Dylan Farrow Forces Hollywood’s Powerful Women, Like Blake Lively, to Acknowledge Complicity

This photo was taken in 2016. Dylan Farrow’s open letter about her abuse ran in the New York Times in 2014.

With the recent formation of the Time’s Up initiative, Hollywood’s women, and their supporters, have been coming out of the woodwork to express solidarity and support. That is a very good thing. However, Dylan Farrow, daughter of Mia Farrow and survivor of alleged sexual abuse by her father, director Woody Allen, wants these women to acknowledge the ways in which they’ve supported abusers and allowed them to thrive.

Actress Blake Lively recently tweeted the following statement:

To which Farrow replied:

Um … yeah. About that.

When talking about this with regard to women, I always feel conflicted. I, personally, would never feel comfortable working with someone I knew had allegations of abuse or assault against them. However, I go back and forth on how I feel about women who choose differently. There are days when I get angry, and frustrated, and wonder how the hell a woman could throw other women under the bus for her own career opportunities. There are days when I see this as the worst kind of complicity. Complicity from the oppressed themselves always feels worse.

However, on other days, it makes me sad as I think about the fact that every woman, no matter how powerful, is oppressed in this system. Yes, of course, some women are more oppressed than others, and ideally, they should use any privilege they have to act on behalf of those who don’t. But I understand fear. And I understand that under oppression, it’s difficult to be brave while you’re also trying to protect yourself and survive.

I expressed as much in a Twitter conversation last month with Lexi Alexander, when she was tweeting about the topic of women, women of color, and complicity:

I stand with Dylan Farrow. I’d say I was boycotting Woody Allen’s films, but I’ve never been a fan of his films anyway, so a “boycott” would be pointless. And Farrow is ensuring that we continue having a very important conversation:

Where do we, as women, draw our moral lines? How can we protect, stand up for, and be of better service to each other? And how can we all find the strength and the bravery to put the needs of the many before the needs of the few?

Look, I’m a Trekkie, okay? I filter just about everything through Trek. Leave me alone.

(via Dylan Farrow on Twitter, image: magicinfoto/Shutterstock)

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Teresa Jusino

Teresa Jusino (she/her) is a native New Yorker and a proud Puerto Rican, Jewish, bisexual woman with ADHD. She's been writing professionally since 2010 and was a former TMS assistant editor from 2015-18. Now, she's back as a contributing writer. When not writing about pop culture, she's writing screenplays and is the creator of your future favorite genre show. Teresa lives in L.A. with her brilliant wife. Her other great loves include: Star Trek, The Last of Us, anything by Brian K. Vaughan, and her Level 5 android Paladin named Lal.

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