Whoopi Wasn’t Defending Polanski, Now Can Someone Defend Her, Please?

Poor Whoopi Goldberg incurred the wrath of critics this week for some remarks she made about Roman Polanski’s arrest.

Specifically, people are pissed that Whoopi appeared to defend Polanski by dismissing his actions as, “not ‘rape-rape.’”

Polanski, for anyone who’s been living under a rock for the last three days (give or take 30 years), was accused of raping a 13-year-old girl in Los Angeles, Calif. He pleaded guilty to a charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor before fleeing the United States and somehow managing to escape capture and extradition until he was arrested by Swiss police in Zürich this weekend.

What drew my attention to this particular controversy was Lindsay Roberts’ post (and the ensuing discussion) on Jezebel criticizing Whoopi for her “crusade of literal legal language” and “obsession” with the charges Polanski actually pleaded guilty to:

There are certainly gray areas to be found here, even if they’re only concerning a biased judge. But Whoopi Goldberg, in a condescending rant ostensibly about clarifying exactly what Roman Polanski was charged with (as if that matters, when nobody is denying that he drugged and had sex with a child), can’t seem to find them. She seems obsessed with the actual charges to which Polanski pleaded guilty (sex with a minor), and refers to the case as a “suit,” as if it’s a civil lawsuit about a roach in a box of french fries.

Look, nobody (including Whoopi, as far as I can tell) was arguing that whatever Polanski did was, regardless of what you’d like to call it, reprehensible. Everybody here pretty much agrees on that. But trying to get her facts straight is hardly an error egregious enough to rake Whoopi over the coals for.

(And as a matter of legal nitpicking and trivia, calling it a “suit” isn’t technically wrong. Although they’re usually called “complaints,” a criminal suit is still technically a lawsuit. It’s simply brought forth by the state instead of a private party and tried in criminal instead of civil court. But I digress.)

But Lindsay’s item bothers me on two, very specific points:

1. Her dismissal of such legal distinctions as somehow meaningless, irrelevant, or unimportant; and,
2. Her assertion that Whoopi must have some “personal, possibly guilty-parent” motivation for refusing to acknowledge Polanski’s crime as “rape:”

The other ladies try to get a word in edgewise while Whoopi distracts them with her crusade of literal legal language — could it be because Whoopi’s own daughter got pregnant at 15? That fact, while seemingly salient (especially when Whoopi says “Would I want my 14-year-old daughter having sex? Not necessarily.”), is never mentioned. So close, ladies! Why didn’t you jump on her then?

[ . . . ]

What is worrisome about Whoopi’s argument is that she refuses to call a 43 year old man having sex with an unconscious 13 year old girl “rape”. She may have personal, possibly guilty-parent reasons for not accepting this, but as tangled up as this case is, the fact that it was rape is one of the least controversial things about it. Roman Polanski admitted to drugging and having sex with a child, and in the country in which he did it, that is rape. (Though nice try Whoopi with the “Europeans have sex with children all the time!” argument, or whatever that was.)

Frankly, I don’t think Whoopi’s situation with her own daughter has anything to do with it, and I’m clueless about where Lindsay’s drawing that conclusion from. Did it ever occur to her that maybe Bill Geddy, or the ABC/Disney lawyers just want to cover their asses from a libel suit? And that Whoopi’s job, as the panel’s appointed moderator, is to articulate such clarifications for the other ladies and the audience? And that, in all likelihood, they were probably even coaching her through her earpiece? (Although if that was her intent, perhaps she should consider a career change. Because she kind of sucks at both articulating and clarifying things, it seems.)

The fact of the matter is, strictly speaking, Polanski is not a rapist. He’s an unlawful sex with a minor-ist. Some people have pointed out that Polanski has “admitted” to Samantha Geimer (née Gailey), and while I’m not personally familiar with those statements, I’m going to assume he (quite deliberately, probably) avoided the “R-word.”

Roman Polanski’s not the best example to illustrate the importance of these subtle legal distinctions, of course, and Lindsay’s completely right when she says a plea agreement “isn’t necessarily, and often bears no resemblance to, what really happened.”

A 44-year old man who sodomizes an unconscious 13-year-old is committing rape, as we commonly understand the meaning of the word “rape.” Absolutely. And it follows to call the perpetrator of such an action a “rapist.” Yes. Duh. You and I and the State of California, at least when it arrested and charged Polanski to begin with, all agree(d) on that.

Journalists (if you dare to say The View is a journalistic enterprise), however, are burdened with a responsibility to report things accurately, and they don’t always have the freedom to make the common sense leaps of logic that you and I do.

But that accountability should not, necessarily, be seen as just a restriction on the media. It serves this purpose, yes, but for good reason: to protect the rights of the subjects whom journalists cover.

An 18-year-old high school senior who has sex with his 17½-year-old girlfriend, for instance, is guilty of “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor” under California law.

But how many of us would jump over each other to label him a rapist? The State might not recognize her ability to give consent, but, I mean, come on, right?

And barring a particularly aggressive district attorney, a (reasonable) prosecutor would probably even agree that calling such an action “rape” is overkill.

For Roman Polanski, we might say these legal nuances are pure semantics. But knee-jerk outrage over his actions, while warranted, should not lead us to dismiss the broad, and quite important, impact of such distinctions.

Lindsay would, it seems, have us believe that these subtleties are somehow meaningless or trivial. That we should cut through the “unlawful sex” bullshit and call a spade a spade. But these subtleties are hardly trivial for the lives of the people they affect — an “unlawful sex” conviction, for example, doesn’t require you to register as a sex offender, and undoubtedly carries a lighter sentence than a rape conviction.

For Roman Polanski, these legal nuances may indeed be pure semantics. But knee-jerk outrage over his individual actions should not lead us to dismiss the impact of these distinctions when applied broadly.

The anger at Whoopi is misdirected. I agree that we should call a spade a spade when it’s a spade, but Whoopi’s not the one who dropped that ball. That honor, my friends, belonged to the Los Angeles District Attorney, and if anyone should be taken to task for agreeing to understate this crime, it’s the State of California, not the ladies of The View.

Whoopi did take a moment on this morning’s episode to clarify her remarks, saying:

Some people got the idea that I was condoning what he did. I’m going to be very clear: I was trying to make sure we had our facts straight because that’s my job – particularly about what he was arrested for and what he was charged with, which was unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, not rape, which was my point.

Polanski, of course, was arrested for and charged with rape, and unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor is what he pleaded guilty to. So even in her clarification, poor Whoopi managed to bungle her facts, but, you know, at least she tried.

Watch out, she just ate a cheeseburger

I guess the theme on today’s GMA is “formerly fatties” or something, because this morning, Chris Cuomo interviewed The View’s Sherri Shepard on her much-publicized weight loss.

It was a nice interview, she talked about the usual weight loss crap. And then she did a little dance for Mr. Cuomo. Which was bizarre. And hilarious. And, therefore, a classic Sherri Shepard moment.

My only complaint:

Ah well, ’tis the life of a lowly slave intern.

This is how you win an Academy Award, kids

So Meryl Streep was on last night’s Tonight Show with Conan O’ Brien to promote promoting Julie & Julia where she told Conan a story about her audition for Out of Africa…

Apparently Sydney Pollack didn’t think she was “sexy enough” to play the role of a 50 year old Danish author, so Streep’s solution was to stuff her bra. (You keep it classy, Meryl)

Check out the clip here.