Aziz and Louis
Though there are certainly more pressing and topical topics to talk about, in the spirit of recreational speculation, I want to talk about the intertwined tales of Louis CK and Aziz Ansari. Two high profile personalities that got #metoo-ed. I feel it worthy of talking about, because in my experience I'm surprised to find how few people are sympathetic to my take on both cases.
So as to not rehash the cases, I'll just link to Aziz' and Louis' if you need to familiarize yourself. In short my position is: Too harsh on Louis, too soft on Aziz. Speaking of course about the court that has had the highest jurisdiction throughout the #metoo era, which I tentatively assume has run its course, adaptations have been made and society returns to a status quo.
What prompts me to revisit this so 2017 of subjects was quite an incidental prompt. I guess during my local lock down I had binge-watched the US adaptation of the Office, and then followed the showrunner's into their next production 'Parks and Recreation' which stars Aziz Ansari who gets second billing after Amy Poehler. Louis CK guest stars in a recurring role in that series as a police officer and love interest to Amy's character, having some scenes with Aziz Ansari. All serving to remind me of the parallels and contrasts of the two men's cases. (perhaps more consequentially, that Amy, Aziz and Louis have their agent, Dave Becky in common).
The second coincidental prompt was receiving an unexpected message from a friend, informing me that they had had to block a mutual friend of ours, and was letting me know on the off chance they attempted to reach them via me. I actually don't know the details or background or context there, I know almost nothing at all, beyond what was asked of me which I shall respect, and wasn't asked of me which I also respect. For example, it left me in a position where while I find the scenario in the abstract quite plausible I have to extend a presumption of innocence. This was somebody communicating to me their personal boundaries, not calling for me to doff my shining armor and ride out on a crusade with them.
But for me, left with the context I have, it functioned as somewhat of a vindication of a social phenomena I observe, but don't see commented on that much: In brief, hypocrisy. With a little more detail, people who say all the right things in public, but who's private conduct contradicts their professed values. It's wide spread, and well established, for what to my nearest guess has been at least a century, been referred to as 'lip service' and the behavior I'm confident is documented in texts at least as old as Machiavelli's 'The Prince' probably the writings of earlier Romans and Greeks, and I would not be surprised if it gets addressed in old testament scriptures and the earlier Hindu texts, Hammurabi's code, and there's some Sumerian cuneiform tablet somewhere in a museum or yet to be excavated from Iraq bitching about sycophants, though I personally am not going to bother to check.
Contemporary to when I'm writing this behavior is referred to as 'virtue signalling' and the linked article does I feel justice to the merits and pitfalls of its use, I tend to think of virtue signalling as analogous to mansplaining - both are definitely a thing, but owing to a general incompetence at diagnosing the phenomena as and when they occur, it is more often used as an Ad Hominem to shut down a speaker, virtue signalling from the right/mansplaining from the left.
While not innocent of virtue signalling, Louis is more often guilty of 'vice signalling' and there is a particularly well argued podcast (actually as this podcast is published in 2019, David McRaney may have removed Louis CK as an example) that makes the case his career is based on exploiting the psychological phenomena of pluralistic ignorance.
Here is an excerpt from podcaster David McRaney's book: 'You Can Beat Your Brain' which may be an alternate title from where I most likely heard it in his book 'You Are Now Less Dumb':
When the comedian Louis CK reveals to his audience that he sometimes thinks his children are assholes, that they are not exempt from the normal frustrations he feels towards adults, he mass-produces an epiphanous sigh night after night. His audiences suffering from pluralistic ignorance, realize in later conversation that their private thoughts about their own children are in fact the majority opinion. It is simply taboo to say it out loud.
That's pluralistic ignorance and how you can make a comedy career out of vice-signalling. So for every time Louis portrayed himself as particularly wise and a particularly excellent parent in his show 'Louis' there are 15 examples of him conveying himself as variously a creep, a pervert, superficial, with sexual hang-ups, stupid, irresponsible and a fuck-up. Louis was famous for talking publicly about his personal practices of masturbation. Less so, but it's there, for actively engaging in lies and deception etc.
Now by comparison, what, if anything has Aziz Ansari built his career out of? That's where I was finding it interesting to consider how intertwined the two men's careers ended up being. Prior to watching Park's and Recreation in full, I had kind of noticed that Aziz' show 'Master of None' was heavily inspired by, if not a rip-off of Louis' show Louis. (Again given Dave Becky is both men's agents and gets producer credits on both shows this is hardly surprising)
Setting that aside for a moment, the characters Aziz Ansari plays are in essence, just caricatures of himself in most cases - Tommy Haverford, the superficial government employee preoccupied with what other people think of him, swag, social media, being baller, clubs, ebonics... basically trying to be relevant and with it, while also feeling entitled and possessive of beautiful women. A character who is bad at stuff, but after shit goes wrong will turn up and say the right things.
Or Randy Springs in the movie 'Funny People' the hack comedian that is clueless about women, misogynistic to boot. Now while this role probably made no impression on nobody as near-nobody saw the film, I single it out because in one of Aziz Ansari's taped comedy specials, his whole final act is 'what would a special look like if I actually was Randy Springs?' and he does like 20~30 minutes in character as Randy. When not in character as Randy, Aziz Ansari's material is generally commentary on: R. Kelly, Kanye West, Social Media, Food trends and Pornography. Personally where Aziz shines the most is actually drawing on material from his chubby cousin - roughly analogous to the Ricky Gervais Show's podcast drawing most of its material and legs from Karl Pilkington.
Much as I might resist it, it is rare for me to write a blog post and not think of Nassim Nicholas Taleb in some way, on this occasion it's his aphorism 'The opposite of success isn't failure, it's name dropping.' and it's amazing how much and nearly how uniquely Aziz drops the names of his celebrity friends into his shows - or maybe it's just Kanye West... the only comparison I can think of is Eddie Murphy in his special Raw dropping the name of Bill Cosby who called him up to tell him what comedy was all about, and then dropping the name of Richard Pryor whom he called after getting off the phone with Cosby to tell him Cosby had told him what comedy was all about.
Then there's 'Master of None', where Aziz plays what... a fictitious version of himself 'Dev Shah, a 30-year-old actor, mostly following his romantic, professional, and personal experiences.' who is obsessed with food and food trends (In one scene he meticulously researches where the best taco truck is) struggles with race and racism (He and fellow ethnic-Indian comedian both read for a sitcom and ask the question why they can't have two Indian cast members in a sitcom) who is somewhat emotionally immature (leading to jealousy and a breakup that catalyzes the second season's opening in Italy) but constantly virtue signals, particularly about how millenials need to appreciate their elders, like the episode that shows the backstories of his father and his friend's father respectively, or the episode in which he helps his girlfriends Grandma bust out of her nursing home and go to a red-sauce Italian restaurant where Aziz again learns to appreciate his elders and a revivalist food trend.
The only vice signalling Aziz does in his career is act like a petulant child when he doesn't get his way. The rest is all about him realizing how hard it is for POCs, how hard it is for women, how we take the elderly for granted, name dropping and how all over the social media game he is.
