I love Michael Ian Black, but he's wrong in that Louis CK didn't serve any time. The idea that once someone serves time or some other legit retribution for being creepy assholes that they return to society and/or their profession in some kind of way is valid, but not doing stand up for a year or whatever is in no way enough.
What he does with him time is his prerogative, if you are offended by him and his actions (as we all should be), we simply do not support him. Do not watch his videos, do not go to his shows, do not book him for events. Do not give this man any revenue that he does not deserve. Simply saying he doesn't deserve to work seems ridiculous.
What would you guys think is an appropriate amount of time for these people to be out of the spotlight before they return to their jobs? Or do you think they shouldn't ever return to the spotlight? Is it different for Louis CK vs Aziz, for example?
The thing that pisses me off with Louis is that his story had a specific emphasis on his victims having their careers severely affected by his actions. As far as I'm concerned his future career is the least important thing for anyone to worry about. I mean he's rich enough to just retire, get some serious therapy/rehabilitation, and he can fuck off into anonymity forever and I'm sure he could still have a very nice life. Why he feels the need to get back in the spotlight is just bizarre.
I personally think it could be different for Aziz, unlike TJ Miller and Louie he didn't use his position of power to make women feel uncomfortable in the workplace, and also not that what he did was okay but a lot of guys don't have strong concepts of consent, but I don't have a clear cut this is what Aziz needs to do for me to be cool with him being back in the spotlight thing As much as I loved Louie I never want to see him again, I don't want the guy who was jerking off in front of women then making his entire standup "dudes are gross but now I have daughters, you know they have vaginas" continuing to profit from that, plus he had the audacity to make an homage to Woody Allen's Manhattan
Look who else is eying for a comeback... Matt Lauer tells fans, "don't worry, I'll be back on TV" after sexual misconduct allegations
Idk how anyone thinks Louis CK has “served time” in any way whatsoever when his comeback performance didn’t even include mention of the assaults he committed. If he isn’t willing to address it in some way in his act, and demonstrate that he has grown or god forbid even just self-reflected on how his career enabled him to assault people in the first place, he shouldn’t get back up on the stage at all. I don’t think he should be on the stage at all anymore, period, even if he were to address it in his act, but like, that’s at least a reasonable baseline that he failed and you’d think other comedians would pick up on that. To everyone saying “what, he’s not allowed to work anymore?”... in this line of work, yeah, he shouldn’t be allowed to work anymore. If his career and his position in the industry allowed him to assault people and get away with it and have his victims’ careers ruined, he can find a different fucking line of work or he can stay at home and be a shut-in.
Just to clarify my previous post, I wasn't trying to defend him getting back on stage or anything. I was just genuinely curious what peoples' thoughts were. Louis CK definitely shouldn't be back on stage, especially this soon.
If people stopped supporting Louis CK financially, stopped paying to see him do anything, stopped watching anything he is in, is that enough...? Like is the consensus that he would eventually go away, or is he too successful that he'd just keep showing up...? I assume if Matt Lauer tries to come back and enough people don't watch and his ratings are bad they'll pull the plug, but I could be wrong.
Louis sells out (sold out) stadiums before, and I would guess that a majority of the people that would fill up a stadium for him aren't aware of what he did. Or many wouldn't care. Some would think it's funny.
my coworker's friend got TJ Miller tickets and wasn't even aware he called in a fake bomb threat, so i def think people don't give a shit/don't know
To me it's not even about serving time. It's not like someone does something sucky and then society gives them a year to be out of the spotlight and then their year is up and they come back. It should be about doing the work and making amends and understanding how your occupation of space impacts others. I hate this idea that the passage of time means anything. Twenty years can pass but I need action. And the fact that Louis even did this tells me he doesn't get it still
Another factor with comedians specifically, they are telling very personal things to an audience. Knowing that the dark and messed up thoughts theyve had translated into concrete actions that directly harmed people makes it very hard to want to listen to them again. I don’t want to hear Louis preach about what people should do, he covered up his own abuse and doesn’t give a fuck about the people he hurt. Fuck him. I don’t want to hear Aziz talk about how dating with a phone is confusing, he actively manipulated a woman into a aggressive sexual situation because he could leverage his celebrity as power. Fuck him. They’ve lost all credibility as honest human beings, I don’t want to hear their jokes anymore.
I can't even imagine having something traumatic like that happen and for years, see the accuser constantly say "Those are just rumors" or "Those aren't real." Then once the tide turns, he finally admit the accusations were true and in less than a year, he's going to try to make a comeback. What a piece of shit.