, and regret rape is rape. Objectivity and proof? No, so last century.
Imagine the same me-too standard was applied to certain immigrants, in say Rotherham. But no, those women don’t get that level of protection.