Louis CK by contrast generally plays a guy who is awkward with, and lacks confidence around women, often crossing definitive lines like locking up his romantic rival in Parks & Recreation in order to try and win back his ex Leslie Knope. Having an extramarital affair in Blue Jasmine without letting his mistress know she is a mistress. Even when playing himself in Louis, it's mostly him fucking things up, being unpopular, alienating himself... and there's a scene where he is depicted as having a habit of asking out all the attractive young wait staff at the comedy club on dates until he is told to stop. Then he reluctantly goes on a date with a fat waitress who gives him a serve about why he won't date her just because she's overweight.
Louis tends to depict himself in unflattering ways, or having things explained to him by characters wiser than himself, where Aziz falls back constantly on 'you know I've learned something today...'
So if you haven't guessed, prior to the respective #metoo incidents going down, I held Louis and Aziz in very different esteem. With Louis being a very honest creep, world-class possibly generation defining comic, a talented director and editor, an innovator, writer and actor of some promise. By contrast my views of Aziz Ansari haven't changed much, Aziz feels like somebody I've known since adolescence, in my high-school I would have disparaged him as a 'try-hard' someone desperate for relevance, consumed with what the right shoes are, what hair cut is in, what bands to be listening to, what parties are going on and what drugs the other kids are taking.
I regard him as a competent hack, easily caricatured into a Kenny Bania archetype, his success is undeniable but he's tapping into a market I don't personally identify with and speaking to a life experience I don't share... you know one that gives a shit what Kanye and the Kardashians are doing, and consults Yelp reviews to decide where to eat.
Probably in my opinion, Aziz' best work would be his book 'Modern Love' which I actually thoroughly enjoyed, and kudos to him for stumbling across something in the zeitgeist worth addressing. However, even there, like my friend said of Bradd Pitt in any role, it's actually easy to imagine numerous candidates that would have been better handling the subject - Alain De Botton, Helen Fisher, Esther Perel, Brene Brown, Malcolm Gladwell, Michael Lewis... they didn't, he did, so kudos to capitalism. Aziz' personal interests still detracted from the book, like discussing his need to sample Ramen places when he visited Japan to research his book, he can't seem to resist reminding me constantly how cloyingly desperate he is to be accepted, to be esteemed by youth culture.
Aziz and I probably only have an inborn suspicion of guys who wear fedoras in common. A trend that has probably passed us by now, as fedora fans became self-aware of the fedora meme and have now abandoned this reliable warning sign to not get entangled with them.
But then there's the similarities between Louis and Aziz - they both tend to play caricatures of themselves, Louis overlooks the questionable conduct of Woody Allen and pays homage to him in his work/arguably flagrantly ripping him off, Aziz overlooks the questionable conduct of Louis CK and pays homage to him in his work/arguably flagrantly ripping him off. Both men you can dredge up clips of them making articulate arguments in support of feminist positions, Louis is far more candid about his hypocrisy generally, owning it, and then both men manifest to varying degrees conduct amounting to prioritizing their personal gratification over the comfort of women and objectifying women.
The similarities though diminish once you look at the respective behaviors from professional and legal frameworks, in which context Louis' conduct is objectively worse. Aziz' conduct is in the context of a date between consenting adults and he pleaded quite plausibly, incompetence. It was a date where he was horny, and assertive to the point of being pushy and dismissive of the wishes of his sexual partner. Louis asked female colleagues, including subordinates to watch him masturbate, and called them while masturbating. It's been a while since I reviewed what is established fact and what is alleged, but he also in conjunction with his manager appears to have tried to cover up his misconduct or particularly apply pressure to Tig Notaro to drop the subject... Louis also relatively quickly offered a mea culpa, utilizing his intelligence to apologize competently, it is also alleged that he sought out a number of his victims years earlier than the 2017 expose piece in the New York Times and apologized to them for his conduct.
So generally what I come across in the commentary on these two cases is that most commentators state unequivocally that what Louis did, in terms of his sexual misconduct is wrong. And the consensus around Aziz was that what he did, amounts to a bad date.
I would extend a benefit of the doubt to both men, since it can't really be proven that they genuinely failed to consider or were oblivious to their ability to apply pressure/stress to the women in order to obtain their consent. Which is to say, incompetence not malice.
It is harder to extend this charity to Louis, because it is hard to imagine the community context in which an individual would think 'here's what is a nice gesture, ask women to watch or listen to or otherwise witness you masturbate.' it doesn't convene with any of my experiences of being a heterosexual man. This isn't a fantasy expressed and validated in locker rooms or boys dorms on school camps. It stretches credulity that someone would assume that conduct is okay, or within normality. But then again, the internet is a large place with many forums available.
Here though, I want to detwine the two individuals and essentially get Louis out of the way.
Louis' Case
I feel my main point of contention with my perception of how most people view Louis CK is the para-legality of it. I don't have any answers, I suspect there aren't any answers. I'm aware we cannot even say that the legal system in any jurisdiction I'm aware of, is consistent.
What often gets lost with Louis CK I suspect, is the timeline, or a clear understanding of his timeline. The most recent cited allegation in the article that had effectively earned Louis' conviction in the court of public opinion prior to it being published in 2017 was from 2005. His 5 accusers all testified to sexual misconduct occuring between 2002-05. Louis gets divorced in 2008, he is a guest star on Parks and Rec. in 2009, and has his breakout comedy special that year. He first came to my attention with a 'who the fuck is that guy' in 2011-12 when I saw him appear alongside Chris Rock, Jerry Seinfeld and Ricky Gervais in 'Talking Funny' on HBO.
The article detailing the allegations against him cites that he actually privately contacted two of his victims some years later and expressed his remorse and apologies. Keeping in mind, there's no disparity here between public offense/private apology, it was private-private.
Now all of this could be revised through further allegations indicating Louis' misconduct was ongoing right up until or beyond the article's publication in 2017. But there's as of writing no evidence this was the case.
What I suspect is at play in Louis CK's case is an offense against the 'Just-World Hypothesis' the intuition that bad things happen to bad people and good people are rewarded. That in a situation where there is a largely unknown male comedian and an unknown female comedian, and locks the door takes off his clothes and masturbates in front of the female, it is not supposed to be the male comedian that goes onto to have the breakout career and the female to remain in obscurity. The fairy tale goes that the innocent victim rallys through adversity and becomes the funniest comic in the world and the male perpetrator winds up selling fruit barefoot on the side of a road.
It may also insult the common intuition of the halo-effect. Most commonly expressed as our inability to see beautiful people as stupid, in Louis case, revelations about his sexual misconduct stress our ability to understand how it could be completely independent of his artistic abilities. It at the very least appears to certainly be the case that many people can't find a bit about air-plane travel funny anymore because Louis likes to take all his clothes off and masturbate to completion in front of women. I've also heard reports of people unable to enjoy Billy-Jean when it comes on the radio anymore because Michael likes to lick the butt holes of young boys while their parents sleep down the hall. I've experienced this conflation somewhat myself, I used to love Pate as a kid, until I found out Pate is goose liver paste, these days though, I mostly don't eat it because it went out of fashion, it's never put out at parties. I suspect, that I no longer care and if someone served me Pate, which increasingly, is likely to be home made, I would eat it.
