The story left the impression of a man horribly damaged and deranged by childhood abuse. Not an excuse but I think it does answer the question of how he could not know the lines he was crossing. He wasn't allowed to have them himself.
I haven't yet read the article but thank you for putting this here + like this. It does not excuse anything and explanations are often not enough, but "there is no good picture" is often the case when we pull out wide enough.
And it's just true that so often people at the center of these kinds of situations aren't able to pull out wide enough on their own. Also true that sometimes they can and just don't want to.
He knew he had trauma. He refused to get real help for it. Writing an allegorical book isn't healing. He knows what is wrong. He's written about it. He just refuses to face it in himself. And others suffer for it.
Trauma is hard. Actually healing is hard. You are right about all of this. I ended contact with my parents over refusal to self-reflect on their trauma. I still love them, even if they never loved me. I just can’t give them access to me anymore.
As a huge fan of Gaiman...my heart hurts with you, dude. People suck. Sometimes they're the people we trust to not suck, and that makes them suck harder.
<3. And fwiw, yeah there's a lot of awful floating around right now but also a lot of goodwill and care from people who desperately want to do something helpful right now. So direct concern and care to the victims, absolutely, but if it happens that some comes your way, well, it's not pie.
It's a bad idea to idolize public figures. That doesn't mean you can't love and admire them, but expecting them to be perfect will disappoint you every time. That's different from finding out something like this about a friend, someone you thought you knew. I'm sorry you're going through this.
Thank you for sharing. I’m grateful, for the first time, that Terry Pratchett is no longer with us, as I hate to have to imagine how he would have felt about this. And I’m resentful that part of his work - Good Omens - is now forever tainted by association. 💔
I don't blame anybody who knew NG professionally & counted him a friend for not speaking out or denouncing him or whatever. You're on the periphery, yeah, but you're still processing hurt. FWIW.
I’m sorry that you have had to go through the personal pain of wrestling that friendship vs horrible behavior dichotomy. No one was owed your post, but your words standing up to his behavior are important, and I’m glad that you have been able to get to a place where you can state it openly.🥰
It's all so awful, and I've been upset for days.It's not just the shadow that will always be on his work for me,but falling for a public persona that seemed so good. It's like if we found out Mr. Rogers drowned puppies.
Thank you for posting this - I'm sorry your friend turned out as he did. I notice a few people have sent cat pictures. Since I don't have a cat, here's a picture of Ridley auditioning to be Long John Silver's parrot.
Thanks for sharing this. I know you didn't have to. (You have a word missing about halfway through. I think it was supposed to have "him" in there somewhere.)
Just in case you mean to direct press to this statement: "and I thanked for it when". I realize this is overly unnecessary feedback. Chalk it up to me being deep in a heavy proofreading phase of my own book.
Taking into account how this news hit me without actually knowing the man, I can only begin to imagine how it must be for someone who counted him a friend.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this, and as we say in Dutch: “Sterkte!”.
Great explanation of how complicated these things are. I think many of us will or have faced similar situations. I have and you have just helped me understand my own experience.
I don't read SF, but I do follow you because I enjoy reading your posts. That said I'm sorry you and others are going through this. Since I'm not sure what I can do to fix or alleviate stress or pain, I've enclosed a picture of my cat Wrathion.
I’ve been going through a similar situation with a person in my life and … omg so much empathy for you and others in your shoes. It’s so messy and heartbreaking in all the ways.
Covid forced a lot of people to show their hands, and a lot of long friendships and acquaintances were thrashed to bits. It still hurts, finding someone you thought you knew, even with their flaws, was so much worse.
I thoroughly admire your approach to this. There seems to be a lack of acknowledgement anymore that you can care for and admire someone, have been supported by and supported them in return and still be willing acknowledge the flaws in them and believe they should be held accountable for their deeds.
Thank you for taking the time and brain cycles to share. I’m sorry that you’re hurting. It’s a different hurt than many of us are feeling, and I’m sure in many ways worse, but thank you for understanding and acknowledging the pain his former-fans feel.
