If you haven’t had your fill of the “apologies” made by famous men accused of sexual assault and harassment, there is now a website dedicated to generating them.
The genius ‘Celebrity Perv Apology Generator’ creates random answers based on the depressing trend of the “non-apology”, where men deflect attention away from the allegation or say they don’t remember what happened.
The generator was created by journalist Dana Schwartz, who told HuffPost UK: “I just hoped to point out how these apologies have become mere lip service, like a frantic attempt to avoid facing real consequences.”
Schwartz explained the generator does not include specific apologies but is based “on the trends I’ve seen, from Louis CK to Kevin Spacey and on from there”.
She added: “It’s not that the apologies themselves are bad (although some are really, really bad), it’s that these people are only apologising now that they’re facing real consequences for the first time. It’s like these apologies are just a box to check at this point.”
“These people spent years denying allegations and gas lighting the victims—so it’s hard to imagine they’re coincidentally repentant now for the first time that there’s actually blowback.”
The generator model itself is a reminder of how predictable some of these apologies can be. As Vox Media pointed out, the generator also creates a more “honest version of some of the public apologies made by some of these high-profile men in recent months”.
It also nods to some of the problematic discourse around the issue of sexual assault, such as “the father of daughters” line, where men seem to only understand the value of women in relation to their own bloodline.
Here are some examples coughed out by the generator:
“As the father of daughters, I feel tremendously guilty now that the things I did have been made public. I imagined that any woman would have been thrilled to see a tiny penis peeking out from below my pasty, middle-aged paunch like the head of a geriatric albino turtle moments from death, and of course now I realize my behavior was wrong. In conclusion, I will do my best to learn from this situation, without reading anything or listening to anyone’s perspective other than my own.”
“As a person who was born in an era before women were “people,” I feel tremendously guilty now that the things I did have been made public. It was simply boys locker room talk, and of course now I realize my behavior was wrong. In conclusion, I will wait 2-3 years before reappearing in film and TV and just sort of hope you all forget about this.”
“As a male feminist, harassment is completely unacceptable, especially when people find out about it. It was simply boys locker room talk, and of course now I realize my behavior was wrong. In conclusion, I will not change anything about my actions or behavior.”