Shia LaBeouf and Jonathan Majors: Double Standards, Anyone? Unraveling Hollywood’s Curiously Different Responses to Assault Accusations.

Who could have guessed? Recent events in Hollywood have once again drawn attention to the fact that all is not fair in love and Hollywood.

Tinseltown home is a buzzing hive of rising and ebbing careers, influence pedaling and publicity. If you can do well there, you can achieve unimaginable wealth and prestige.

But if you get into trouble, don’t expect equal treatment from the ruling powers in their well-appointed executive boardrooms and rambling studio sound stages. This town has its own standards, and they are neither fair nor equal.

Take the cases of actors Jonathan Majors and Shia LaBeouf, and the curiously different ways Hollywood has responded to them recently.

Majors and LaBeouf share a rare distinction: they both face serious legal actions accusing them of abusive behavior against a former spouse or partner.

Majors, praised for his performances in films like Lovecraft Country and The Harder They Fall, is facing domestic violence and assault charges from a March 2023 incident with ex-girlfriend Grace Jabbari. Majors denies the charges, and says that it was Jabbari who attacked him, not the other way around.

Majors had been a rising star in Hollywood circles, but upon his arrest, his career began a downward spiral.

According to industry news outlets, in the wake of Jabbari’s accusations, the U.S. Army pulled commercials in which Majors was appearing. His ads for the Texas Rangers were discontinued. His invitation to a major fashion event, the Valentino Met Gala, was withdrawn.

And just when he thought it couldn’t get much worse, his talent management agency, Entertainment 360, cancelled him.

Other potential opportunities also evaporated, according to reports. These include a starring role and production job in The Men In My Basement and a role in Otis Redding’s biopic, Otis and Zelma.

Despite Majors loudly proclaiming his innocence, the industry’s response against him was fast and hard.

Contrast that to the case of actor/producer Shia LaBeouf.

A former Disney Channel child star, LaBeouf had like Majors built up a promising career over the past few years. His performances in films like Honey Boy, Transformers, and more garnered positive reviews from key industry critics.

In December of 2022, however, disaster struck.

LaBeouf was sued by ex-girlfriend-singer FKA Twigs for sexual battery, physical assault and infliction of emotional distress. According to a statement by Twigs, LaBeouf had a history in their relationship of engaging in verbal and mental abuse, belittling and berating her, events which often culminated in violent physical attacks.

If you think that sounds even worse than the behavior attributed to Majors, you’d expect that Hollywood decision makers would throw up their arms in disgust and turn their backs on him, right?

Not at all.

Despite the accusations and the details that leaked out, LaBeouf found himself with a potful of new opportunities. He was given the title role in Padre Pio, ironically the story of a 20^th century Italian saint, plus a major role in Francis Ford Coppola’s work, Megalopolis, which is scheduled for release sometime in 2024.

Not bad for a guy accused of actions that some consider even more serious than those faced by Majors.

But here’s the kicker: LaBeouf actually confessed on Jon Bernthal’s podcast that he had “hurt that woman,” meaning Twigs.

He admitted it publically for all the world to hear. He did some time in rehab. He beat his breast with everyone who would listen, asserting his profound remorse and doing everything he could to put the career-threatening Twigs accusations behind him.

Majors, on the other hand, to this day continues to assert his innocence. Yet while he struggles to knock down new roles and his career spirals down, LaBeouf somehow gets lucrative offers that inevitably boosting both his wallet and his influence in powerful circles.

Is there a double standard here? You be the judge.

Hollywood isn’t exactly known for its consistency. Many believe that their responses in these two cases are influenced by the fame of the individuals involved, their leverage at the box office, and the weight of consequences within the entertainment world.

Their response rarely dwells on guilt or innocence. Sometimes the evidence is enough to end a career (Bill Cosby comes to mind), sometimes it is not (LaBeouf, apparently).

That said, in the public consciousness there is still this little thing called fairness. Hollywood needs a more consistent and equitable approach to addressing abuse allegations. It is hardly fair to victims like Twigs that they suffer just because her assailant confesses guilt or remorse.

Accountability should leave no room for bias—the facts must speak for themselves.

Twigs will get her day in court in April of 2024 unless LaBeouf offers to settle first—a good idea, maybe? He has, after all, confessed to hurting Twigs. Yet in the three years since the case was filed, he has shown no signs of making amends.

Ultimate, a judge will consider the evidence on its own tangible merits, not on the merits profit-seeking Hollywood influencers would like to give it. Until then, abuse victim Twigs continues to suffer from her frightening experiences with Hollywood’s golden boy, accused abuser Shia LaBeouf.

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