Why Hollywood loves Roman Polanski

In the news recently has been the behavior of Meryl Streep, who rightly castigated Donald Trump for mocking a disabled reporter, but then proceeded to applaud a lifetime achievement award for Roman Polanski, who has admitted what was more or less a forcible rape of a 13 year old, and has paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions, in compensation to her.

Now we could attribute this to the same moral blindness that leads most of Hollywood to love another rapist, Bill Clinton, or we could take a good look at the Hollywood tradition of the "casting couch."  It is, apparently, well known in the industry that a certain proportion of movie producers and directors use the desire for good parts to obtain sexual favors, and I remember reading that no less than Marilyn Monroe reported this use of the casting couch, and of course Tippi Hedgren recently reported the same of no less than Alfred Hitchcock. 

Whether or not Ms. Streep has been a victim of this practice (I personally doubt it), it is nearly certain that she knows of a number of directors, producers, and studio executives who have taken advantage of it, and just as certainly Polanski has the goods on any number of his colleagues if a suitable number of them turn on him. 

In other words, code of omerta  or mutual assured destruction may well be getting Polanski awards.  I have previously resisted the thoughts of conspiracy, but in this case, I've got to wonder if more is going on than "my tribe/your tribe" hypocrisy.