In short, people like Tig Notaro, learned something distasteful about Louis CK that changed their opinion of him. Then everyone reacted.
I do believe there is a 'there' there. There is something like Louis stole his career by obfuscating facts about himself that may have changed things. I don't know what you do about that though.
Consider, as a hypothetical, that you are CEO of a company, and one day your HR manager approaches you and informs you that your 54 year old CFO Cheryl apparently used to steal cars for joyrides as a teenager, even crashing one into a pole. She never got busted though, and doesn't have a criminal record. Do you summon her to your office and revoke her access to the office parking, for concern for the other employees cars?
I feel probably not, unless there's some compelling reason to believe Cheryl still steals cars and goes on joyrides, and I'm not sure there's a compelling reason to believe Louis CK would resume asking women if he can jack off in front of them 12 years after the last time he is known to have done so. There are reasonable grounds to suspect he wont, like the lack of any recent victims willing to join the 5 named in the article, the fact that he got divorced, and that as his misconduct disappears his career takes off, indicating that he may have gotten his life and mental health somewhat together.
There's also an absence of professional assessment, even professional speculation as to what could have been going on with Louis and others who exhibit this kind of behavior. Is it about domination or humiliation? Is it a rationalization of avoiding an extra-marital affair through some self perceived loop-hole?
Most critically, is society in any further danger? The implicit answer has to be no. Because unlike Bill Cosby, Harvey Weinstein and Ron Jeremy no criminal charges were brought against Louis CK.
Bringing us to the problem of the barbarity of going paralegal - they misconduct appears to have stopped over a decade ago, so how does Louis demonstrate he has learned it is wrong, if he learned it was wrong and stopped way before the public found out? He offered an apology and took a big and immediate hit, but he wasn't handed a sentence, or parole period. A bunch of people basically disassociated themselves from him.
I don't know what the basis is for the concept of a 'statute of limitations' probably simply to make the legal system feasible, more practical than ethical, but I'd argue that one potential basis for a statute of limitations would be the pointlesslessness of incarcerating or otherwise impeding someone for behavior or conduct they have already demonstrably ceased. This argument may be captured in the 'Litigation of a long-dormant claim may result in more cruelty than justice.'
All that really was outstanding at the time of the article's publication, was that Louis CK did not disclose his misconduct himself. He didn't speak to them when Roseanne Barr raised them in the public domain, he didn't speak to them when Tig Notaro found out and took issue with him.
I would fault him for this, and I would fault him for the sexual misconduct, but to find out ten years+ after the misconduct has ceased, I'm not sure what to do. The obvious thing seems to be to pay damages to the victims, which can be worked out privately. The injustice of that is that for a woman who is sexually assaulted by her shift manager at Burger King, her assailant can't pay them between $200k~3 million like Louis CK can. But that's the risk Louis took in a situation entirely of his own making, women don't get to choose their offenders.
In terms of addressing systemic sexism, misogeny and sexual misconduct including men's violence against women, that won't be resolved through the public shaming and black-listing of individuals like Louis, but the people that employ him like FX (Disney) and his agent Dave Becky etc. Tig acquits herself well in that regard because as soon as she heard she sought clarification in order to immediately dissociate herself, whereas throughout the #metoo wave and through the Brian Epstein saga, my impression overwhelmingly was that most entities only dissociate when public opinion renders the association untenable commercially.
What I find cruel, is that Louis basically can't undo what he did. At the time that his conduct became general knowledge, I'm not sure what he could do apart from pay some damages with interest, I perhaps unfairly adopt the perspective of a sentencing Judge, that just doesn't see the point of sending this person to Jail as they appear to already be rehabilitated and that materially the incidental fact that they went on to exponentially increase their net worth, again assuming private settlements are to be made was unwittingly in part working for them.
Tig's concerns appear to be that she was used in a kind of 'feminist washing' pr campaign by Louis CK. I can understand the concern, it's even plausible, I just suspect it isn't provable and particularly when you consider it in conjunction with the evidence that Louis CK promoted other comic talents he liked through his vehicles like Todd Barry who gets featured in segments of 'Louis'. It is plausible that Louis, a decade on from when whatever motivated him to jerk off while women watched, was just a fan of Tig's work and wanted her to succeed. At this stage it's probably safe to say, that Tig successfully avoided being used in the way she feared Louis intended.
Then there's comedians like Hannah Gadsby, that appear to represent the camp that never is the appropriate time for Louis to start working again and he should basically be banned for life. There's probably some harsh conservative deterrent argument to be made, but I personally cannot by into the theory, nor the epistemic constructivism to get behind it. I suspect that like is observed in the parts of the world where thieves get their hands cut off, that thieves keep cropping up, and in the states where murderers and mentally handicapped people get executed that people keep killing and the day after Louis CK's 'I love you daddy' film got its distribution cancelled and Louis' voice over work got recast that Steve still thought it was a good idea to follow Jenny into the supply room and block her exit while he jacked off.
It's possible that Louis' actions cost the world another Hannah Gadsby, Michelle Wolf, Nicki Glaser, Mindy Kaling, Tina Fey, Sarah Silverman, Roseann Barr, Tig Notaro, Ali Wong etc. but it would still overwhelmingly be indirect. As in, it would be a hard burden of proof to reach that Louis' conduct was motivated by seeing his victims as competition and choosing to destroy them psychologically in order to eradicate the competition. It appears far more simple to interpret that Louis was motivated by egocentric sexual and personal hang-ups, and viewed his victims as objects not as competition.
Attention is ultimately scarce, in that way Louis' capacity to continue to perform draws on a limited resource. But there's no real substitutes in comedy. Dennis Leary is no real substitute of Bill Hicks, Joe Rogan is not a substitute for Bill Burr, Sandi Toksvig is not a substitute for Stephen Fry, Hannah Gadsby is not a substitute for Louis CK and in every case vice versa. I can understand theatres not wanting to book Louis CK, or streaming platforms not wanting to carry his content, but these are all individual choices, that people can be free to disagree with.
I recognize that under certain ideologies, the idea that Louis CK could 'come back' and even out earn Hannah Gadsby in a year or two could pose an existential threat. It's even likely that Hannah Gadsby will never earn in her lifetime as much money as Louis CK lost.
That zero-redemption policy leaves us in a place however where neurotic guys who struggle with their own sexuality are expected to do their best to cease to exist, they can't rehabilitate and they shouldn't be allowed to perform in their competency what society most values about them.
I guess what I'd be saying, is that I completely understand an individual like Hannah Gadsby arriving at the conclusion that art cannot be separated from artist and that she never wants to see Louis CK perform again, but she nor any interest group should be deciding that for anyone else.
