Harry Mens has little compassion for the alleged victims of Ali B. He points out that after one of his alleged rapes, Ali called a taxi for the lady in question. “That’s neat.”
The abuse riot around The Voice of Holland makes little impression on Harry Mens, he shows in The Friday Move on BNR Nieuwsradio. “I think it’s all old fashioned. It happened three or four months ago, I believe. The light goes out softly and time heals many wounds. We are about to go into the holidays and then it will be almost the end of the year.”
Harry defends Ali
In Tim Hofman’s much-discussed Voice documentary, Ali B is portrayed as a predator who surreptitiously invades the private sphere of young women and then abuses them. Several young ladies who told their story stated that he put them in a taxi after the alleged abuse.
Actually quite neat, thinks Harry Mens. “The circumstances under which it happened… I mean: Ali B went to bed with a lady and the practice is that he did his best and she also did her best, she stayed behind for a while and then she went home by taxi. She could also have driven to the police station.”
charming rapper
Harry questions Ali’s alleged victims. “If Ali B is very charming with such a girl and she goes to bed with that man, then she could have walked away three times and she won’t. Then he neatly calls a taxi, saying: ‘Hello honey!’”
Presenter Wilfred Genee stunned: “He still calls a taxi neatly?!”
Harry: “Yes, then she could have driven to the police station.”
Five daughters
Unbelievable, Wilfred thinks. “But Harry, you have five daughters. If that happens to your daughters, then you don’t talk about it so easily, do you?”
Harry: “Well, my daughters have hair on their teeth. They won’t let that happen. They’ll throw that guy out before he’s in.”
Sébas Diekstra, who assists several Voice victims – not Ali B’s incidentally, says: “Yes, but Harry: let that happen… Not everyone reacts in the same way.”
Harry: “It depends. Look, when you’re sober, nothing happens at all. But they’re going to drink, they’re going to do coke, and then you get that kind of theater.”
‘Goes very far’
Sébas: “Yes, but that’s not this, Harry. ‘Make it happen’ sounds like you’re asking to be a victim. That goes a long way.”
Harry: “It doesn’t bother my daughters.”
Wilfred: “There are other women who do suffer from it.”
Harry: “Obviously they are…”
Wilfred: “Now you are almost going to say that those women are guilty of the fact that it happened.”
Harry: “You won’t hear me say that, but they’re busy with their careers and on the one hand they want to be famous…”
Wilfred: “And then you just have to tolerate that other people abuse it?”
Harry: “I’m not saying that.”
Unempathetic
Harry thinks the alleged Voice victims have behaved strangely. “They could also have packed up their stuff and stopped participating. Finished.”
Wilfred: “Yes, but Harry, it’s all so one-sided from your point of view. Those people have a dream and then that dream is finished, huh?”
Harry: “That’s right, but what should you choose? A dream or being insulted?”
Sébas: “But Harry, that is of course very unempathic reasoning. Those girls can’t resist in any way.”
Harry: “Then you come home, then you tell your father and your mother, then the old man goes over there and he beats that guy for his ass and then he says: ‘You can’t go there anymore.’ Finished.”
Fragment
The excerpt in The Friday Move: