Warning, this story is really horrific and will be heartbreaking for any fans of his, but Neil Gaiman is a sadistic [not in the BDSM sense] sexual predator with a predilection for very young women.
Paywall bypass: https://archive.is/dfXCj
I’m really disappointed in Amanda Palmer. This does not paint a pretty picture of her.
Wow. Several of the instances described are quite clearly rape; with some horrible scarring and degrading stuff through in; exploiting power-imbalance to make it possible. What I struggle to fully understand though are the text messages mentioned in the story. Gaiman argues that there was consent, and there are things said in those text messages that might support him. But the other circumstances, and the pattern of behaviour across multiple victims surely is enough to overrule that.
Pleasing your abuser and even returning to them because all you have ever known is abuse and they are showing you attention is extremely common. This situation sounds like one of those.
Edit: In the article they also point out that she didn’t actually think of it as rape until she described the situation to others. Which is something I have heard more than one other rape victim say.
This article from 2017 is worth a read for anyone trying to figure out whether/how to separate the art from the artist.
What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men? By Claire Dederer, Paris Review, November 20, 2017 https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2017/11/20/art-monstrous-men/
I never read this and I really appreciate the share.
Some parts that spoke to me:
This, I think, is what happens to so many of us when we consider the work of the monster geniuses—we tell ourselves we’re having ethical thoughts when really what we’re having is moral feelings.
Yeah. Guilty.
“The heart wants what it wants.” (Steve Allen when discussing Soon-Yi)
It was one of those phrases that never leaves your head once you’ve heard it: we all immediately memorized it whether we wanted to our not. Its monstrous disregard for anything but the self. Its proud irrationality. Woody goes on: “There’s no logic to those things. You meet someone and you fall in love and that’s that.”
I moved on her like a bitch.
I found this fascinating. While I was confused by Allen’s statement and why women found it so disgusting, the Trump parallel made it click.
A great work of art brings us a feeling. And yet when I say Manhattan makes me feel urpy, a man says, No, not that feeling. You’re having the wrong feeling. He speaks with authority: Manhattan is a work of genius. But who gets to say?
Going back to Gaiman, his work is held to a very high standard. But to say you dislike it, you will be met with confusion or even anger. And this is where this piece really spoke to me.
She mentioned a short story she’d just written and published. “Oh, you mean the most recent occasion for your abandoning me and the kids?” asked the very smart, very charming husband. The wife had been a monster, monster enough to finish the work. The husband had not.
A tangent in the essay about women writers. I found it fascinating that when a fuckface like Elon Musk abandoning his more than dozen kids can still rise the ranks. but God forbid a woman does the same.
There really is no answer to this that the author provides.
The tangent I shared is her last thought: does great art only come from monsters? I think a lot about other creative works, painters, comedians film makers… Who does some wild shit but not nearly to the level of Gaiman’s accusations.
Also, like all summaries, read it yourself and find your own takeaways. It’s the nuance, not the summary, that has value.
The tangent I shared is her last thought: does great art only come from monsters? I think a lot about other creative works, painters, comedians film makers… Who does some wild shit but not nearly to the level of Gaiman’s accusations.
Nah. It’s well known that power corrupts and being a great artist is a form of power, so that skews things perhaps, but I really don’t think there’s a direct correlation.
Gross. I’m glad this particular milkshake duck wasn’t one I cared about. I still won’t spend any more money on JK Rowling’s stuff ever again.
Milkshake duck?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkshake_Duck
Copy/paste- pixelatedboat @pixelatedboat Twitter logo, a stylized blue bird
The whole internet loves Milkshake Duck, a lovely duck that drinks milkshakes! 5 seconds later We regret to inform you the duck is racist
Today I learned!
That’s some sad reading. Like watching a train wreck in slow motion, from the point where the train crashes back to where the company forces an engineer to cut corners on the design.
Legal classification: probably rape, definitely sexual assault.
An enabling factor: wealth (he was in a position to influence other’s well-being economically, offer hush money and sign non-disclosure agreements).
“‘I’m a very wealthy man,’” she remembers him saying, “‘and I’m used to getting what I want.’”
