can’t even bypass our knowledge of what he’s done. We can’t bypass the stain. It colors the life and the work. Does the stain go so far that it touches the child who will become the monster? And what about that child’s own experience of having things done to him? As my critic friend pointed out, the child MJ grew up in an exploitative milieu. That exploitation travels through time too—travels forward. We call it causality. We yearn for a reason behind the terrible acts of men, and we rest in the explanation. We tell ourselves: MJ’s crime grew out of his exploitative childhood; Polanski’s crime
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