I've gone through this. It's the right thing to do, but, damn--it hurts. There will always be a tiny kernel of my heart that will call me Betrayer. May your heart be kinder to yourself than mine.
Thank you, John. As usual, you’ve been able to clearly express what a lot of us are going through, even if we’re just fans and not friends. It’s certainly an icky situation and difficult to parse.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this, John, which despite what shouting jerks on the internet are all clamouring to say, you don't actually owe anyone. But we appreciate it all the same.
Be well. Good luck getting that deadline dealt with quickly. Ignore the hate, we all know your character.
I'm having a lot more trouble coming to grips with separating author from art with this than with JKR. With her it's just terrible opinions. This is actions that directly hurt others. I'm not sure I can be as willfully blind in this case.
I mean just for the record, it's way more than opinions with her. She has influence, and actively donates to groups that are doing active harm to marginalized & emotionally vulnerable people. That doesn't detract from the rest of what you're saying, but it bears keeping in mind. There is no "just."
She's directly hurting groups of people she doesn't have to look in the eye, and he hurt individuals one at a time. I'm not sure that hair is worth splitting, frankly.
Psychologically, there’s a large difference. The degree of social impact is only really arguable from a Benthamite perspective; we can’t rightly quantify human suffering.
In terms of what we know about human behavior and how easy it is to hurt people situationally, one-on-one abuse is harder.
I've already settled on not giving him (or her!) another penny, so no new ones. What I'll do with the ones I have....unsure. Maybe in a bit I'll feel like rereading and then we'll see.
I was thinking about this. For me, I think it's because I don't really associate JKR with her writing. I never followed her closely, I just enjoyed the world she built. So it's upsetting, but not devastating. But Gaiman's public persona is more deeply tied to my love of his work.
As you said, “fucking same.” I’ve been turning this around in my head for months, and ultimately came to the same conclusion about “best case scenario” still being very awful - it’s magnitudes of bad the whole way down. I can’t find the right words beyond this, so I’ll end with thanks for posting.
Also, FWIW, I think working things through privately first is the healthy and sensible way to do this,especially as a public figure. The internet is a place that will take stuff posted as a gut reaction asgospel truth forever, even if you become more nuanced later.
I mean, I feel quite betrayed, and I'm just an avid reader of his books. (Or was, I guess. Not sure how that will pan out. No new ones for sure.) But as somebody who was actually friendly with him it must be so much worse. *hugs*
Sad to hear about this whole mess, always admired his writing skill and style, gutted that it's come out he's been a shit person to a lot of people, and accused of worse.
that selfishness has robbed the world of words worth reading, unwritten or unreleased, or retracted, and that's also tragic.
Anyway, he was admired, revered, and put on a pedestal, and I think that's always a mistake. We're all fucked up in one way or another, and artists tend to be more so for a variety of reasons - not the least of which is coping with fame and success, tripping over ego if that happens. Ugh.
This is great of you, John. It had to be painful AND a pain in the ass to write. "Yes I considered that, Internet Stranger. YES, I'm aware of that angle too. Yes. ..."
Much respect for this, and regrets for the loss of a one-time friendship.
Thanks, too, for you're setting an example for men not necessarily in the public view to stand up and speak out, because there are others out there who do these things and nobody says anything.
It's hard being a friend. You can control nothing and influence very little and because humans are complexly stupid there remains the deep capacity for depravity and shame. Not a defense, just an observation from someone who has been friends with challenging people.
I'm happy to hear that you didn't feel pressured to do this publicly until you were ready, as well as obviously being sorry that we all found that someone who many of us had admired, and who had been a friend to you, was also a unacceptably disgusting and abusive person.
Been having long discussions on separating artist from art. Dickens,Gauguin, Picasso treated women badly. Good artists.Alice McDermott allowed a monster to prey on her daughter & neighborhood girls. Considered good artist.Don't know the answer. Great artist wrote Lolita but I can't read that shit.
As I posted before, I donated money to meet Gaiman. Because of the delays in the Kickstarter film, I never did. Now I don't want to. As Seth Rogen said about George Lucas, there's a reason you should never meet your heroes.