An excuse: BDSM. The author of the article is correct to note:
BDSM is a culture with a set of long-standing norms, the most important of which is that all parties must eagerly and clearly consent
As for the search for the origin of his behaviour… I think they’re on the right track. Like a former child soldier who carries a war inside them, Gaiman has probably been carrying a lot inside.
In 1965, when Neil was 5 years old, his parents, David and Sheila, left their jobs as a business executive and a pharmacist and bought a house in East Grinstead, a mile away from what was at that time the worldwide headquarters for the Church of Scientology. Its founder, the former science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, lived down the road from them from 1965 until 1967, when he fled the country and began directing the church from international waters, pursued by the CIA, FBI, and a handful of foreign governments and maritime agencies. David and Sheila were among England’s earliest adherents to Scientology.
/…/
Palmer began asking Gaiman to tell her more about his childhood in Scientology. But he seemed unable to string more than a few sentences together. When she encouraged him to continue, he would curl up on the bed into a fetal position and cry. He refused to see a therapist.
Reading this, it seems obvious that Gaiman developed his behaviour due to trauma during childhood and youth - and has been exhibiting behaviour patterns that became normalized for him during time in the cult.
As for people whom he assaulted, it seems that they too carry a pattern - they were vulnerable at the time. Some had already experienced violence on themselves. Which, it seems - often hadn’t been resolved, but had become normalized. They were not the kind of people whose “no” is followed by physical self-defense or the full weight of legal options - and Gaiman understood enough to recognize: with them, he could get away with doing things.
She didn’t consider reaching out to her own family. Her parents had divorced when she was 3, and Pavlovich had grown up splitting time between their households. Violence, Pavlovich tells me, “was normalized in the household.”
Well, what can I say about it…
…it is customary that accusations be investigated by cops (who hopefully cannot be bought) and presented as charges to a court of law. The defendant should have a chance to deny or excuse their actions, but if deemed guilty, is required to give up time or resources either as compensation or punishment. A court could make lesser or greater punishment dependent on taking action to fix one’s behaviour traits - seeking assistance and not offending again. Those harmed should be offered assistance by their societies.
Yup, big fan of his work, really pissed off to find out he’s such an asshole. But I’m glad we live in an era where creeps can get their due. Fuck this guy.
But it’s mere hearsay. Is your judgment so casual?
Hearsay, eh?
9 women, the youngest being 18, are all saying the same thing, and he also made them sign NDA’s. [Content Warning]
9 women, the youngest being 18
In this world of fucked up authors, it’s sad that I’m impressed that he didn’t go below 18.
That we know about.
I’m already turning down any party invitations from him, i’ll wait to hear underage before I worry about that one :P
You literally only know that because you heard somebody say it
Unless it’s an AI or an automated response, that’s how everyone knows everything. They either heard it or read it from someone else.
I see stuff and meet people in real life, actually.
And then they tell you things that you were not there to witness. That is literally how communication works.
You just seem to think that people you meet in real life are less likely to lie to you than people in an article that shows that a huge amount of research was done and I’m not sure why.
In real life you can talk to people that you know and see things with your own eyes. This is better than essays written by anonymous people on the internet.
And yet here you are sticking up for Gaiman because of what he said over what 9 women said.
I am only criticizing you people actually. There’s a lot of room for criticism. Your whole process is retarded.
And yes, you are going after Neil like a mob of 12th century potato farmers.
Statistically speaking, the likelihood of someone lying about sexual assault is low, a reasonable estimate being around 3-4%. When you have 9 separate people making the same claim, it gives credance to the idea that the odds of their claims being false is very low.
What people? All I have is a story, same as you.
Go back to Reddit, douchebag.
Just block him he’s a teenage troll trying to piss people off
You get angry at people you never met, based on stories written by people you never met.
Your anger is very cheap.
You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.
I didn’t heed the warning and regretted reading the whole thing - there are very detailed and gruesome first hand accounts of his alleged assaults on multiple women. Excellent reporting throughout, which only makes it more sickening.
