“But if we get rid of all the paedophiles, we won’t have any estate agents/plumbers/accountants left!” wailed literally no one ever. And yet, this plaint is regularly repeated when it comes to artists accused of abusive behaviour, even now, after everything. Because, really, how can we possibly expect people to make decent music without committing some casual sexual abuse?
Last week, the New York Times published allegations of psychological and sexual abuse against navel-gazing indie bore Ryan Adams, all of which he denies. Several women, including his ex-wife, Mandy Moore, claimed Adams’ behaviour put them off the music industry. One young woman, referred to as Ava, said she and Adams started having Skype sex when she was 15 years old. “If people knew, they would say I was like R Kelly lol,” Adams allegedly wrote to her. Lol.
Up until now, my main feeling about Adams, whenever I heard his name on the radio, was irritation that he wasn’t the clearly far superior Bryan Adams. But it turns out that to other people Adams is not just a singer: he is the whole of music.
“If Ryan Adams can be ruined for his creepy behaviour, most of rock will go down with him,” was the headline on one column last week, as if that were a bad thing. I guess I missed the meeting where it was decided art matters more than people. “I’m inclined to think you can’t make good art without being a flawed human being,” the column concludes. It’s not just the artist who must suffer in the name of good art, but those around him, apparently.
A similar argument was made recently about the director Bryan Singer, after the Atlantic published multiple allegations of child abuse against him, all of which Singer denies. When asked if this gave him pause about producing Singer’s next film, Red Sonja, producer Avi Lerner dismissed the story as “fake news” and added, “The over $800m Bohemian Rhapsody has grossed, making it the highest grossing drama in film history, is testament to his remarkable vision and acumen.” Yeah, what are a few child sex allegations next to a massive pile of money? After some people suggested this was not an appropriate response, Lerner apologised and Red Sonja is now, to use the industry euphemism, on hiatus.
Last year’s 100th anniversary of Egon Schiele’s death sparked arguments about the artist’s personal life and art. Schiele spent time in prison after having sex with a 13-year-old; he was never tried for rape but was convicted for exposing the children who posed for him to pornography. When the New York Times described him as an abuser, some were outraged. “Schiele’s sexual escapades were fully in keeping with the norm for a bourgeois young man [in early 20th-century Austria]”, the Art Newspaper insisted. But given the controversy that Schiele caused in his own lifetime, including being driven out of one town for his relationship with a teenager, this seems debatable.
“Oh, but it was the 1900s/the 60s/the 70s! Everyone was doing that then!” the defenders always cry. Yet only, really, in regards to men in the entertainment or creative industries. In her bestselling memoir, An Education, Lynn Barber describes how she was abused by a 27-year-old man, Simon, when she was 16 and nowhere did I see any reviewers argue, “Oh, but that’s OK, it was the 1960s!” Because Simon wasn’t a celebrity but a dodgy property developer, his proclivity for shagging a teenager didn’t suggest creative depths. It just proved he was a creep who caused a young woman significant damage.
The idea that you can’t make great art without being an accused abuser must come as a surprise to pretty much every single female artist in history. Dusty Springfield, Joni Mitchell and Dionne Warwick managed to make decent albums without anyone suggesting they had sex with minors, despite being around in the apparently bacchanalian 60s and 70s. When I hear people argue that dodgy sexual behaviour is forgivable for some, I’m reminded of The Favourite, in which the aristocracy can have sex with whoever they like, but the servants cannot. The persistent deification of (male) artists has created a new kind of aristocracy.
It has also convinced too many people of the infallibility of their heroes. Michael Jackson’s fans have reacted with the reasonableness one has come to expect of them to news that Channel 4 will screen the documentary Leaving Neverland, which accuses Jackson of child abuse. As a result, television station bosses have reportedly had to beef up security. It’s the celebrity version of the kind of hysterical partisanship we see now across the political spectrum, in which certain kinds of supporters of everyone from Trump to Corbyn instantly dismiss any criticisms as “smears” and “conspiracies”.
Those of us capable of holding two thoughts in our head simultaneously know that people can do great work and also bad things. “Does this mean I have to throw out my record collection?” music fans cry in outrage, to which the answer is: it’s up to you, dude – no one gives a good goddamn about your music tastes. We’re just trying to make a world in which those who say they were abused are taken as seriously as celebrities. Maybe even more so.
• This article was amended on 6 April 2021. Egon Schiele was never “acquitted of rape”, as an earlier version stated, as he was never tried on rape charges. This has been corrected.
