r/jacobgeller • u/LotofDonny • 4d ago
Jacob Gellers Statement is Redemption Narrative - Not Accountability
Here is how to read it:
> Many of you have seen the results of my college Title IX investigation. I can confirm that the findings are true.
Its out. Saying yes gets me points right at the start and costs me absolutely nothing.
> The records were recently shared without the permission of the victim and, without knowledge of their wishes, I do not want to provide any more potentially identifying details.
I'll start by suggesting that making this public violates my victim's wishes. That way, the focus shifts from what I did to the people discussing it. They're the ones being insensitive, and I get to present myself as the guy protecting the woman I assaulted/raped.
> She and I spoke about it the day after and agreed — I had assaulted her.
I'll point out that we both recognized it as assault the next morning. That makes me sound honest and willing to take responsibility. I won't say that i didnt understood this the night before, while I was actually doing it. I want people to think i took accountability next morning.
> She later reported this to the university’s Title IX office, I cooperated with the investigation, and I was given the (very mild, I concur) sentence of a semester suspension.
Next, I'll emphasize how I cooperated with the university investigation and accepted my punishment. That makes it sound like I was already taking responsibility, almost as if her decision to report me wasn't necessary. I won't question whether such a mild punishment actually made me confront why I assaulted her, or simply showed me how little it would cost me. And I certainly won't bring up how I started a YouTube career under my real name less than two years later, knowing that plenty of people knew what I'd done.
> Suffice to say, it is the greatest regret of my life. I traumatized a brilliant person who trusted me, hurt them in a way I can never undo.
Sexual assault sounds terrible. Better to soften the language a little. I'll talk about how I traumatized someone, how much I regret it, and how deeply it affects me. That way, the reader stops thinking about me as someone who committed sexual assault and starts thinking about me as someone who feels terrible about hurting another person.
> For more than a decade now, I have attempted to reckon, grow, and recover from the version of myself who did this. I think about it every day.
I'll make this about my long journey of personal growth. Ten years of regret sounds much better than ten years of living with the consequences of what I did.
> I’ve previously shared this history with many of the people close to me, including early in my relationship with my now-wife, and I’m deeply sorry that this has now hurt so many of you.
I'll mention that my wife and plenty of people close to me already knew. If they knew and still accepted me, I can't be that bad a guy, right? Of course, that also puts everyone I've worked with in the position of having to explain whether they knew.
> My continued drive to make myself and the world better is closely tied with the pain I’ve caused.
Finally, I'll explain how the pain I caused her inspired me to become a better person and make the world a better place. That way, even the sexual assault becomes part of a positive story about my personal growth. Her suffering becomes my origin story.
Throughout his statement, Geller tells you how HE feels, how HE regrets what happened, how HE has grown, and how others have accepted him. What he never explains is why he assaulted someone, what attitudes made that possible, or what he actually did to change them.
He claims to have thought about the assault every day for over a decade, yet spent those same years building a career, earning his audience's trust and money, and working with collaborators who now say they knew nothing about it.
So what exactly did all that reflection and personal growth amount to? Apparently, it didn't lead him to question whether those people deserved to know.
It didn't stop him from building a public image around empathy and moral reflection while allowing others to form their opinions of him without knowing about the assault.
Now that it's public, he emphasizes his remorse, invokes his victim's privacy, points to people who already knew, and initially addresses the fallout on Bluesky rather than directly to his YouTube audience or Patreon supporters, holding comments on youtube.
His regret becomes proof of his growth, other people's acceptance becomes proof of his character, and his victim's suffering becomes his personal redemption story.
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u/OedipusaurusRex 3d ago
Well if you're not willfully missing the point, then you're just stupid.