No Pity for Sex Abuse Victims

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kaylagrl

Guest
#1
British actor/comedian Stephen Fry has little pity for sex abuse victims apparently.


Stephen Fry criticised for telling self-pitying abuse victims to 'grow up' | Culture | The Guardian


He commented "“There are many great plays which contain rapes, and the word rape now is even
considered a rape,” he said. “If you say: ‘you can’t watch this play, you can’t watch Titus Andronicus, or you can’t read it in a Shakespeare class, or you can’t read Macbeth because it’s got children being killed in it, it might trigger something when you were young that upset you once, because uncle touched you in a nasty place’, well I’m sorry.
“It’s a great shame and we’re all very sorry that your uncle touched you in that nasty place, you get some of my sympathy, but your self-pity gets none of my sympathy because self-pity is the ugliest emotion in humanity.
“Get rid of it, because no one’s going to like you if you feel sorry for yourself. The irony is we’ll feel sorry for you, if you stop feeling sorry for yourself. Just grow up.”

He recently married his young gay lover.
 

blue_ladybug

Senior Member
Feb 21, 2014
70,860
9,579
113
#2
And when he contracts AIDS from his young gay lover, he'll be crying the same self-pity for himself, that he's showing now for others. :/ Just saying..
 
C

coby2

Guest
#3
I bet he was abused himself or his friend.
Watching porn at a young age is also abuse. Heard one guy talk like that who was a porn addict and got addicted as a kid. Told him it was abuse and he told me to shut up because it was true.
 

sharkwhales

Senior Member
Jan 31, 2016
280
25
28
#4
The title suggests he doesn't care about abuse victims, but the quote says "you get some of my sympathy, but your self-pity gets none of my sympathy because self-pity is the ugliest emotion in humanity."

Self-pity is a real problem which obstructs the recovery process. It's like a person after a car accident who refuses physical therapy and instead prefers the wheelchair. In the context he's talking about, people pitying themselves become defined by their trauma and then use it as license to attempt to control free speech and public spaces and make it all about their pain. Rather than try to recover and overcome the pain, the pain becomes an entitlement for them not to listen to anyone else and not care about anyone else. Ultimately contributing to narcissistic humanist ethics.

There are good ways and bad ways to comfort ourselves after a trauma. Even if his lifestyle is wrong, it doesn't mean he's wrong about this.
 
K

kaylagrl

Guest
#5
The title suggests he doesn't care about abuse victims, but the quote says "you get some of my sympathy, but your self-pity gets none of my sympathy because self-pity is the ugliest emotion in humanity."

Self-pity is a real problem which obstructs the recovery process. It's like a person after a car accident who refuses physical therapy and instead prefers the wheelchair. In the context he's talking about, people pitying themselves become defined by their trauma and then use it as license to attempt to control free speech and public spaces and make it all about their pain. Rather than try to recover and overcome the pain, the pain becomes an entitlement for them not to listen to anyone else and not care about anyone else. Ultimately contributing to narcissistic humanist ethics.

There are good ways and bad ways to comfort ourselves after a trauma. Even if his lifestyle is wrong, it doesn't mean he's wrong about this.

Quote "t might trigger something when you were young that upset you once, because uncle touched you in a nasty place’,"


Seems pretty condescending to me. People who have gone through sexual abuse deserve our understanding. Fry is not qualified to make a comment on sexual abuse victims.nor when they are able to get over pity. Someone who is abused as a child has had their lives changed forever,their innocence taken away,they can never be the same again. Yes they can heal but "suck it up buttercup" is hardly the cure for what ails them.
 

Desdichado

Senior Member
Feb 9, 2014
8,768
837
113
#6
On balance, I agree with Fry. The thrust of this criticism was over what the culture of victimhood has done to discourse.

He could be more understanding of people who were truly hurt, but it seems his frustration largely rests in when people take their victimhood and use it as an excuse to ban a valuable expression of ideas.