Rapey Smoke, Rapey Fire: Conor McGregor Convicted For? You Guessed It: Rape!
That irrepressible Irish cut-up, star of stage and screen, was finally called to account for at least one of the brutal rapes he's been accused of. Does anyone care?
“Shorty just tried to rape me!”
Lisa ran in, breathless, pupils dilated. Angry.
“Nooooo…” The chorus of male voices, laden with doubt, triggered a wholly predictable response.
“You guys are FUCKED!”
We were sitting on the concrete stairs that led up to 2 + 2, a Lower East Side club/squat. It was at the height of the first generation New York hardcore days, noteworthy in how different they were from the New York punk rock days. The main difference being mostly a willingness to believe in the transformative powers of violence.
That is, those who had been running from ass kicking in 1977-78, were now, in 1982, delivering them. That didn’t change the calculus though as Lisa screamed and fumed and the gathered men excused the now-absent Shorty.
“Out of all of the things she could have come in here and said, why would she say that?” I asked.
See, I had thought it through. Shorty had already been known to have raped a girl, a junkie, in Tompkins Square Park. While none of us had actually witnessed this, it did constitute a prior.
“Let’s find him,” Bubby had finally said, and we set off to do just that. After bouncing between a few of the better known drug spots where he was likely to be found working his trade, we finally found him.
My take on rape, specifically, and sexual assault, generally however, would forever be framed by having to witness a rape. When I was 10.
For those who have already read my memoir, the story end is familiar. For those yet to read it, we’ll just cut to the chase: street justice was administered in a swift and wildly brutal fashion, stopped only by the presence of drug dealers with guns who had no interest in their block drawing more cop heat. Barring this, death would have most assuredly found him.
I think of this often, more often still in this Age of Rape where everyone is raping everybody and more importantly, sometimes, the malefactors are socially redeemed by shrugs, exculpatory explanations, and the kind of generalized doubt displayed on the stairs of 2+ 2. My take on rape, specifically, and sexual assault, generally however, would forever be framed by having to witness a rape. When I was 10. Or having endured an assault when I was 11.
So like Bud in James Ellroy’s LA Confidential, my take would also always and now, forever, be tinged with a murderous impulse to stop them that are more powerful from predating on those that were not. But in this season of Bill Cosby, Harvey Weinstein, Danny Masterson, Donald Trump, Matt Gaetz, Andrew Tate, Diddy, Matt Lauer, Jeffrey Epstein, and the list goes on, and disturbingly on, the rule that reason had dictated was the exception, has returned to being the rule again.
Witness: Mixed martial artist, actor and now-convicted rapist Conor McGregor.
Witness, even more closely, someone from his Straight Blast Gym in Ireland in an email to me in response to my having publicly called McGregor, Accused Anal Rapist Conor McGregor: “Come by so we can shovel more shit down your shithole.”
You see, despite all of the Alpha male chatter about free speech, some is valued and some is not and my response to him was as it’s been to many/any others who have challenged me to fights over the most threadbare of concerns: “Next time I’m in Dublin I will stop by so we can see if beating my ass actually results in your boss raping fewer women.”
Which was met with radio silence. Kind of like the vast majority of Mixed Martial Arts “press” one member of which had the audacity to spin the story of McGregor’s conviction as him declaring his innocence while talking up the fact that his co-defendant had been set free. No mention of the fact that a few days ago he was finally convicted of one of the few rapes he’s been accused of.
“Next time I’m in Dublin I will stop by so we can see if beating my ass actually results in your boss raping fewer women.”
However, mainstream media articles that have discussed his case have also mentioned the fact that the woman bringing the charges also had her partner stabbed, in order to, perhaps, encourage her to drop the charges. Then “they” set her car aflame. Which are totally the textbook steps taken by those who are completely innocent.
McGregor has, for his part, embraced the Trumpian-Roy Cohn reactive attack that has become rote for rapists. He attacked the court, the proceedings, his accuser, and like OJ Simpson, seemed to indicate that he is the real victim here, and he’s looking forward to redress and eventual vindication.
And the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) whose president Dana White, most recently seen seated next to Trump at a UFC in Madison Square Garden, less than 12 months ago was also filmed punching and kicking his wife on New Year’s Eve, on video, has been amazingly quiet on the whole imbroglio.
It seems not so much that we’re knee deep in rape culture now but that without rape we have no culture. The upswing of threats against women a la the “your body, my choice” cry of the newly reconstituted he-men-women-haters-club is just the tip of a much more gooned out iceberg that seems to posit the idea that since male elevation is so hard, it’ll settle on the depression of the female.
This is not just some white-knighting on my part either. The only person to tell me that the unconscious woman raped by Stanford athlete Brock Turner was drunk (hence the unconsciousness), as though that could comfortably explain her rape, was a woman (a mother of three sons).
Moreover there’s also an epidemic of not-big-deal-ism that colors this discussion as well where the line between consensual and rape is seen as being “pleasantly” fuzzy for many. These many might consider prison life to bring it all a little closer to home if they need to recast their understanding of what happens when penis meets resisting anus.
Meanwhile the rapist McGregor while bleating out claims of his innocence is appealing the civil judgment that has him owing her a paltry sum of $259,000, and much more quietly watching to see what the ocean within which he swims does. With an estimated worth of $200 million, McGregor need not be concerned about cash anymore but that doesn’t seem to be what interests him at this point anyway.
What seems to interest him, weirdly, and I say weirdly given the number of times he’s assaulted not only women, but old men, phones and buses, is something having a little more to do with reputation. It’s almost Rosebud-ian his unspoken desire to revisit the early years’ run up with its universal acclaim and love for the plucky little Hibernian who with a wink and smile displayed the kind of It-Factor that made many who saw him say he was destined for stardom.
Well, that’s long gone. Along with the spots on late night talk shows, the TV commercials, the movies with Jake Gyllenhall, the red carpet opportunities to punch people like Machine Gun Kelly, the love of the people, a village of other fighters, all of it. Leaving? Cash. Mostly just cash. And the disappointment of loved ones. All of which he most definitely earned.
And all of which he probably could have done without ever leaving Dublin in the first place. Which is perhaps the real issue to begin with. You can take The Rapist McGregor out of Crumlin, Dublin, but taking the Crumlin, Dublin out of The Rapist McGregor? Maybe not the easiest.
Will the waiting world welcome him back though? Early indicators sadly seem to suggest a healthy maybe. Lao Tzu famously said that a journey of 1000 miles begins with but a single rape conviction, or some such thing, but hope springs eternal here. At least until my scheduled ass beating at SBG.
OK…So you have ordered the memoir A Walk Across Dirty Water and Straight Into Murderer's Row, from Amazon…Or the Bookshop.Org dealie: Here?
Might you consider giving it a review in either of those places?
I’ve been told it matters, somehow. So please: review away! Unless you think it sucks. Then, maybe, just keep that part to yourself. At last count there were 72 reviews…so yeah…GET AT IT!!! Every one helps, if everyone helps. Or so they tell me.
If you’d like to book a book show? Please DM.
And FINALLY the new BUNUEL is creeping out….be about it. ON SALE DATE is OCTOBER 25, 2024. For digital. Vinyl, CD and cassette? November 22.
And now THIS…the monster live. For starters. This February. Be there. And if you were planning on going to ROADBURN in 2025 know that we’ll be there TOO.
You can refer to him as confirmed instead of accused from now on!