Re my comment upthread, I think Hilton went in to this with the attitude that nothing ever happens that her money or status won’t cover. She has seen her celeb peers walk away from this sort of thing repeatedly with minor inconvenience. I’m sure she was quite shocked to be treated like a common criminal.

One of the many myths of the patriarchy is that women get off easier with law enforcement and the courts. The facts don’t bear it out, but the myth persists. Prior to determinate sentencing in this state, it was not unusual for a male judge to sentence a woman to prison for a crime that commonly received probation. Further, they often stated during sentencing that they did it to ‘teach her a lesson’.

Yeah, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more than a few homeless women who would be willing to the spend 45 days in there, in place of her.

The lesson Paris Hilton just learned is that she will not be treated the same as male celebrities are treated.

Hold on a minute. I thought the principle was that “all are equal in the eyes of the law”. Now, obviously, we know this isn’t true, but I certainly don’t remember it saying “all celebrities are equal in the eyes of the law”. We know how Hilton’s sentence compares to the other celebrities mentioned above: it appears to be approximately comparable to DMX’s sentence, and more lenient than Busta Rhymes’s. Had Hilton pleaded alcohol addiction, she might have got off with rehab as Baldwin did. We don’t know.

But you can keep cherrypicking examples of other miscreant celebrities and their sentences all day, and I’m sure Hilton’s legal team would be very grateful if you did. On the other hand, how does her sentence compare to the average handed down in that jurisdiction for that offence to, say, unemployed black men aged 21-34? Or to prostituted women? Or to illegal immigrants? Or to the average of all defendants?

Perhaps a few celebrities have come off very lightly in their run-ins with the law. That’s a problem, no doubt about it. And I don’t doubt that thebewilderness is right in saying that some judges take pleasure in teaching women a lesson, though bearing in mind the wealth of statistics showing that black people are prosecuted and sentenced disproportionately in the US you might illustrate an even wider legal trend by comparing DMX’s sentence with Baldwin’s. But it seems to me, looking at Hilton’s lengthy history of driving violations, intoxication at the wheel, and open disrespect of probation, that the bigger picture here is that she has actually evaded justice for a very long time.

She may well evade it again now. With the legal team she can finance, the chances of her actually making it to the clink, or staying there for more than two hours, are pretty low.

The judge’s summing up was very clear: he thought that Hilton had deliberately disregarded her probationary notice because she wanted to continue to drive. There was no indication, in any of his remarks, that he held any opinions on Hilton qua woman. There was an indication that he thought she was rich and overprivileged: when prosecutors asked him to impound her car, he refused, saying that “I think she probably has about five other cars”; he then apologised for this “facetious” comment. So perhaps he was biased against Hilton qua rich brat. If anyone wants to jump up and down shouting “Judges are prejudiced against the rich!”, this may be your one and only chance.

In the meantime, I am completely with Thealogian and kathy a, and the judge, and have little sympathy for the wilfully negligent drunk-driving heiress. I actually think that 45 days of thinking time and contact with people who aren’t all spoilt brats with private incomes might do her a world of good.

I don’t diss Martha; she did what only men had done before her. Made a couple million on what women do/did. I give that to her.

what i have a lot of trouble with is the idea that paris hilton has somehow been unfairly hung out to dry. the fact that some celebrity guys have gotten away with worse does not make her a poster child for feminism. poster child for wretched excesses of the ruling class, maybe.

this woman was raised on a pedestal; she clearly believes that her people should just make annoyances [like the consequences of her conduct] go away. she easily had the means to avoid problems — drivers, alarm clocks, listening to her lawyers. it’s not like she had to drive her fancy car at twice the speed limit in order to save her sainted mother’s life in an emergency.

you want to create more fairness in the world? giving more poor women half a chance to support themselves and their families legally would help. support education. support reproductive rights. support humans who are struggling in the hundreds of ways they do to survive. but pul-eeze, don’t waste precious energy crying for paris hilton. 45 days of bad food and no internet access is not gonna kill her.