I often wonder if abusive people are drawn to the arts, or if a certain amount of notoriety just makes people turn to shit. I am involved in a lot of different art scenes, and every single one has a whisper network about some big names who nobody feels they can address directly.
How many times have I been naked in the dressing room when someone came up to me and said "Hey, just so you know, try not to ever be alone with [insert name of the HEADLINER]. He's a known sex pest." How many times have I had a project fall apart because the big name attached to it was a creep.
The thing about whisper networks is that they don't reach all potential victims, and it's often the ones who are left out who are most vulnerable. The newbies in the scene/industry. The unpopular ones. The ones who don't have a lot of connections.
(My partner left an am dram group partly because he asked why everyone was white, and was told that yes, some people had shown up for auditions, but they just hadn't seemed that into it, you know? I left the local queer women's group after the response I got for asking why everyone was cis and gay.)