Sometimes your heroes are worth meeting. You won’t know until after the fact. But I find it dangerous and unsettling that people are so quick to distance themselves from the humanity of evil.
Of course we don’t want to be associated with it, but we need to recall that we’re capable of it, too.
Thank you, John, for your transparent and open assessment of where you are at with this situation. As a huge fan of both you and Neil Gaiman, your comments were helpful to me in sorting out my own feelings about Gaiman's situation. Nuch respect to you. 🙏
I had no idea what to think or what it was at the time, but Xeni Jardin called him a "bad person" and I had no reason to distrust her. I had been waiting since that time to find out what she meant, and now I think we know.
Sorry people are being shitty to you John. I think most of us have believed in a relationship that turned sour, and some more painfully after years and years. How many people owe their careers to Weinstein and had no idea? It’s gonna be a long couple years, you are a bright spot.
Although we're more aware of generational trauma these days, it's still startling to read such a specific ethnography of it. From the early days of Scientology, no less. My heart aches for the victims.
We are all affected, in a way. Still, your words are comfort.
Once had a friend. Met her as a band meeting a club owner; very sweet and took a liking to our band. Played her club regularly. Lead singer moves into her spare room when he needs a place to live. Then Detectives come and arrest her for a 10 year old triple homicide. You never know, til you do.🥴🤷🏼
Description: Gorgeous calico cat perches her fuzzy backside on a piece of expensive watercolor paper while contemplating reaching out to smear the still-wet bright red paint comprising a cherry atop sundae (that probably took a very long time to paint).
What does one do in the face of so much harm? A female survivor of “man with power refusing to accept the equal humanity of others,” how do I to find a way forward other than endless rage and submergence into feelings of futility? Witnessing your confusion and grief eases the isolation. Thank you.
I have struggled with this too. All I can say is that over time the rage has mellowed- still there but I can't give it that much attention anymore. I chose to focus on the things I love and on serving my community in ways that don't feel futile. Let your feelings exist as long as they need to. ❤️
You keep waking up. You give yourself reasons to be happy and people who have chosen to keep showing up. Day after day, you enact tiny pieces of a plan.
You have to want freedom enough. And you still have to feel the loss, hard. If you don’t do both, you might die.
Good point about the absolute best case scenario being deeply messed up. That's when I knew there was going to be more coming out, as "sexing an employee on day 1" is not something you just do out of the blue.
As a fan, I'm not so much sad but disappointed. This is someone I thought was an ally to women. Instead, he's a predator. I cannot begin to fathom how you must feel as his (former) friend and colleague. Thank you for writing this piece. 💔
Yeah I wouldn't remain friends with him either. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on our continued relationship with Gaiman's work though. I still love it all so much. And people who've worked on adaptations of his stories shouldn't suffer because of his personal behavior. Right?
This is always the crisis fans face: Death of the Author. How easily can we/should we be willing or able to separate the art that has moved and enriched us from the deeply messed up person who made it? In the end we can only use our own conscience to guide us to whatever decision we make.
Nope. Both-side-erism isn’t needed. Society already leans too strongly towards forgiving and supporting the rapists while vilifying and further traumatizing the victims. He could have spoken to the person who wrote the Vulture article but he chose not to.
The fact that he thinks it was consensual means, despite all that work he claims he's been doing since the first revelations, he is blind to his own predatory actions and the harm he has done to others. The fact that he admitted hitting on the 20-something nanny to John is proof.
People's moral stances are none of my business because, duh.
But I admire people publishing their thoughts about moral choices. Again, the reasons are none of my business, but shared moral thinking helps everyone work through stuff.
Sometimes I don't think of all the angles on my own.
I'm not sure how I would deal with finding out someone I consider a friend has done some really gross stuff. That's just not an easy situation for anyone to deal with, and I don't think there is a "right" answer.
I've never met him, but from his online persona, I always got the feeling that he'd be among the first to recognize the crimes and stand up for the victims if it were any other predator. That was certainly the image that he cultivated, and is a large part of why so many feel his betrayal so deeply.
