Weinstein Verdict Reignites #MeToo
(Women inspired by the Chilean feminist group called Las Tesis hug after performing a protest song in front of the New York City criminal court during Harvey Weinstein's sex crimes trial on January 10, 2020 in New York City. Photo by Stephanie Keith/Getty Images.)
The former most powerful man in Hollywood was found guilty by a Manhattan court yesterday after a grueling jury deliberation that concerned many that he might escape a guilty verdict altogether. Harvey Weinstein, who has now been accused by nearly one hundred women of sexual assault was found guilty of third-degree rape of Jessica Mann, a former aspiring actress, and criminal sexual act in the first degree against Mimi Haley, a former "Project Runway" production assistant. Weinstein was married to Georgina Chapman, who appeared as a judge on the fashion competition show where Weinstein used to serve as an executive producer.
Despite his pathetic attempt to present himself to the jury as the victim by using a walker and having his attorneys make pleas to the court that involved his sudden declining physical state, the jury was ultimately able to come to a conclusion that will have the former mogul spending his twilight years behind bars. There was concern that the ploy to look feeble and helpless would be effective in persuading jurors to overlook the larger counts of predatory sexual assault against Annabella Sciorra and first-degree rape against Mann. But ultimately, Weinstein could face up to 25 years in prison for his first conviction alone and he will now stand trial in California where many more women will present evidence about what he did to them.
(Harvey Weinstein leaving court during the first week of his trial in New York City, via Getty Images.)
It might be easy to see this verdict as a compromise, or something less than the full conviction that survivors, particularly Annabella Sciorra deserved. But this is a moment to step back and take in the entire landscape of the last several years and what it means to be able to put a man this big and powerful rightfully behind bars where he belongs. There is a reason Harvey Weinstein got away with raping women for so many years — when you have that kind of money and his kind of power you can literally get away with anything. Sadly, Donald Trump wasn’t being hyperbolic when he declared he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it, he was being prophetic. Weinstein was no different in his level of insulation, an arrangement that he was careful to create with a team of high-paid lawyers and a black ops company to protect him at all costs.
Harvey Weinstein now represents both the past and future in a simultaneous moment of reckoning. The days of abusing women as an extension of your domination in a particular field are over and they are over for one major reason — we are all talking to each other now. The days of silencing your victim through shame and intimidation are over because after each landmark take-down, our collective grows stronger and even more determined to shield future generations of women (and men) from a similar fate. The Weinstein verdict didn’t resurrect something that had been dormant after the #MeToo movement started with such gusto and then seemingly became a little softer — it merely refueled a patient army, who is always lying in wait.
With all of the set-backs in cases that involve some elusive form of justice for yet another sexual assault — I’m looking at you Brock Turner — we don’t give up or feel defeated. We don’t soften to the notion that this is just the way things are and we have to accept it now — we harden our resolve to keep going with the belief that the next one will advance us all to a place where these kinds of set-backs happen less and less under the law.
Last week one of my favorite writers, E. Jean Carrol announced that she had been fired from her long-time job at Elle Magazine. Few are willing to declare the real reason for why this happened, including the very magazine who is supposed to represent the modern woman. No doubt Elle Magazine used the #MeToo headline when it served them to be trendy by fueling the popular women’s movement and help sell magazines. But, by canceling one of the foremost advice columnists for professional women at a time when she is in the biggest legal fight of her life against the President of the United States, another brand that we have all fed into and handed over our money to has let us down, again.
None of this should serve to discourage us though, and the Harvey Weinstein verdict is proof. The sad reality is that while the #MeToo movement seemed like an over-night explosion of change, the fundamental change, the kind with solid legal ramifications, takes time. It is a step-by step battle in which we all have to hold hands, support each other and slowly press forward through the mud and rain and everything else they throw at us.
Harvey Weinstein will likely die in prison. I don’t say this to evoke a sense of glee from his suffering, I say this to remind us all that he will no longer have access to any of our daughters. He was a man who controlled an industry some think is more powerful than the federal government. But enough women spoke out and enough people listened and a few brilliant writers told their stories and here we are. I will also throw out another idea that might seem controversial: in the struggle to get what we are due, there is healing. I feel stronger every time I support another woman, friend, ally. Most of these battles are just beginning and this army is not going anywhere. One down, many, many more to go.
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Amee Vanderpool writes the “Shero” Newsletter and is an attorney, contributor to Playboy Magazine and analyst for BBC radio. She can be reached at avanderpool@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @girlsreallyrule.
Now let’s see what his sentence is.
Hopefully, the Weinstein verdict is but the first step towards making work places (and life in general) free of this type of despicable, criminal behaviour.