Also, as a former Amanda Palmer fan, fuck her, too. It’s clear she enabled this and committed, at minimum, wage theft crimes. Both of them deserve to do jail time with even the most generous best-case-scenarios. I’m sure she was also abused by him, but that is not an excuse to abuse other women. Some feminist.
I never liked her. She always struck me as the worst kind of drama club narcissist.
Wait what happen with Amanda Palmer? I’ve looked her stuff for a while what did she do?
Idk how to format, but I want to save you from reading if you need that. So here’s a brief list of claims in the article:
- she frequently and repeatedly recruited homeless, impoverished female fans to provide childcare without any payment
- she repeatedly left these women alone with Gaiman, without the child present
- she warned Gaiman to “keep his hands off” at least one woman
- she said that at least 14 women had come to her for help with Gaiman
- she subsequently wrote a song about how much of a chore it was for her to deal with the multiple “suicidal mess”es Gaiman created
- she routinely controlled employment/housing of these women and knew Gaiman was, at best, sleeping with them (this cannot be consensual when housing/employment are in the mix)
- when notified of an assault that happened with her child present, only questioned whether the child was “wearing headphones”
- refused to cooperate with at least one police investigation
- refused any material help to assaulted women after repeatedly assuring them she would “take care of” them, get different housing/employment set up, etc.
Just…awful stuff, and this is best case scenario, FFS. She is fucking trash.
That’s really sad and disappointing
God, she was one of my favorite artists. This is really crushing to learn. It’s so counter to everything she seemed to stand for.
And fuck, Ampersand no longer feels like an empowering song about marriage.
Amanda Palmer also routinely didn’t pay musicians and other people who worked for her, and defended Jian Ghomeshi the sex predator and abuser. She also faked her own suicide to record her then boyfriend’s reaction, who them died of suicide six months later.
That’s awful. I had no idea :(
Right there with you. I believe Gaiman was using her as a smokescreen for exactly that reason. (I’m being generous and assuming she wasn’t actively and deliberately trafficking women for him.)
And yes, there are a lot of song lyrics / tweets / media that aged like milk for both of them.
She was married to him and enabled him.
Welp, that’s yet another maker of incredible art that turned out to be an absolute monster. Fucking hell.
If what he says about The Ocean at the End of the Lane about the kid representing him is true, then he’s just another case of keeping a vicious cycle of abuse going. He should’ve sought psychological help. Hell, he should seek psychological help now, the media would love to write about his RL redemption.
Serving for his rape crimes would also be nice.
I was just thinking about how people that are idolized like David Bowie and Bob Dylan are going to have their legacies ruined when all their crimes come to light
Welp, I guess if I still want to read any of his books, there will probably be a ton of them at the thrift store
Libraries are free.
Annual vpn subscription: $75
20 TB home server: $450
Enjoying the art while the shitheel artist doesn’t profit: Priceless
When you want an artist to benefit from their creative works, support them directly. For everything else, there’s piracy
I dunno. Pirating it is still giving them attention. Talking about it, bringing them up, giving them relevance. You’re paying for it with mental space. But when you straight up shun them, they wither away.
Like the great Terry Pratchett (rip), I see them like Small Gods: you give them power when you believe they exist.
You people cry shitheel with so little substantiating evidence.
Is this you? What is your evidence that everyone does what you claim they do?
What?
You are arguing that you can’t know things other people tell you. So how do you know that everyone fakes it? Did everyone tell you? Every single person? Are they all telling the truth?
It’s just weak evidence. Hearsay.
That’s literally what you’re arguing against believing in this thread.
I guess it’s different when you do it.
