Optics and Misleading Equivalencies

Here is a tweet from Donald J. Trump, Jr.

As an FYI @SonyPictures has a movie with him dropping in a few days. I wonder if they will apply the same rules to @iamfonda that they did to @therealroseanne. I have a strange suspicion that they wont do anything. Please RT, we deserve an answer! https://t.co/j38NnlJKn7

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) June 20, 2018

This was in response to this horrifying, abhorrent tweet from Peter Fonda (which he deleted and then apologized for):

Sending this tweet was not just wrong, it was inexcusable.  

People call this a threat against Barron Trump.  Some say it isn't because he never intended to carry out the threat.  Sorry folks, but that's not the test as to whether or not it rises to the level of a threat as defined in the U.S. Code that makes it a crime to threaten to kill, kidnap or cause bodily harm to the family of a President.  This is from one of the cases where courts interpreted the law to mean that the intent of carrying out the threat personally is not required for conviction.

"This Court therefore construes the willfulness requirement of the statute to require only that the defendant intentionally make a statement, written or oral, in a context or under such circumstances wherein a reasonable person would foresee that the statement would be interpreted by those to whom the maker communicates the statement as a serious expression of an intention to inflict bodily harm upon or to take the life of the President, and that the statement not be the result of mistake, duress, or coercion. The statute does not require that the defendant actually intend to carry out the threat."

Here's another one.

Contrary to the dissent's interpretation of case law, the government is not required to establish that the defendant actually intended to carry out the threat. As the Second Circuit noted, "it is the utterance which the statute makes criminal, not the specific intent to carry out the threat...." United States v. Kelner, 534 F.2d 1020, 1025 (2nd Cir.1976). 

Will Peter Fonda be prosecuted?  I don't think he will, but it could happen.  

* * *

Now on to the comparison between what Peter Fonda tweeted and what Roseanne tweeted about Valerie Jarrett; made by Trump, Jr.  

He is comparing a television series that had the highest ratings on TV last season with a small indie film that is opening in limited release in only five theaters.  Only in Los Angeles and New York City.  I do not have any problem with people wanting to boycott this movie.  Unless my editor assigns me to cover it, I will not be seeing it.  Not because of the presence of Peter Fonda, but because it doesn't interest me.

I read a number of the early reviews of Boundaries.  Some of them didn't mention Peter Fonda at all.  Those that did make it clear that his role is very limited.

Roseanne's name was the name of her show.  The comparison is a misleading equivalency.  

All of the people who were involved in the production of Roseanne lost their jobs.  A number of them will apparently get them back in the announced reboot of the show, and Roseanne will not profit from this reboot.  

Should Sony Pictures Classic go back and reshoot a film to excise Peter Fonda's participation and replace him, as was done with All the Money in the World, where Kevin Spacey was replaced by Christopher Plummer (who coincidentally has second billing in Boundaries)?  Boundaries opens on Friday, June 22nd (tomorrow).  It is a tough call.  

I find what Peter Fonda said in his tweet to be worse than what Roseanne said in hers.  They are also not equivalent.  

Peter Fonda should consider donating his salary from this movie to a charity, as a further way of apologizing.