Celebrities and the Law

Decca wrote:Now I'm remembering the parts of the "Being Elmo" doc where he talked about how much it meant to him when he was mentored by older puppeteers as a teenager (and he was quite young when he started working) and how he tried to do the same thing now. And I thought how cool that was.

I know! Reading this today was just so depressing. :(

gannetguts wrote:There is not enough NOPE in the world.

If it ever came to a trial, you know how it would go:

PROSECUTION: Yip. Yip-yip-yip-yip. Yip.
DEFENSE: Nope. Nope-nope-nope-nope. Nope.

He was divorced at the end of the documentary, so I think at least there's no cheating involved. I remember watching the film and feeling that it wasn't all good with his family, but I thought it was that he was so successful and busy that he neglected his wife and daughter. I did not suspect anything like this. (The kid he mentored at the end was this adorable nerdy girl, so that makes me feel a little better.)

Watching Finding Elmo, I was shocked that he had been married and had a child with a woman. So it's not shocking to me that he had a relationship with a man. I am crazy shocked and hope the allegations of having sex/relationship/abused an underage kid are not true.

This one just made me sick. I can't even discuss it.

This is one of those times when I feel like, "Just lock all children in a pen and let them be cared for by robots and St. Bernards and Skinner boxes until they're 21, because clearly no human adults, anywhere, can be trusted."

Also, the more I think about it, the worse I feel for Sesame Street. This could do them serious, serious damage. How many kids has he interacted with over the years? PBS is already perpetually on the razor's edge as far as funding (as we saw this election season), and their kids' programming is their strongest point. Sesame Street was basically rebuilt around Elmo. They can have someone else do it, but he's been maybe the best-known puppeteer since the original Henson/Oz/Nelson/Spinney etc. days. Ugh ugh ugh. If I were them I would be FURIOUS with him. And, yes, I hope it turns out the underage thing is not true, but regardless, it's too close for comfort.

I agree that they're furious with him, and should be for a multitude of reasons including because adults shouldn't be messing with teenagers, for fuck's sake. That said, I wonder how many teenagers are around Sesame Street. From the posts here, I see some kind of teen puppeteer mentoring thing existed.

The man who accused Kevin Clash has recanted. Says a NYTimes reporter on Twitter.

The man who accused Kevin Clash (Elmo) of underage sexual conduct has RECANTED. His lawyer now says it was "adult consensual relationship."

You may now wipe the bad images from your head.

ETA: NYTimes blog

particle_person wrote:The man who accused Kevin Clash has recanted. Says a NYTimes reporter on Twitter.

The man who accused Kevin Clash (Elmo) of underage sexual conduct has RECANTED. His lawyer now says it was "adult consensual relationship."

You may now wipe the bad images from your head.

ETA: NYTimes blog

That's something, at least. Hopefully this will all blow over, and Clash will show better judgment in the future.

The damage is already done. He recounted but there will still be doubts.

And still the fact that he did sleep with an 18 year old is not exactly covering him with glory, to put it mildly. I don't think he should go to jail, or even lose his job necessarily. But I don't think he should be in any kind of mentoring role to teenagers.

If no crime was committed, I'm really glad. But I've lost respect for Clash either way, and it's depressing.

I find it hard not to sympathize with him. He got married, had a kid, got divorced. Did he know he was gay then? Even if he didn't actively try and suppress it at that point and just hadn't admitted it, that can't be healthy. And on top of that, once he was out of the marriage and could be honest about it, even then, he couldn't really be honest about it. Because of his job, if he'd just come out publicly, he would have been excoriated - maybe PBS and Sesame Workshop would have stood behind him, and maybe not. We still don't know that they're really behind him on this - they just haven't fired him yet. I would not be surprised if he "chooses" to retire soon. And I don't know that it would have been any different if he'd come out on his own rather than being outed this way because either way it's embroiling the Sesame Street brand in sexual controversy, and straight or gay, that's not something a pre-school oriented business wants around it at all.

I don't know the circumstances - claimed, recanted, or real - but if he didn't do anything illegal, I think that's good enough for me, because I can't imagine what it must be like to be so known for a "pure and innocent" image and yet be as human as the next guy.

I'll be honest--I don't have a problem with someone banging an 18 year old. 18 is an adult and if you can cast a ballot or join the military then who you choose to sleep with is no one's business. A 16 year old, problematic (as well as illegal but age of consent laws are worthy of discussion), but otherwise, Kevin Clash is single and should be allowed to date who he wants. It is unfortunate that his coming-out had to be under these circumstances and I hope that if the young man, and anyone "prompting" him, face repercussions if extortion were their motives.