15 accusations, voicemails of him setting up hush money payments, NDAs, none of this points to lacking merit. 1 woman, yeah it could be false or misleading. 15? Either this is very very likely to be true, or someone with tons of money has convinced a huge swath of real people in his life and not total strangers to publicly destroy him in a conspiracy that would be on the scale of a military operation. How much money would it take for you to knowingly lie about an innocent person you babysat for, who, if this isn’t true, is lovely to know by all professional accounts. What kind of dollar figure would that take? Would you be willing to do this without possessing the money already? Would you demand that in advance? Who would contact you to get you into this conspiracy? Certainly not the benefactor. How would they know you wouldn’t flip on them in a heartbeat? Or simply out them to begin because you’re not a horrible person. 15 times. Successfully. That’s what this requires. People who are known to have worked for him. That’s you’re pool. That’s a very shallow pool. 15 successful payoffs with no deserters or whistleblowers? Accusing someone of a crime isn’t fruitful. You don’t get fame or money out of this, particularly if you have 15 victims on your side sharing the supposed limelight and potential pay day. And why if that’s all they wanted, why would they go further than blackmail? They were already getting paid off. More women came out after the first 5? More? 10 people were like oh, they are getting 1/5th of the spotlight. I want that. I’ll get 1/15th of a spotlight! All I have to do is ruin the life of the rich guy paying me off right now. It makes NO sense.
I actually never met Neil Gaiman, or the people making the accusations, or the person who wrote the article. How about you?
You’re THIS ridiculous? OK. Utterly pointless. Next time lead with ‘‘I’m insane and don’t believe anything or anyone unless I’ve personally met them myself’’ save everyone some time.
Do you have to meet the meteorologist and check his data and model to believe their weather forecast? Do you have to meet every single politician, scientist, news reporter, just everyone, to believe any news at all?
If I’m going to revile somebody, yes.
Is your bar that you have to meet the victim to believe them?
Actually yes. Before I condemn somebody I insist upon meeting the fellow, interviewing the witnesses and seeing the evidence.
With what expertise and training? Do we all have to wait until big_fat_fluffy has concluded his investigations before we can trust that any criminal activity has occurred?
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Removed by mod
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I have enjoyed Gaiman’s writing, also the Sandman show was excellent, but I am glad that in this era that I’m not the type of person to be a fan of anybody. I guess it is natural to ascribe virtue and look up to people who create thing you resonate with, but there’s no reason to think someone who wrote a book is worth praising or emulating other than in the book you liked.
Sounds like someone who suffered from serious abuse, never went to actual therapy in a meaningful way but instead got into a position of power where he could feel good by being the abuser instead of the abused. Which does not excuse any of it. On the contrary, his writing shows very clearly that he understands that what he did was wrong, but he did it regardless.
will be heartbreaking for any fans of his
ISHYGDDT
YAAS.
Your Acronyms Are Shit.
I have no evidence, but I believe Orson Scott Card has a thing for little boys. I devoured his books when I was a tween, but began to feel uneasy over time. There was a reoccurring theme of young boys being put in graphic situations that just, I don’t know, but I’ve never been able to shake that feeling. Song Master pushed me over the edge. A ‘beautiful young boy’ being castrated so he doesn’t go through puberty was when I stopped reading. My Spidey sense had never stopped going off about him since then.
Aaaand I just googled. I’m not the only one who picked up on that. Ew
Felt that way about luc besson films, Leon is great but has deep pedo vibes, then I find out besson wanted a sex scene between Leon and the kid. Also the fifth element, liloo is essentially a baby, but she’s the one everyone wants.
Card is also a giant piece of shit in other ways, which is unfortunate because he is a good writer and his essays on the methodology of writing are excellent.
I find it difficult to reconcile how the writer of Speaker for the Dead is such a bigot. Dude took a hard swerve at some point.
You’re not alone in your confusion there, friend. Reading Speaker for the Dead and finding out about who the author was as a person blows my mind as to how such a bigot could even conceive of the ideas in that book.
Huh. I never noticed, but that actually explains Ender’s Game.
yeah some of those authors…Like Heinlein’s later novels, what was with the fucking incest?
Jesus fucking Christ.
I have not read anything from Gaiman, but I can see that lots of People really liked his books and the Person he showed the world.
So I just want to say, I’m really sorry for all of you. Even though Gaiman can rot in Hell, I feel sad for people who just got their favorite Books and stories poisoned.
Sandman was my teenage years. The series got me into the goth subculture which led to such great experiences in my life. Finding out Gaiman is a monstrous piece of shit has been gut punch.
This is way worse than the J.K. Rowling turned TERF bit. These are actual crimes committed against women.