It's taken legal systems a long time to learn to be humane and civilized, and it's only just getting there like now, as in now, now, some parts of the world have cracked the case and have more humane justice systems that also coincidentally produce better results. I personally do not need my pound of flesh to gratify my blood lust, or personal indignation.
I actually suspect, that I don't need the legal system of my country to intervene on my behalf to prevent me from having people that offend me, drawn and quartered in the public square. I get why we moved beyond that, but I am often left with the impression that most of my neighbors do need that intervention, they aren't sure why we can't just burn witches at the stake if a child dreamed they were copulating with Satan.
Bringing us back to...
Aziz' case
Everything with Aziz is in the context of:
"In 2014 he self-identified as a feminist, saying his girlfriend has helped influence him. Ansari also incorporated an episode about feminism titled "Ladies and Gentlemen" in Master of None. In an interview in 2015, he spoke about the episode's meaningfulness to him saying "I thought it was interesting that this is happening, yet so many people are unaware of it. And the problem is people aren't talking about it. What I've learned, as a guy, is to just ask women questions and listen to what they have to say. Go to your group of female friends and ask them about times they've experienced sexism at their job, and you'll get blown away by the things they tell you." (from his Wikipedia page, link inserted by me to synopsis/review of the episode)
You can read/revisit the Babe.net article if you feel a need to.
And then Aziz addresses it in his 2019 comedy special, which I have not watched owing to lack of interest, but the pull quote is from Aziz' wikipedia page:
"If this made not just me but other people be more thoughtful, then that's a good thing, and that's how I feel about it."
And much like Louis, this would probably benefit greatly from a clear timeline, which would go something like 2014 > self-identifies as a feminist, 2015 > releases book 'Modern Romance' featuring chapter on Buenos Aires, Argentina and the impacts of Machismo culture, among other in depth exploration of sexual politics, 2016 > Wins some Emmys for Master of None season 1, 2017 > releases Master of None season 2, goes on bad date. 2018 > Wins Golden Globe award for Master of none, girl from date tells story of date to Babe.net.
So Aziz' conduct occurs after his successful career, at the arguable height of his celebrity power (he could still become a Republican POTUS) having presented not just an onscreen persona in Dev, but his personal public persona. Keep in mind how upset people seem to be over Ellen Degeneres not living up to her 'be kind' public persona.
It's the sacking of Troy, and Louis CK is Achilles, or Hector, whatever side you want to identify with. I don't care, the point is Louis is going out day after day and being all like 'Imma gonna kill you! You are my enemy' except in this case it was 'I'm a nuerotic guy with low self esteem and sexual kinks and I talk a lot about masturbating and my obsession with young attractive women and how they are physically repulsed by me!' and then Louis gets outed in the media, Achilles kills Hector (or Paris kills Achilles) and a large community reacts with 'we assumed you were joking this whole time.'
Whereas Aziz Ansari is more like 'Hey Trojans, I'm a horse yeah, bring me inside your city gates it will please your gods.' which is to say, Aziz Ansari identified as a feminist, incorporated it into his creative output and interprets a request to slow down as moving to the couch and pointing at his crotch to request a blowjob. The recount of the date and Aziz' conduct might be inaccurate, it's not like there were no mitigating factors like the conduct of his date doing a lot to imply consent or at least mislead as to her willingness to participate in the sexual activity.
Just to my knowledge, Aziz has never given an alternative account (he may in the 2019 special I have not watched) particularly anything to the effect of 'I didn't say that thing about a glass of wine moving us to the second date' or 'I never said anything like "seems like you don't hate me"'
Even if his date feels validated after discussing it with numerous friends that his conduct constituted sexual assault, that doesn't mean her feeling is in anyway validated by law nor would meet the burden of proof to make a case.
The thing that bothers me about the Aziz Ansari case is in direct comparison to the fallout for Louis CK. I admittedly haven't dug into the media monitoring data, it probably remains true that Aziz' profile has never been as large as Louis CK (in line with their respective earning power) and that does 99% of the explaining why Louis recieves so much more criticism and resistance to resuming working than Aziz does. The other mitigating factor is that I assume, people feel visceral implicit differences between somebody using their power as a celebrity to pressure someone into being penetrated in the context of a consensual date, and somebody using the power of seniority or their role to pressure someone into consenting to watch them masturbate in the context of a workplace.
Analogous to the outrage felt over a women being murdered by a man who is a stranger, versus being murdered by her husband. Even if people never intelligibly articulate it, the respective public reactions imply that nested in the collective unconscious is an idea that either a) the offense is diminished by her choice of spouse or b) women remain the property of their husband or father or both.
I do not identify as a feminist, for reasons that I have explained many times but is highlighted by the case of Aziz Ansari - because it costs men nothing to be feminists. The one and only criteria for a man to be a feminist as near as I have been able to determine, is for men to say they are.
Where Aziz gets off lightly, is in not-being expelled from feminism having demonstrated a comprehensive cynicism. Unlike the criminal charge, I feel that case is incredibly easy to make.
The timing of Louis' comeback should essentially be left to Louis and whatever audience remains him, and dissenting opinions being free to dissent should not attempt to encroach or de-platform Louis. Aziz on the other hand, his comeback should be essentially contingent on creating a new non-hypocritical persona. That his experience may have prompted to think that maybe the scope of feminism reaches into how he conducts himself on a first date suggests that maybe feminism's membership threshold is too low.
One thing I take away from the whole Trump, Bryan Kavanaugh and the Christian single-issue voters is an impression of the Christian conservative voter base. The fact that they don't care about the conduct of these men, just that they are on team Pro-Life diminishes Christianity to mere tribalism, in-group loyalty. The tolerance of these men's conduct invalidates their belief system as a moral authority.
Aziz poses the same threat to feminism as a whole. How feminists react to Aziz' cynacism and hypocrisy says things to me about the movement in general. And yes, there's no amazon queen to make decrees of feminism, but there are informal consensus and champions that get more oxygen than others. It makes feminism look like 'We hate Louis because he won't grovel, he won't kowtow and pay lip-service, we are okay with Aziz because he pays lip-service.'
It moves from a movement I might actually identify with of 'we object to the treatment of women, we are equal in dignity and this conduct falls below our dignity as living feeling beings' to one I have no sympathy with of 'all we care about is solidarity, you're with us or against us, get the fuck out of the way of my will to power! Nietzsche ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuulllllllllles!'
I suspect, owing to phenomena like preference falsification, the market will fall inline with my expectations - Louis will get richer, Aziz' earning power will never recover.
I reserve the right to change my mind, once I have good reason to on both men. Further allegations, criminal charges etc. that substantiate that Louis has not in fact changed at all and has even become worse would be sufficient to change my mind. As would any evidence that Aziz Ansari can be taken at his word, or has learned or changed in some way. In Aziz case however, the great struggle is given the level of his hypocrasy, I'm not sure what would actually constitute that evidence, nor what a realistic time-frame is.