The Elmo accuser recanted.

For me, it's more that Clash said that he waited until the boy was legally an adult before he began a sexual relationship with him. This suggests to me that he knew him as a teenager and was probably doing borderline, grey area things. And if he was waiting for the kid to turn 18, then that's a little icky, because he's waiting for a kid to turn 18.

There's also the thing of his profession. He works a job where he has a lot of exposure to children and where his actions are a reflection of him. I'm not saying he's a pervert or a molester or anything like that. Not even close. But given what his job is, he has to be above reproach. And I don't mean he can't be gay or bi or a transvestite or anything he wants, but there can't be any grey area things. And getting emotionally involved with an underage teenager is very much a grey area.

I think that's taking the worst possible hypothesis here. I prefer a more of an innocent until proven guilty point of view. I also don't see where Clash said anything about "waiting until the boy was legally an adult."

I'll be honest--I don't have a problem with someone banging an 18 year old. 18 is an adult and if you can cast a ballot or join the military then who you choose to sleep with is no one's business.

True enough, and I get what you're saying. I guess for me personally the age difference would create a power imbalance that would be pretty hard to overcome, and I'd side-eye a middle aged person who would pursue someone just out of their teens. But that's my preference. Thinking it over more, it is true: I don't know what their actual situation was, and romantic relationships are between individuals not whole identity groups. If everybody was consenting, then it isn't anyone else's business.

It makes me respect him less, can't lie. But I can't really condemn him forever on what little info there is.

And to be fair, in many states, there would be no legal issue even if the young man was 16 when a sexual relationship began. With regards to his exposure to children: kids know Elmo, they don't know Kevin Clash. He's not a teacher, a priest, or a coach, he's an entertainer who is never seen. Walt Disney was a racist anti-semite, and some of his views leaked into his films, but that doesn't mean his value to kid's entertainment is lessened. Kevin Clash is as deserving of a sex life--particularly if he came to terms with his sexuality later in life--as anyone else.

I just shudder because I can't stop hearing Elmo saying filthy things.

If hes over 18, then frankly while I might side eye its not really our business. We don't know their relationship. As far as we know it was consensual and I choose to give him the benefit of the doubt at this point. I would never date a person that much older then me, but its not me. I mean Calvin Klein is dating a 21 year old, and apparently so is Joe Simpson.

I also hope no one forced the accuser into the position of making this claim because thats just icky all around.

For the record, for me, it's not the 18-year-old thing, and it's certainly not the gay thing, it's the underage allegations. That's problematic for a children's television show, particularly one that relies on federal funding that's frequently the subject of touchy political debate. I'm glad it's been recanted, but the fact that it was made in the first place is still really unfortunate.

I'm not unsympathetic to him, and if he's just a guy having what he thought was a private relationship with another consenting adult, then he may very well be blameless in this. It sucks, regardless.

As for exposure to children, at the very least there are lots of kids on the show. Again, even if it turned out that he was sexually interested in a 16-year-old, that's a long way from being a child molester. But it does make things awkward for the show. Here's hoping it blows over quickly.

I was totally icked out by the allegations too but if hes recanted....like PBS doesn't seem the type to pay someone off. And they do seem the type to be SUPER vigilant about that kind of thing. Maybe I'm being too optimistic here, I don't know.

PBS no, but isn't the Children's Television Workshop worth like half a billion dollars or something? Sesame Street makes bank off merchandising and stuff. So I don't rule out a pay out.

I just hope for all parties sake that this is the real story.

I just hope for all parties sake that this is the real story.

I agree, and I'm just going to believe it as true because I want to, and unless we hear otherwise. I love Sesame Street and loved that Elmo documentary.

Innocent until proven guilty is usually how I operate, too, but when it comes to cases of sexual assault/rape/molestation/statutory rape, I'm almost always inclined to believe the accuser - because it's a crime that's SO hard to prove, and victims get SO much shit for coming forward, to the point where their behavior is scrutinized as much as (or even moreso) than the perpetrators'. I'm always suspicious even when the accuser recants because I have to wonder why - is it because the allegations are untrue, or because the victim isn't prepared to deal with the inevitable shitstorm that will happen because they came forward?

However, I cannot deal with Elmo or anyone involved in Sesame Street being a pedophile. Can NOT deal. So I'm going with "this is the real story" until it's proven otherwise.