It's easy because, in part, he doesn't see himself as a predator, so he never projects that vibe. He genuinely seems to have believed all of these 'encounters' were fully consensual. A big part of this is that he's from a generation that was just barely taught "no means no". So if a woman is too1/x
He has written quite a bit about rape. In Calliope in fact theirs a character who rapes a muse for his ideas while presenting himself as a feminist. He knows what he did.
surprised or shocked or frightened or overwhelmed to articulate a 'no'? The assumption will be that she is saying yes. (I also remember 'silence implies consent' being tossed around a lot in my teen years.) And of course, he probably did have many encounters that were superficially the same--2/x
he moves in aggressively, she yields--that were completely consensual, because there were a lot of women (and, probably, a fair number of men) who would be fine with being bedded by him. From his perspective, there's little difference between those two types of encounters. But to the victims, of 3/x
course, it's a world of difference. This is why the idea of 'enthusiastic consent' needs to be drilled into young men. We need to more aggressively teach them that an accidental rapist is still a rapist. 4/4
This is not a case of misunderstanding. He knew what he was doing, or he’d have not tried to silence his victims with NDAs. And nobody, no matter their age, rapes someone until they pass out because oopsie, crossed signals. That’s not a thing.
I have to disagree with the "generation" thing. There are plenty of people older than him who recognize that his predation is appalling. And he never hesitated to condemn this exact behavior when other people were doing it.
You don't have to feel guilty about not realizing his other side earlier. Predators can be very good at hiding that they are predators from anyone other than their prey.
p.s. I am on the opposite side of point 3. I really hope that you are not like this as I enjoy your books and agree with your public opinions on a lot.
Thank you so much for this. As an author myself I admired NG. It almost felt like he was my friend too. I asked for his advice once on tumblr and he responded almost immediately. I know it's not the same, but it feels like I've just lost a friend too. Grief, anger, disappointment.
I just wanted to say that this is what I'm feeling for you and all those in your position: 💔. As for the actual people hurt, even more. Thank you for taking the time to post, though I don't think you owed anyone that either; hang in there.
It has been a difficult time for many who knew one persona and couldn’t reconcile the person they thought they knew with the public face, or even the semi-private portion they were presented. I appreciate your courage in speaking out, it has to be uncomfortable and unpleasant.
It's just refreshing to see a man publicly and unconditionally condemning predatory behavior of another man in his field. If we saw more of this, perhaps it might have an effect on predatory behavior.
I think this story is a good example of why it's unlikely work that way. Gaiman lacked internal controls but his writing clearly shows someone who understands what society expects.
Bingo. You want to see less sexism, you have a responsibility as the non-marginalized group to get out of the way. Same for race, queerness, disability etc. Advocate but understand that you are not the expert, just the messenger to more bigoted groups.
I feel for everyone who has been hurt by this -- first, the immediate victims. But also for everyone like you, friends and loved ones who had no idea. We don't do enough to acknowledge the wider swath of harm caused when an otherwise-beloved someone turns out to have a truly dark side.
From friends and family to people who lose parts or all of their income -- in this case, everyone from the actors and writers to the crafts table people who were slated to work on a Gaiman show.
I don't want to return to a world where the Louis CKs and Neil Gaimans face no consequences; OTOH, it would be marvelous if we could at least mitigate the peripheral economic harm of those consequences.
The same w/Kevin Spacey and "House of Cards," though that didn't go as well. But those were/are shows with lots of other talents involved. When a creative business arises that depends on a single person -- Woody Allen, Gaiman -- that's a different animal.
Gutted at the revelations. Gutted for the victims. And I'm gutted for you, and all the folks having to pick up the pieces and deal with the fact that a person they called 'friend' deceived them, used them as cover, and hid his true nature from them.
I went through this some years ago. Mercifully, the friend hadn't done something even close to the things Gaiman has done, and in the end, I supported him in getting help. Still, it was a dark moment, and not everyone agreed with my decision. Shit's hard.
I know some folks who know & have worked with him, and have been thinking about them a lot. Appreciate your helping me understand what they might be dealing with.