If Aziz was truly influenced by Louis CK, I guess something compelling would be if Aziz adopted a persona more in line with Louis' one of vice-signalling, similar to Kevin Hart, of basically presenting himself as 'yeah I'm a guy who's really insecure and would say anything, anything to get laid.' That may just cut it.
So as to not rehash the cases, I'll just link to Aziz' and Louis' if you need to familiarize yourself. In short my position is: Too harsh on Louis, too soft on Aziz. Speaking of course about the court that has had the highest jurisdiction throughout the #metoo era, which I tentatively assume has run its course, adaptations have been made and society returns to a status quo.
What prompts me to revisit this so 2017 of subjects was quite an incidental prompt. I guess during my local lock down I had binge-watched the US adaptation of the Office, and then followed the showrunner's into their next production 'Parks and Recreation' which stars Aziz Ansari who gets second billing after Amy Poehler. Louis CK guest stars in a recurring role in that series as a police officer and love interest to Amy's character, having some scenes with Aziz Ansari. All serving to remind me of the parallels and contrasts of the two men's cases. (perhaps more consequentially, that Amy, Aziz and Louis have their agent, Dave Becky in common).
The second coincidental prompt was receiving an unexpected message from a friend, informing me that they had had to block a mutual friend of ours, and was letting me know on the off chance they attempted to reach them via me. I actually don't know the details or background or context there, I know almost nothing at all, beyond what was asked of me which I shall respect, and wasn't asked of me which I also respect. For example, it left me in a position where while I find the scenario in the abstract quite plausible I have to extend a presumption of innocence. This was somebody communicating to me their personal boundaries, not calling for me to doff my shining armor and ride out on a crusade with them.
But for me, left with the context I have, it functioned as somewhat of a vindication of a social phenomena I observe, but don't see commented on that much: In brief, hypocrisy. With a little more detail, people who say all the right things in public, but who's private conduct contradicts their professed values. It's wide spread, and well established, for what to my nearest guess has been at least a century, been referred to as 'lip service' and the behavior I'm confident is documented in texts at least as old as Machiavelli's 'The Prince' probably the writings of earlier Romans and Greeks, and I would not be surprised if it gets addressed in old testament scriptures and the earlier Hindu texts, Hammurabi's code, and there's some Sumerian cuneiform tablet somewhere in a museum or yet to be excavated from Iraq bitching about sycophants, though I personally am not going to bother to check.
Contemporary to when I'm writing this behavior is referred to as 'virtue signalling' and the linked article does I feel justice to the merits and pitfalls of its use, I tend to think of virtue signalling as analogous to mansplaining - both are definitely a thing, but owing to a general incompetence at diagnosing the phenomena as and when they occur, it is more often used as an Ad Hominem to shut down a speaker, virtue signalling from the right/mansplaining from the left.
While not innocent of virtue signalling, Louis is more often guilty of 'vice signalling' and there is a particularly well argued podcast (actually as this podcast is published in 2019, David McRaney may have removed Louis CK as an example) that makes the case his career is based on exploiting the psychological phenomena of pluralistic ignorance.
Here is an excerpt from podcaster David McRaney's book: 'You Can Beat Your Brain' which may be an alternate title from where I most likely heard it in his book 'You Are Now Less Dumb':
When the comedian Louis CK reveals to his audience that he sometimes thinks his children are assholes, that they are not exempt from the normal frustrations he feels towards adults, he mass-produces an epiphanous sigh night after night. His audiences suffering from pluralistic ignorance, realize in later conversation that their private thoughts about their own children are in fact the majority opinion. It is simply taboo to say it out loud.
That's pluralistic ignorance and how you can make a comedy career out of vice-signalling. So for every time Louis portrayed himself as particularly wise and a particularly excellent parent in his show 'Louis' there are 15 examples of him conveying himself as variously a creep, a pervert, superficial, with sexual hang-ups, stupid, irresponsible and a fuck-up. Louis was famous for talking publicly about his personal practices of masturbation. Less so, but it's there, for actively engaging in lies and deception etc.
Now by comparison, what, if anything has Aziz Ansari built his career out of? That's where I was finding it interesting to consider how intertwined the two men's careers ended up being. Prior to watching Park's and Recreation in full, I had kind of noticed that Aziz' show 'Master of None' was heavily inspired by, if not a rip-off of Louis' show Louis. (Again given Dave Becky is both men's agents and gets producer credits on both shows this is hardly surprising)
Setting that aside for a moment, the characters Aziz Ansari plays are in essence, just caricatures of himself in most cases - Tommy Haverford, the superficial government employee preoccupied with what other people think of him, swag, social media, being baller, clubs, ebonics... basically trying to be relevant and with it, while also feeling entitled and possessive of beautiful women. A character who is bad at stuff, but after shit goes wrong will turn up and say the right things.
Or Randy Springs in the movie 'Funny People' the hack comedian that is clueless about women, misogynistic to boot. Now while this role probably made no impression on nobody as near-nobody saw the film, I single it out because in one of Aziz Ansari's taped comedy specials, his whole final act is 'what would a special look like if I actually was Randy Springs?' and he does like 20~30 minutes in character as Randy. When not in character as Randy, Aziz Ansari's material is generally commentary on: R. Kelly, Kanye West, Social Media, Food trends and Pornography. Personally where Aziz shines the most is actually drawing on material from his chubby cousin - roughly analogous to the Ricky Gervais Show's podcast drawing most of its material and legs from Karl Pilkington.
Much as I might resist it, it is rare for me to write a blog post and not think of Nassim Nicholas Taleb in some way, on this occasion it's his aphorism 'The opposite of success isn't failure, it's name dropping.' and it's amazing how much and nearly how uniquely Aziz drops the names of his celebrity friends into his shows - or maybe it's just Kanye West... the only comparison I can think of is Eddie Murphy in his special Raw dropping the name of Bill Cosby who called him up to tell him what comedy was all about, and then dropping the name of Richard Pryor whom he called after getting off the phone with Cosby to tell him Cosby had told him what comedy was all about.
Then there's 'Master of None', where Aziz plays what... a fictitious version of himself 'Dev Shah, a 30-year-old actor, mostly following his romantic, professional, and personal experiences.' who is obsessed with food and food trends (In one scene he meticulously researches where the best taco truck is) struggles with race and racism (He and fellow ethnic-Indian comedian both read for a sitcom and ask the question why they can't have two Indian cast members in a sitcom) who is somewhat emotionally immature (leading to jealousy and a breakup that catalyzes the second season's opening in Italy) but constantly virtue signals, particularly about how millenials need to appreciate their elders, like the episode that shows the backstories of his father and his friend's father respectively, or the episode in which he helps his girlfriends Grandma bust out of her nursing home and go to a red-sauce Italian restaurant where Aziz again learns to appreciate his elders and a revivalist food trend.
The only vice signalling Aziz does in his career is act like a petulant child when he doesn't get his way. The rest is all about him realizing how hard it is for POCs, how hard it is for women, how we take the elderly for granted, name dropping and how all over the social media game he is.