I legit really enjoyed many of his works, Good Omens, written with Terry Pratchett, is an all time classic, and I used to be proud of the fact that I actually met the man, as did one of my oldest friends as well as my brother in law.
Now it’s all like “What the fuck?”
Is it awful that a part of me is glad Terry Pratchett is gone and doesn’t have to face this about someone who was a friend and co-writer?
Given how progressive Pratchett’s stories were I would have a hard time believing he was a bad person or could support bad people, and I imagine this would be hard on him. Then again perhaps I’m just selfishly glad that I don’t have to know if he didn’t respond appropriately by distancing himself.
Don’t know if I’m even making sense. This is just so disheartening given how many people I know absolutely loved Gaiman.
It does raise the spectre of “how much did Terry know?” I really hope he was blissfully ignorant of all of it because, frankly, it’s more than I personally ever wanted to know.
Pratchett had a deep sense of justice, and was driven by a righteous rage - as described (ironically) by Gaiman in the introduction to Pratchett’s “A Slip of the Keyboard”.
Pratchett also has multiple books with a primary focus on feminism (Equal Rights, Monstrous Regiment), and lots of his other books have feminist takes sprinkled through them.
I’ve read a bit of Gaiman (not as much as of Pratchett), and I don’t think I remember reading anything explicitly feminist. He seems much more obsessed with fantastic mythology than anything with sociopolitical relevance.
Anyway, who knows how Pratchett would have reacted, but I kind of wish he WAS here to see it, because I suspect he would have said something really good about it…
Yeah, that’s occurred to me as well. For context I haven’t brought myself to read the specifics yet, so I don’t know all the details. I don’t like to comment when I’ve only read the title, but I’ve seen enough trigger warnings to put this one off until I’m ready.
I’ll just say this, I DID read the details and it is incredibly, deeply fucked up. Fucked up to the point I’m not ashamed to say I’d like to see Gaiman criminally charged. If you do not know, then you’re better off for not knowing.
I really hope he didn’t know anything about it. Not awful at all, my first reaction when the gf mentioned this headline to me was “oh god please tell me Terry (GNU) wasn’t involved.”
That must be creepy³ :0
Why though? He is a sack of shit and can rot in hell for all I care… his art can still be enjoyed. Having him take that way means he has even more power.
I would suggest obtaining it in ways that do not give him new money… Like buying books second hand.
If you can do that more Power to you!
But I can understand that some People now look with diffrent eyes on his work or simply can’t make that cut between Author and his work.
Yeah I can imagine for some people his work is tainted…
That’s the case for me. Same as watching anything with Kevin Spacey in it now. I just can’t separate the man from from his reported actions.
In this specific case, it’s really difficult because, as the article talks about in the beginning, his stories were often viewed as being feminist (and progressive in other ways), but when you re-read them, you can start getting a sense of the monster that was hiding.
I mentioned this above, I don’t think I’ve ever noticed anything feminist (or even particularly progressive or political at all) in Gaiman’s writing. But maybe there’s things I missed… Do you know of any examples of him presenting something clearly feminist?
Edit: I see someone post an example below, it’s not something I’ve read.
I’ve been a fan of his for a very long time - decades. I enjoyed the dark part of the dark humour and the commentaey on humanity.
He has an excellent book called the sleeper and the spindle. It is a beautifully crafted and illustrated book clearly targeted at young women. It feels like art, and I genuinely celebrate it for what it is, a feminist retelling of Cinderella, where the celebrated main character is…how do I put it - both good, and effective. Not empowered, or brave, or glossy, but competent and certain. It is a version of feminism I see in those pragmatic, excellent women who do valuable, notable and productive things.
I don’t see any echoes of a monster any moreso than any fantasy writer who holds up a chipped and scratched mirror to the human condition. And that is the profoundly sad thing here. I believe you can be two things at once and that as a story, without his name attached to it, sleeper and the spindle should be something young people can read and enjoy and make them think a bit differently.
This isn’t a shoulder shrug and wave off of his actions. I can’t forgive him his cruel treatment of vulnerable people who cared for him, trusted him and wanted to please him. It is abhorrent.
