DELANO, Calif. (AP) — “That ‘70s Show” actor Danny Masterson has been sent to a California state prison to serve his sentence for two rape convictions.
Authorities said Wednesday that the 47-year-old Masterson has been admitted to North Kern State Prison, and they released his first prison mug shot. The photo shows him wearing orange prison attire, with long hair and a beard.
Let’s have some devils advocate! Everybody loves devils advocate. Just real quick before I start cooking, I just want to say that rape is bad and there’s no excuse. That’s important and I’m not going to use it in my examples. Murder though - that’s basically fine, I think.
A lot of crimes amount to one bad decision. A life of being a really good person and then one time you murder someone, then jail forever? (Well, yes, but actually no - first time offenders don’t get life in prison, even for murder.)
Even if you have a dark side that you’ve been keeping under wraps, that’s actually good! If there are people with dark sides, what we want is for them to not act on it - sociopaths, pedophiles - like, if we take for granted that these are conditions which occur in people and there’s no cure, what we want is for them to not act on it.
But, one day, you fail, your dark side gets out and you do one of the horrible things you’ve been trying not to do; then it’s easier to do it again, and again, and suddenly you’re a serial killer. 40 years of being good despite a very difficult challenge, to suppress that darkness, but the rest of your life, you’re judged for the few bad decisions you made in moments of weakness.
Let’s talk about Ebeneezer Scrooge. Tis the season after all.
That dude was a total dick for like 60 years, but, in the end of the story, he’s changed - it’s a redemption story. But his name, Scrooge, is a commonplace synonym which characterizes him as a villain; fuck his redemption, he lived most of his life as a dick, and we remember him that way.
So which is it? Do we judge based on most of their lives, or do we judge based on a recent set of decisions which severely depart from that? Or do we just go with whichever was worst?
When it comes to Ashton Kutcher, like, even a serial killer isn’t murdering literally every moment of their day. They have jobs, they go to the store. All that time, that person is being a good person, they’re suppressing their darkness. It’s easy to see a person in that light when that’s how you’ve seen them for basically your entire adult life.
That said, Ashton Kutcher is a rich TV star so basically all his opinions are invalid. He probably only helps victims of sex trafficking because his PR team thought it would be a good fit for his brand. Not to say he doesn’t like helping - I’m just saying fuck that guy. Fuck all those guys.
That was quite a journey, my friend. To address your central point, I’m certain a scenario such as you propose happens. However, the reality is most people commit far more crime than they are ever caught and tried for. Especially when it comes to rape which is one of the most under-reported and under-prosecuted crimes. I’m going by memory here so I might be wrong, but something like 3% of accused rapists get convicted. So worst case scenario, you or I could go rape someone right now and be virtually guaranteed of getting away with it.
It’s vastly more likely that this wasn’t a one-time thing, but the tip of the iceberg. Of course, we can’t be sure but statistics tells us Danny likely isn’t someone waging an internal war with a rapist who lost once. It’s also the case that once you commit a crime once, it becomes easier and more comfortable to do it again.
Of course if one of my friends was accused of rape, I’d say that doesn’t sound like them at all. After all, if I thought one of my friends was a rapist we wouldn’t be friends for long. But in terms of keeping people safe, it would be irresponsible of us to give people the benefit of doubt and hope they’ve learned their lesson. We would almost certainly be wrong.
But ultimately, Ashton should know that already. I will grant him that the statements written by him and Mila were given months before all the details were made public.
I think this is the most likely factor in why both Kutcher and Kunis wrote statements. They knew a friend was in court (who probably told them it was all crap and that they were innocent) and that their friend would benefit from a reference from someone well known who could vouch for their good character. So they did it to help a friend who they likely believed would be cleared of wrongdoing.
Then all the details came out and it became clear that he was probably guilty and statements were already sent. They could have requested them back but probably thought it wouldn’t make a difference in the result of the case and either didn’t worry about it for that reason or just tried to rationalize that they were standing by a friend because of the good old days when he wasn’t doing terrible things.
Yeah I think my final point about Ashton should’ve been more prominent - he’s just a TV star, he shouldn’t be our moral compass.
It’s great he’s contributing to this cause but his efforts are a tiny candle when compared to the efforts of the people his money is going to. He sits on a stage, looks handsome, and talks into a microphone about how you shouldn’t kidnap people and sell them into sexual slavery. He’s not holding anyone’s hair back while they vomit.
I’m not reading this whole novel, but
Rape isn’t “one bad decision,” it’s a continuous string of bad decisions the entire time it’s happening. Two rapes is certainly not “one bad decision.” Dude raped two women. That’s a pattern. He’s a serial rapist. He needs to die in prison before he inevitably rapes again.
Thanks.
My example was murder, which can be one bad decision. I talked about serial crimes and remorse and all that later - but none of my post was about forgiveness, it was about, specifically, why Ashton Kutcher might say what he did about Masterson.
What interests me about the topic, and why I made that post, is the interplay between redemption (eg Scrooge) and … whatever redemption’s opposite is (eg Masterson).