Louis CK by contrast generally plays a guy who is awkward with, and lacks confidence around women, often crossing definitive lines like locking up his romantic rival in Parks & Recreation in order to try and win back his ex Leslie Knope. Having an extramarital affair in Blue Jasmine without letting his mistress know she is a mistress. Even when playing himself in Louis, it's mostly him fucking things up, being unpopular, alienating himself... and there's a scene where he is depicted as having a habit of asking out all the attractive young wait staff at the comedy club on dates until he is told to stop. Then he reluctantly goes on a date with a fat waitress who gives him a serve about why he won't date her just because she's overweight.
Louis tends to depict himself in unflattering ways, or having things explained to him by characters wiser than himself, where Aziz falls back constantly on 'you know I've learned something today...'
So if you haven't guessed, prior to the respective #metoo incidents going down, I held Louis and Aziz in very different esteem. With Louis being a very honest creep, world-class possibly generation defining comic, a talented director and editor, an innovator, writer and actor of some promise. By contrast my views of Aziz Ansari haven't changed much, Aziz feels like somebody I've known since adolescence, in my high-school I would have disparaged him as a 'try-hard' someone desperate for relevance, consumed with what the right shoes are, what hair cut is in, what bands to be listening to, what parties are going on and what drugs the other kids are taking.
I regard him as a competent hack, easily caricatured into a Kenny Bania archetype, his success is undeniable but he's tapping into a market I don't personally identify with and speaking to a life experience I don't share... you know one that gives a shit what Kanye and the Kardashians are doing, and consults Yelp reviews to decide where to eat.
Probably in my opinion, Aziz' best work would be his book 'Modern Love' which I actually thoroughly enjoyed, and kudos to him for stumbling across something in the zeitgeist worth addressing. However, even there, like my friend said of Bradd Pitt in any role, it's actually easy to imagine numerous candidates that would have been better handling the subject - Alain De Botton, Helen Fisher, Esther Perel, Brene Brown, Malcolm Gladwell, Michael Lewis... they didn't, he did, so kudos to capitalism. Aziz' personal interests still detracted from the book, like discussing his need to sample Ramen places when he visited Japan to research his book, he can't seem to resist reminding me constantly how cloyingly desperate he is to be accepted, to be esteemed by youth culture.
Aziz and I probably only have an inborn suspicion of guys who wear fedoras in common. A trend that has probably passed us by now, as fedora fans became self-aware of the fedora meme and have now abandoned this reliable warning sign to not get entangled with them.
But then there's the similarities between Louis and Aziz - they both tend to play caricatures of themselves, Louis overlooks the questionable conduct of Woody Allen and pays homage to him in his work/arguably flagrantly ripping him off, Aziz overlooks the questionable conduct of Louis CK and pays homage to him in his work/arguably flagrantly ripping him off. Both men you can dredge up clips of them making articulate arguments in support of feminist positions, Louis is far more candid about his hypocrisy generally, owning it, and then both men manifest to varying degrees conduct amounting to prioritizing their personal gratification over the comfort of women and objectifying women.
The similarities though diminish once you look at the respective behaviors from professional and legal frameworks, in which context Louis' conduct is objectively worse. Aziz' conduct is in the context of a date between consenting adults and he pleaded quite plausibly, incompetence. It was a date where he was horny, and assertive to the point of being pushy and dismissive of the wishes of his sexual partner. Louis asked female colleagues, including subordinates to watch him masturbate, and called them while masturbating. It's been a while since I reviewed what is established fact and what is alleged, but he also in conjunction with his manager appears to have tried to cover up his misconduct or particularly apply pressure to Tig Notaro to drop the subject... Louis also relatively quickly offered a mea culpa, utilizing his intelligence to apologize competently, it is also alleged that he sought out a number of his victims years earlier than the 2017 expose piece in the New York Times and apologized to them for his conduct.
So generally what I come across in the commentary on these two cases is that most commentators state unequivocally that what Louis did, in terms of his sexual misconduct is wrong. And the consensus around Aziz was that what he did, amounts to a bad date.
I would extend a benefit of the doubt to both men, since it can't really be proven that they genuinely failed to consider or were oblivious to their ability to apply pressure/stress to the women in order to obtain their consent. Which is to say, incompetence not malice.
It is harder to extend this charity to Louis, because it is hard to imagine the community context in which an individual would think 'here's what is a nice gesture, ask women to watch or listen to or otherwise witness you masturbate.' it doesn't convene with any of my experiences of being a heterosexual man. This isn't a fantasy expressed and validated in locker rooms or boys dorms on school camps. It stretches credulity that someone would assume that conduct is okay, or within normality. But then again, the internet is a large place with many forums available.
Here though, I want to detwine the two individuals and essentially get Louis out of the way.
Louis' Case
I feel my main point of contention with my perception of how most people view Louis CK is the para-legality of it. I don't have any answers, I suspect there aren't any answers. I'm aware we cannot even say that the legal system in any jurisdiction I'm aware of, is consistent.
What often gets lost with Louis CK I suspect, is the timeline, or a clear understanding of his timeline. The most recent cited allegation in the article that had effectively earned Louis' conviction in the court of public opinion prior to it being published in 2017 was from 2005. His 5 accusers all testified to sexual misconduct occuring between 2002-05. Louis gets divorced in 2008, he is a guest star on Parks and Rec. in 2009, and has his breakout comedy special that year. He first came to my attention with a 'who the fuck is that guy' in 2011-12 when I saw him appear alongside Chris Rock, Jerry Seinfeld and Ricky Gervais in 'Talking Funny' on HBO.
The article detailing the allegations against him cites that he actually privately contacted two of his victims some years later and expressed his remorse and apologies. Keeping in mind, there's no disparity here between public offense/private apology, it was private-private.
Now all of this could be revised through further allegations indicating Louis' misconduct was ongoing right up until or beyond the article's publication in 2017. But there's as of writing no evidence this was the case.
What I suspect is at play in Louis CK's case is an offense against the 'Just-World Hypothesis' the intuition that bad things happen to bad people and good people are rewarded. That in a situation where there is a largely unknown male comedian and an unknown female comedian, and locks the door takes off his clothes and masturbates in front of the female, it is not supposed to be the male comedian that goes onto to have the breakout career and the female to remain in obscurity. The fairy tale goes that the innocent victim rallys through adversity and becomes the funniest comic in the world and the male perpetrator winds up selling fruit barefoot on the side of a road.
It may also insult the common intuition of the halo-effect. Most commonly expressed as our inability to see beautiful people as stupid, in Louis case, revelations about his sexual misconduct stress our ability to understand how it could be completely independent of his artistic abilities. It at the very least appears to certainly be the case that many people can't find a bit about air-plane travel funny anymore because Louis likes to take all his clothes off and masturbate to completion in front of women. I've also heard reports of people unable to enjoy Billy-Jean when it comes on the radio anymore because Michael likes to lick the butt holes of young boys while their parents sleep down the hall. I've experienced this conflation somewhat myself, I used to love Pate as a kid, until I found out Pate is goose liver paste, these days though, I mostly don't eat it because it went out of fashion, it's never put out at parties. I suspect, that I no longer care and if someone served me Pate, which increasingly, is likely to be home made, I would eat it.
