CLOSE-UPS AND LONG SHOTS

There's something I've learned in the past few weeks concerning TV news stories involving celebrities. Unless they've rescued children from a burning orphanage, it's never a good thing when you hear their job titles followed by their names.

"Producer Harvey Weinstein..."

"Actor Kevin Spacey..."

"Comedian Louis C.K. ..."

But wait, there's more! Some you might not have heard of! Director Brett Ratner, political pundit Mark Halperin, producer Andrew Kreisberg, NPR news chief Michael Oreskes... Heck, just read the New York Times list of celebrity sex criminals. And don't forget to refresh the page for the latest update!

What do these people have in common? A quick look at a few of them will give us some helpful clues. 

Well, they're certainly not what women would refer to as "dishy". Most of them sport facial hair in order to hide their saggy skin and double (or, in the case Weinstein, triple) chins. In fact, they, and most of the others on the Times list, look they didn't get laid in high school, and decided they were going to get rich and powerful one day in order to get back at women in the most heinous way possible.

Well, I never got laid in high school, and for good reason. Make that "reasons". And in the back of my mind, I wanted to become rich and powerful one day, too, so I could get laid -- but without the benefit of rape. (Louis C.K., apparently, got stuck in first gear.)

Who knows how many of these guys are professionally damaged. The evangelicals praying for Judge Roy Moore's senate victory have proven that pedophilia charges can only lead to comparisons to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph -- a trio of names I feel like yelling every time I read about this guy and his supporters. 

But outside of Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey is the most likely to spend his remaining days roaming the world, unemployed, looking for acceptance, or at least someone to sexually abuse. Perhaps if his victims were 14 year-old girls instead of 14 year-old boys, he could have a future in Alabama politics.

Spacey, too, is first on everyone's "most likely to blow his brains out" list, because pedophilia is way worse than Louis C.K. masturbating in front of unwilling women. Well, you can say they were willing -- none of them said no, but that was probably because they were so busy thinking What the fuck have I gotten myself into? that it was one of those classic deer-in-the-headlights moments. Or else they were thinking, What the hell, this might be my only chance to watch Louis C.K. jerk off -- I hope. A person could dine out on that story forever. 

I freely admit that I continued to be a Louis C.K. fan even after first hearing about his little hobby two or three years ago. However, you couldn't pay me to watch a Roman Polanski movie, because he drugged and raped a 13 year-old girl -- among others. If you can't see the difference between a jerk with psychological problems and a pedophile rapist (who now has at least five more accusers to his name), then you're a member of good standing in the Motion Picture Academy. 

And if you consider the previous statement a cop-out, then you should no longer enjoy movies made by Alfred Hitchcock (sexual harasser), Charlie Chaplin (pedophile), Groucho Marx (took showers with his daughter Miriam until she was 10 years old), Ronald Reagan (at least one rape to his name), or anything released by the major Hollywood studio heads from the '20s until the early '60s.

Hell, can you ever think of Topo Gigio the same way knowing that Ed Sullivan raped actress/comic Jane Kean in the 1940s? Just take a long, hard look at that frightening TV Guide cover photo and its headline -- What Makes Ed Sullivan Laugh? -- now that I've told you. 

Even Atlantic magazine has finally called out Bill Clinton for his litany of sex crimes, albeit a generation too late. If you've ever read the way Gloria Steinem defended Bubba in a way that would make a New York pretzel envious, you would have thought that all you needed to be was charming, powerful, and pro-choice to get a pass from Democrats, liberals and feminists back in the day. And you would be correct. Looks like Louis C.K. just isn't powerful enough now.

Now, can you guess what else all these fellows share? Oops, I just gave you a big hint!

What they have common are penii (the plural of penis). Yes, everyone on the ever-growing list of accused sex offenders -- which now includes George Tekai, Richard Dreyfuss, and Dustin Hoffman -- is of the male persuasion. Doesn't matter if they're straight, gay, or, in the case of Harvey Weinstein, porcine. I would guess that this is one time when women are glad to be excluded from yet another male-dominated area.

For some reason, I'm reminded of the wise observation -- from, appropriately, Charlie Chaplin -- "Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long shot." We appear to be moving toward a little more tragedy in the way we perceive societal norms. Excellent. Too much comedy can leave you choking. Just ask Harvey Weinstein's victims.

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