Non per farmi gli affari tuoi (e chiedo scusa in anticipo per l'indiscrezione nel caso) ma pensi di scrivere qualcosa a riguardo? Da quello che vedo Gaiman non sembra essere così popolare in Italia, ma non so, io ci vedo una bella storia di rivalsa (di classe e non solo femminista)
Thank you for this. Your words helped to condense the morass of mixed emotions I had. Now I mostly feel grief. Grief over the loss of such an important part of my life, and in how I became who I am. But grieving is the start of moving on. Thank you for that. Thank you for being you.
Twenty odd years ago, a friend of mine assaulted another man at a party. He did it in the hall, so several people pulled him off the victim.
We'd been friends for years, and we ended up waiting an hour for a taxi together. I tried to explain that what he'd done was wrong, and he kept justifying it.
I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. When something like this happens, it's like death while the person is living. That person wasn't really who you thought they were and it's a terrible loss. When it's added to what he did to others you start to think your loss doesn't count, but you still mourn
Really meaningful to read this, John—as someone who also knew him socially (albeit far less well than you) and feels fucking weird & sad & bad as a result, I so appreciate your openness & honesty & your acknowledging of the messiness of feelings and... yeah I dunno, I just wanted to say thank you.
Thanks for sharing your process. I think so many have had to deal with similar issues, ie the revelation that people, friends or otherwise, that we'd placed on a pedestal at some point, turning out to have a whole other side. Your ability to explain how you have been working through it is helpful.
Your first paragraph nails it. If the question is "is Neil Gaiman a sexual predator to the core," then he admitted it from the start.
The other allegations are meaningful and important and credible, but he's completely conceded the point about what he is. He's just too much of a predator to notice.
He was a huge influence on my writing and I'm so sorry that you've had to deal with a peer that you admired and considered a friend. Be kind to yourself. Many hugs.
Comments
I'm very sorry and sad for all of this.
🫂
As far as the show goes, he and his production company were booted from it almost 3 months ago.
I hope you are able to find some peace and spend more time being the non-public side of yourself. 🫶
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this, and as we say in Dutch: “Sterkte!”.
We need men such as yourself to move the conversation forward like this.
Be well. Good luck getting that deadline dealt with quickly. Ignore the hate, we all know your character.
In terms of what we know about human behavior and how easy it is to hurt people situationally, one-on-one abuse is harder.
(Though I’m baffled at the notion that you’re somehow implicit in Gaiman’s behavior.)
that selfishness has robbed the world of words worth reading, unwritten or unreleased, or retracted, and that's also tragic.
take care
Thanks, too, for you're setting an example for men not necessarily in the public view to stand up and speak out, because there are others out there who do these things and nobody says anything.
Which makes it even more cruel and thoughtless, because it makes potential harm to other people about themselves.
Of course we don’t want to be associated with it, but we need to recall that we’re capable of it, too.
We are all affected, in a way. Still, your words are comfort.
You have to want freedom enough. And you still have to feel the loss, hard. If you don’t do both, you might die.
Find a fuel that burns clean.
Folks, if you've read one you should read the other.
All I will say is that trial by media is a bitch.
https://journal.neilgaiman.com/2025/01/breaking-silence.html?m=1
And I know who I believe.
My dude, take your apologetics elsewhere.
But I admire people publishing their thoughts about moral choices. Again, the reasons are none of my business, but shared moral thinking helps everyone work through stuff.
Sometimes I don't think of all the angles on my own.
As a survivor of SA, I believe other survivors first. If he doesn’t remember things happening, did they not happen?
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Be well.
I went through this some years ago. Mercifully, the friend hadn't done something even close to the things Gaiman has done, and in the end, I supported him in getting help. Still, it was a dark moment, and not everyone agreed with my decision. Shit's hard.
We'd been friends for years, and we ended up waiting an hour for a taxi together. I tried to explain that what he'd done was wrong, and he kept justifying it.
I've never spoken to him since. It does hurt.
Although I imagine it hurt the victim a lot more.
Thank you for doing the right thing. Speaking out is what shuts these abusers down.
The other allegations are meaningful and important and credible, but he's completely conceded the point about what he is. He's just too much of a predator to notice.