In short, people like Tig Notaro, learned something distasteful about Louis CK that changed their opinion of him. Then everyone reacted.
I do believe there is a 'there' there. There is something like Louis stole his career by obfuscating facts about himself that may have changed things. I don't know what you do about that though.
Consider, as a hypothetical, that you are CEO of a company, and one day your HR manager approaches you and informs you that your 54 year old CFO Cheryl apparently used to steal cars for joyrides as a teenager, even crashing one into a pole. She never got busted though, and doesn't have a criminal record. Do you summon her to your office and revoke her access to the office parking, for concern for the other employees cars?
I feel probably not, unless there's some compelling reason to believe Cheryl still steals cars and goes on joyrides, and I'm not sure there's a compelling reason to believe Louis CK would resume asking women if he can jack off in front of them 12 years after the last time he is known to have done so. There are reasonable grounds to suspect he wont, like the lack of any recent victims willing to join the 5 named in the article, the fact that he got divorced, and that as his misconduct disappears his career takes off, indicating that he may have gotten his life and mental health somewhat together.
There's also an absence of professional assessment, even professional speculation as to what could have been going on with Louis and others who exhibit this kind of behavior. Is it about domination or humiliation? Is it a rationalization of avoiding an extra-marital affair through some self perceived loop-hole?
Most critically, is society in any further danger? The implicit answer has to be no. Because unlike Bill Cosby, Harvey Weinstein and Ron Jeremy no criminal charges were brought against Louis CK.
Bringing us to the problem of the barbarity of going paralegal - they misconduct appears to have stopped over a decade ago, so how does Louis demonstrate he has learned it is wrong, if he learned it was wrong and stopped way before the public found out? He offered an apology and took a big and immediate hit, but he wasn't handed a sentence, or parole period. A bunch of people basically disassociated themselves from him.
I don't know what the basis is for the concept of a 'statute of limitations' probably simply to make the legal system feasible, more practical than ethical, but I'd argue that one potential basis for a statute of limitations would be the pointlesslessness of incarcerating or otherwise impeding someone for behavior or conduct they have already demonstrably ceased. This argument may be captured in the 'Litigation of a long-dormant claim may result in more cruelty than justice.'
All that really was outstanding at the time of the article's publication, was that Louis CK did not disclose his misconduct himself. He didn't speak to them when Roseanne Barr raised them in the public domain, he didn't speak to them when Tig Notaro found out and took issue with him.
I would fault him for this, and I would fault him for the sexual misconduct, but to find out ten years+ after the misconduct has ceased, I'm not sure what to do. The obvious thing seems to be to pay damages to the victims, which can be worked out privately. The injustice of that is that for a woman who is sexually assaulted by her shift manager at Burger King, her assailant can't pay them between $200k~3 million like Louis CK can. But that's the risk Louis took in a situation entirely of his own making, women don't get to choose their offenders.
In terms of addressing systemic sexism, misogeny and sexual misconduct including men's violence against women, that won't be resolved through the public shaming and black-listing of individuals like Louis, but the people that employ him like FX (Disney) and his agent Dave Becky etc. Tig acquits herself well in that regard because as soon as she heard she sought clarification in order to immediately dissociate herself, whereas throughout the #metoo wave and through the Brian Epstein saga, my impression overwhelmingly was that most entities only dissociate when public opinion renders the association untenable commercially.
What I find cruel, is that Louis basically can't undo what he did. At the time that his conduct became general knowledge, I'm not sure what he could do apart from pay some damages with interest, I perhaps unfairly adopt the perspective of a sentencing Judge, that just doesn't see the point of sending this person to Jail as they appear to already be rehabilitated and that materially the incidental fact that they went on to exponentially increase their net worth, again assuming private settlements are to be made was unwittingly in part working for them.
Tig's concerns appear to be that she was used in a kind of 'feminist washing' pr campaign by Louis CK. I can understand the concern, it's even plausible, I just suspect it isn't provable and particularly when you consider it in conjunction with the evidence that Louis CK promoted other comic talents he liked through his vehicles like Todd Barry who gets featured in segments of 'Louis'. It is plausible that Louis, a decade on from when whatever motivated him to jerk off while women watched, was just a fan of Tig's work and wanted her to succeed. At this stage it's probably safe to say, that Tig successfully avoided being used in the way she feared Louis intended.
Then there's comedians like Hannah Gadsby, that appear to represent the camp that never is the appropriate time for Louis to start working again and he should basically be banned for life. There's probably some harsh conservative deterrent argument to be made, but I personally cannot by into the theory, nor the epistemic constructivism to get behind it. I suspect that like is observed in the parts of the world where thieves get their hands cut off, that thieves keep cropping up, and in the states where murderers and mentally handicapped people get executed that people keep killing and the day after Louis CK's 'I love you daddy' film got its distribution cancelled and Louis' voice over work got recast that Steve still thought it was a good idea to follow Jenny into the supply room and block her exit while he jacked off.
It's possible that Louis' actions cost the world another Hannah Gadsby, Michelle Wolf, Nicki Glaser, Mindy Kaling, Tina Fey, Sarah Silverman, Roseann Barr, Tig Notaro, Ali Wong etc. but it would still overwhelmingly be indirect. As in, it would be a hard burden of proof to reach that Louis' conduct was motivated by seeing his victims as competition and choosing to destroy them psychologically in order to eradicate the competition. It appears far more simple to interpret that Louis was motivated by egocentric sexual and personal hang-ups, and viewed his victims as objects not as competition.
Attention is ultimately scarce, in that way Louis' capacity to continue to perform draws on a limited resource. But there's no real substitutes in comedy. Dennis Leary is no real substitute of Bill Hicks, Joe Rogan is not a substitute for Bill Burr, Sandi Toksvig is not a substitute for Stephen Fry, Hannah Gadsby is not a substitute for Louis CK and in every case vice versa. I can understand theatres not wanting to book Louis CK, or streaming platforms not wanting to carry his content, but these are all individual choices, that people can be free to disagree with.
I recognize that under certain ideologies, the idea that Louis CK could 'come back' and even out earn Hannah Gadsby in a year or two could pose an existential threat. It's even likely that Hannah Gadsby will never earn in her lifetime as much money as Louis CK lost.
That zero-redemption policy leaves us in a place however where neurotic guys who struggle with their own sexuality are expected to do their best to cease to exist, they can't rehabilitate and they shouldn't be allowed to perform in their competency what society most values about them.
I guess what I'd be saying, is that I completely understand an individual like Hannah Gadsby arriving at the conclusion that art cannot be separated from artist and that she never wants to see Louis CK perform again, but she nor any interest group should be deciding that for anyone else.
It's taken legal systems a long time to learn to be humane and civilized, and it's only just getting there like now, as in now, now, some parts of the world have cracked the case and have more humane justice systems that also coincidentally produce better results. I personally do not need my pound of flesh to gratify my blood lust, or personal indignation.
