There is no filmmaker in the past few months who has been put in the media more than Roman Polanski, and it isn’t because he has a new film coming out.

Polanski was taken into custody in September at the Zurich airport for a crime he committed in 1977.

Since 1977, he has been a fugitive from America. When he won the 2003 award for Best Picture at the Academy Awards for his film “The Pianist,” Harrison Ford accepted it on his behalf.

I’m not here to scrutinize or to pass moral judgment upon the man. He committed the crime, and there isn’t a shred of doubt about it.

Additionally, there has been no musician who has garnered more publicity than Michael Jackson, particularly posthumously. Everyone is aware of both Jackson’s possible moral deficiencies and his significant contribution to music. I remember driving to school in high school and getting the updates on morning radio of what was happening in his trial.

Yes, Polanski pleaded guilty to statutory rape and Jackson was never convicted of anything, but as with O.J. Simpson, you would be hard-pressed to find people who think that they know everything in Jackson’s case.

Why do we look so favorably upon someone like Jackson and demonize someone like Polanski?

I think the reason is because someone like Jackson produces beloved, mainstream popular music, but Polanski is mainly popular in the film world. We are, in some ways, giving Jackson a pass because we can’t associate his moral shortfalls with someone lauded as one of the most significant pop stars of all time.

You can ask people all over the planet to name a Michael Jackson song, and most would be able to name at least one. However, if you ask people to name one Polanski film, you would have a hard time trying to find half as many people.

People crave the idea of condemning celebrities, but never celebrities who are that powerful or high-profile. Polanski is the perfect mid-level celebrity Americans love to hate.

Polanski is just famous enough to be in the spotlight, but not famous enough to draw any headlines beyond those of his crimes and the releases of his films. Though he has made some of the greatest films of all time, people are merely content to look at his crime.

Another reason for this could be that many people don’t think of a film director as someone who is famous. Directors work behind the scenes, and only if they are someone like Steven Spielberg do they really garner public acclaim.

The common public could watch his new film, “The Ghost Writer,” and not even associate it with Roman Polanski. But if the same people hear “Thriller” come on the radio they immediately associate it with Michael Jackson. When the public thinks of Polanski’s “Chinatown,” the attention is focused on Jack Nicholson because he is on screen instead of behind the scenes.

This provides a definite line between artist and art. Neither Jackson nor Polanski is right, and their art doesn’t justify their behaviors, but their art isn’t diminished by their questionable pasts.

There are distinct discrepancies among the public’s reactions to celebrities who get in trouble personally.

If you’re a rapper in trouble with the law, your records jump off the shelf, but if you’re Michael Phelps and you get caught smoking pot, you get crucified in the media and have to publicly apologize.

If you’re Tiger Woods with a series of infidelities, you face an endless storm of media scrutiny, but if you’re Paris Hilton with a sex tape, you get unprecedented popularity.

In the end, the public gets too excited about seeing celebrities fail morally. Media and paparazzi smother celebrities so much that they inevitably catch them at their worst. It is part of what celebrities get when they enter the business, but, in the end, it isn’t the public’s business.

Polanski and Jackson both have their moral downfalls, but it isn’t our job to judge. Every person has skeletons in their closet, and unless people want their pasts to run them into the ground, they should watch the fingers they point and the people they judge.

Peterson Hill is a senior in New College. His column runs on Wednesday. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/petersonwhill.