What I’m trying to say is mud and gold come from the same hole.
Well for example, all of the sexual (and other) violence in the 24-Hour Diner part of The Sandman takes on a very different connotation now. Because now I know he’s responsible for such things. He was writing from experience.
I dunno, I thought it was pretty fucked up first time around too.
It was fucked up, but within the context of the comic, it was fucked up because a horrific and insane person was doing it.
Now it turns out, Gaiman was also doing it. But he didn’t need magic powers because he had real power.
He did have a Sandman story where a a writer who claimed to be a male feminist is raping a muse to be a good writer. Even the first time I read that years ago seemed a little on the nose, but I thought Gaiman was just making fun of himself in a dark way, and yeah I guess I wasn’t wrong.
I don’t see any echoes of a monster
I think it’s not possible to see that far. Ability to write good stories and ability to maintain ethical behaviour, they’re probably unrelated abilities.
For example, Yevgeni Prigozhin actually wrote decent children’s stories, but alas, his personal ethics didn’t prevent becoming Putin’s accomplice with a private military company.
if you want to spend time re-reading those books, might I suggest spending that time finding new authors that are more deserving of your time and attention? Yes the books were pretty great; yes this situation is awful.
Just, find new good books.
You really should. Sandman and American Gods are incredible, and he also occasionally dipped into trashy comic fare, also enjoyable. He’s one trait I guess comes from the comics he used to do, his best stories are all with other people’s characters. I don’t think he’s ever used a original character, they’re all like mythological tropes. Even supposedly original protagonists turn out to be Balder or some shit.
I think Mirrormask and Coraline were fairly original?
Not really up on his “kid” stuff, I could be completely wrong
We have to remember that Bill Cosby was praised for decades because he genuinely made the world a better place while being an utter sack of shit.
It sounds like (at best) some of Gaiman’s victims consented to some form of foreplay or sex and then rapidly found themselves on the receiving end of some brutal BDSM without consenting to it. If I were a woman reading this I would find it hard to ever trust any man, going into sex, even if I wanted to have sex with him. When the world’s most harmless-seeming man can suddenly become a punishing torturer in the sack, how can you ever know that a guy is safe until after the fact? Jesus.
This is why women choose the bear…
I’ve never heard it articulated quite like this before, but you phrase it well.
Men like this absolutely deserve to be condemned and shunned for what they have done, but that doesn’t also erase the good that they did before – nor does it preclude them from ever doing good again.
At the same time, any good they do does not erase or counterbalance the harm. Jimmy Savile, the UK’s worst celebrity paedophile who abused hundreds of children, conspicuously did a lot for charities throughout his career. He said that he knew God would look at all the good he had done and it would make up for the bad things. There was a calculus in which he only had to do more good each time he did bad, and it would cancel it out. It’s a twisted view. Harm is harm and is not changed by any independent “good” act a person does. But apparent goodness can change its significance in the light of the harm that accompanies it.
Savile’s apparent selfless good acts were actually a calculated attempt to win license to do harm, and a psychological coping mechanism to allow him to believe in his own basic goodness before God. Plus the reputation for selfless goodness served as a smokescreen to prevent people seeing clearly what was really going on, and to win the support and protection of powerful people. Seen this way, while the charitable works may have had some helpful effects, these were not genuinely good actions but in large part self-serving and an integral part of the dynamics of this man’s abuse.
I think the same applies to men like Cosby and Gaiman: the overt charity or the overt feminism changes its meaning when you see how it serves them psychologically and reputationally, amd how it may be a functional part of the whole abusive operation.
Matt Bernstein in a recent video (it’s long) discusses men who act as outspoken self-avowed feminists but then abuse their power to treat women terribly. The feminism may be genuine, but it may also be their smokescreen, or a mix of each, and when a man is very loud about being a feminist you have to look carefully to see which is the case. Some are genuine, but you have to ask. Maybe Gaiman was doing the feminist smokescreen, or maybe he’s just so messed up that these two sides of his life - the feminism and the abuse - just didn’t really encounter each other.
This explains so much. Read a book written by his very young wife. Now I get it and how fucked up he is.