I actually suspect, that I don't need the legal system of my country to intervene on my behalf to prevent me from having people that offend me, drawn and quartered in the public square. I get why we moved beyond that, but I am often left with the impression that most of my neighbors do need that intervention, they aren't sure why we can't just burn witches at the stake if a child dreamed they were copulating with Satan.
Bringing us back to...
Aziz' case
Everything with Aziz is in the context of:
"In 2014 he self-identified as a feminist, saying his girlfriend has helped influence him. Ansari also incorporated an episode about feminism titled "Ladies and Gentlemen" in Master of None. In an interview in 2015, he spoke about the episode's meaningfulness to him saying "I thought it was interesting that this is happening, yet so many people are unaware of it. And the problem is people aren't talking about it. What I've learned, as a guy, is to just ask women questions and listen to what they have to say. Go to your group of female friends and ask them about times they've experienced sexism at their job, and you'll get blown away by the things they tell you." (from his Wikipedia page, link inserted by me to synopsis/review of the episode)
You can read/revisit the Babe.net article if you feel a need to.
And then Aziz addresses it in his 2019 comedy special, which I have not watched owing to lack of interest, but the pull quote is from Aziz' wikipedia page:
"If this made not just me but other people be more thoughtful, then that's a good thing, and that's how I feel about it."
And much like Louis, this would probably benefit greatly from a clear timeline, which would go something like 2014 > self-identifies as a feminist, 2015 > releases book 'Modern Romance' featuring chapter on Buenos Aires, Argentina and the impacts of Machismo culture, among other in depth exploration of sexual politics, 2016 > Wins some Emmys for Master of None season 1, 2017 > releases Master of None season 2, goes on bad date. 2018 > Wins Golden Globe award for Master of none, girl from date tells story of date to Babe.net.
So Aziz' conduct occurs after his successful career, at the arguable height of his celebrity power (he could still become a Republican POTUS) having presented not just an onscreen persona in Dev, but his personal public persona. Keep in mind how upset people seem to be over Ellen Degeneres not living up to her 'be kind' public persona.
It's the sacking of Troy, and Louis CK is Achilles, or Hector, whatever side you want to identify with. I don't care, the point is Louis is going out day after day and being all like 'Imma gonna kill you! You are my enemy' except in this case it was 'I'm a nuerotic guy with low self esteem and sexual kinks and I talk a lot about masturbating and my obsession with young attractive women and how they are physically repulsed by me!' and then Louis gets outed in the media, Achilles kills Hector (or Paris kills Achilles) and a large community reacts with 'we assumed you were joking this whole time.'
Whereas Aziz Ansari is more like 'Hey Trojans, I'm a horse yeah, bring me inside your city gates it will please your gods.' which is to say, Aziz Ansari identified as a feminist, incorporated it into his creative output and interprets a request to slow down as moving to the couch and pointing at his crotch to request a blowjob. The recount of the date and Aziz' conduct might be inaccurate, it's not like there were no mitigating factors like the conduct of his date doing a lot to imply consent or at least mislead as to her willingness to participate in the sexual activity.
Just to my knowledge, Aziz has never given an alternative account (he may in the 2019 special I have not watched) particularly anything to the effect of 'I didn't say that thing about a glass of wine moving us to the second date' or 'I never said anything like "seems like you don't hate me"'
Even if his date feels validated after discussing it with numerous friends that his conduct constituted sexual assault, that doesn't mean her feeling is in anyway validated by law nor would meet the burden of proof to make a case.
The thing that bothers me about the Aziz Ansari case is in direct comparison to the fallout for Louis CK. I admittedly haven't dug into the media monitoring data, it probably remains true that Aziz' profile has never been as large as Louis CK (in line with their respective earning power) and that does 99% of the explaining why Louis recieves so much more criticism and resistance to resuming working than Aziz does. The other mitigating factor is that I assume, people feel visceral implicit differences between somebody using their power as a celebrity to pressure someone into being penetrated in the context of a consensual date, and somebody using the power of seniority or their role to pressure someone into consenting to watch them masturbate in the context of a workplace.
Analogous to the outrage felt over a women being murdered by a man who is a stranger, versus being murdered by her husband. Even if people never intelligibly articulate it, the respective public reactions imply that nested in the collective unconscious is an idea that either a) the offense is diminished by her choice of spouse or b) women remain the property of their husband or father or both.
I do not identify as a feminist, for reasons that I have explained many times but is highlighted by the case of Aziz Ansari - because it costs men nothing to be feminists. The one and only criteria for a man to be a feminist as near as I have been able to determine, is for men to say they are.
Where Aziz gets off lightly, is in not-being expelled from feminism having demonstrated a comprehensive cynicism. Unlike the criminal charge, I feel that case is incredibly easy to make.
The timing of Louis' comeback should essentially be left to Louis and whatever audience remains him, and dissenting opinions being free to dissent should not attempt to encroach or de-platform Louis. Aziz on the other hand, his comeback should be essentially contingent on creating a new non-hypocritical persona. That his experience may have prompted to think that maybe the scope of feminism reaches into how he conducts himself on a first date suggests that maybe feminism's membership threshold is too low.
One thing I take away from the whole Trump, Bryan Kavanaugh and the Christian single-issue voters is an impression of the Christian conservative voter base. The fact that they don't care about the conduct of these men, just that they are on team Pro-Life diminishes Christianity to mere tribalism, in-group loyalty. The tolerance of these men's conduct invalidates their belief system as a moral authority.
Aziz poses the same threat to feminism as a whole. How feminists react to Aziz' cynacism and hypocrisy says things to me about the movement in general. And yes, there's no amazon queen to make decrees of feminism, but there are informal consensus and champions that get more oxygen than others. It makes feminism look like 'We hate Louis because he won't grovel, he won't kowtow and pay lip-service, we are okay with Aziz because he pays lip-service.'
It moves from a movement I might actually identify with of 'we object to the treatment of women, we are equal in dignity and this conduct falls below our dignity as living feeling beings' to one I have no sympathy with of 'all we care about is solidarity, you're with us or against us, get the fuck out of the way of my will to power! Nietzsche ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuulllllllllles!'
I suspect, owing to phenomena like preference falsification, the market will fall inline with my expectations - Louis will get richer, Aziz' earning power will never recover.
I reserve the right to change my mind, once I have good reason to on both men. Further allegations, criminal charges etc. that substantiate that Louis has not in fact changed at all and has even become worse would be sufficient to change my mind. As would any evidence that Aziz Ansari can be taken at his word, or has learned or changed in some way. In Aziz case however, the great struggle is given the level of his hypocrasy, I'm not sure what would actually constitute that evidence, nor what a realistic time-frame is.
If Aziz was truly influenced by Louis CK, I guess something compelling would be if Aziz adopted a persona more in line with Louis' one of vice-signalling, similar to Kevin Hart, of basically presenting himself as 'yeah I'm a guy who's really insecure and would say anything, anything to get laid.' That may just cut it.
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