When You've Lost Eugene Robinson: 'Hollywood's Shame'

The Polanski divide isn’t a left/right issue, it’s a culture issue, and while there are many good and moral people working in the entertainment industry, there’s also a dark underbelly of money, power, sex and fame among the most powerful. They’re terrified to judge Polanski because they don’t want to open that door. If “judgment” is allowed in the room, it could turn on them.

The worst sin imaginable among the Harvey Weinsteins who run this town and the Whoopi Goldbergs desperate to hold on to their celebrity, obviously isn’t the sodomizing a thirteen year-old child. The worst sin is making a moral judgment against another — unless that “other” is someone who makes them ashamed through the upholding of a personal moral standard, like a Christian.

But the whole thing is burning down around them and they don’t even see it. The world now senses something dark and ugly at work among those who control the world’s most powerful propaganda tool, and the last two decades of being written off as a bunch of fuzzy headed, out-of-touch liberals are about to be remembered as the good old days.

To any rational human human being, proudly rallying around the most heinous crime imaginable in front of all your customers is beyond counter-intuitive, it’s like McDonald’s embracing food poisoning. But they’re “all in,” and even the Eugene Robinsons of the world can’t believe their eyes:

Could it be that the conservative culture warriors who portray Hollywood as a cesspool of moral bankruptcy have been right all along? Not really. But in the case of Roman Polanski, the puritan scolds definitely have a point. …

More than 100 movie-business heavyweights — including directors Martin Scorsese, David Lynch, Mike Nichols and Pedro Almod?var — have signed a petition calling on Swiss authorities to set Polanski free. Piling chutzpah upon gall, Woody Allen is among the petitioners. You will recall that Allen shocked non-Hollywood sensibilities by acknowledging his romance with Soon-Yi Previn, the daughter of Allen’s longtime companion, Mia Farrow. At the time, Allen was 56 and Previn was 21.

Actress, comedian and “The View” co-host Whoopi Goldberg has come under well-justified fire for making a jaw-dropping statement about Polanski’s crime: “I know it wasn’t rape-rape. I think it was something else, but I don’t believe it was rape-rape.”

Really?

Read the full piece here.