Tipping Point - Sexual Harassment In America

[mama cass]

Nick66 you're making me feel nervous - i'm not used to you agreeing with me

 

[Irvine511]

on a happier note, you're REALLY making me sad that we've postponed a planned trip to France this summer. it is a wonderful, wonderful country, and i was eating up every word you were writing about it.

*le sigh*

 

[Nick66]

Nick66 you're making me feel nervous - i'm not used to you agreeing with me

Yeah...and an endorsement from me won't exactly win you any points here.

But still, very high quality posts. I've really enjoyed reading your perspective, incredibly refreshing.

 

[mama cass]

There was an interesting article I read recently about the differences between American and French feminism (including Americans relative tolerance for women in some countries being forced cover themselves, and the French disdain for it)

this is an interesting one, as the French Left itself has been split over this issue, taking the burkini as an example, i.e., between those who feel that women should be free to dress as they please and wear the burkini if they choose to do so, and those who feel it shouldn't be tolerated in France as it symbolizes the oppression of women which goes against the values of the Republic...

 

[mama cass]

on a happier note, you're REALLY making me sad that we've postponed a planned trip to France this summer. it is a wonderful, wonderful country, and i was eating up every word you were writing about it.

*le sigh*

aw crap! hope you can get over here some time soon Irvine! xxx

 

[Nick66]

this is an interesting one, as the French Left itself has been split over this issue, taking the burkini as an example, i.e., between those who feel that women should be free to dress as they please and wear the burkini if they choose to do so, and those who feel it shouldn't be tolerated in France as it symbolizes the oppression of women which goes against the values of the Republic...

Obviously there's something to be said for countries and cultures being left to decide their own affairs, but that doesn't mean that those of us who are concerned with ending oppression of women world wide shouldn't feel free to speak out about it.

And there's also something to be said for adapting to the culture of the country you choose to live in. I'd never consider making the burqa, for example, illegal, I'm too much of a believer in freedom of speech for that. But I also understand the discomfort and even intolerance of the practice by people in France who view it as symbol of oppression (a sentiment I share). The fact that the left is split on this one has always puzzled me a bit. I understand the competing values...free speech, respect for other culture vs. wanting to empower women. But if your primary concern is the liberation of women as individuals, I'd think the choice would be easy. But given that there are many Muslim women who will embrace and defend the burqa, who am I to say?

Ultimately though it comes back to something you've mentioned several times...women's agency. If the practice is going to end, it will ultimately be up to the women of those countries to end it. The West only has the ability to make things worse.

 

[LuckyNumber7]

In France it's socially acceptable to whip out your testicles and put them on sleeping people at parties.

Or to show them during beer pong to distract your opponent.

 

[Nick66]

In France it's socially acceptable to whip out your testicles and put them on sleeping people at parties.

Or to show them during beer pong to distract your opponent.

And in Korea the kids play dong chim on unsuspecting adults (as anyone who has taught English there will tell you).

Behaviour that would probably result in one or two inquiries in most other countries.

 

[Irvine511]

In France it's socially acceptable to whip out your testicles and put them on sleeping people at parties.

Or to show them during beer pong to distract your opponent.

Was this not your American college experience?

Asking for a friend.

 

[mama cass]

am crying-laughing real tears!

 

[corianderstem]

In France it's socially acceptable to whip out your testicles and put them on sleeping people at parties.

Or to show them during beer pong to distract your opponent.

 

[LuckyNumber7]

The best part was that it was the university band who was hosting the party, during the summer.

This one time, at band camp...

 

[cobl04]

anitram - if i recall correctly, you're a lawyer right? don't you think that men should have the right to a fair trial and let the courts apply the sanctions? the whole trial by media/twitter is disturbing to me

IF WOMEN DIDN'T HAVE SOCIAL MEDIA TO CALL MEN OUT THEN IT WOULDN'T HAPPEN AND WE'D BE BACK TO WHERE WE WERE AND THE MEN WOULD BE PAYING HUSH MONEY AND GETTING NO REPERCUSSIONS FOR THEIR SHIT BEHAVIOUR AND OTHER MEN WOULD BE LEARNING NOTHING.

I maybe a bit sarcastic at times (something I know I need to work on, but I feel like I give as good as I get), but...damn. "Right wing commentator"...."pathetic"...and which woman am I arguing with about her own experiences? I thought I laid out my comments (in a discussion with antiram) reasonably, and you come back with this?

You know, Cobbler, you're an interesting case...it's almost like there's two Cobblers. I've seen you make some pretty thoughtful posts on here. A while ago, you made a long one about some Aussie band you had seen at a club (I can't recall the name), and how good they were and how much it moved you and how it was one of the best nights of your life in terms of listening to music. You were so effusive in your praise that a few people gave you (good natured) shit about it I think. It was fucking beautiful...your sheer enthusiasm made me go to Youtube and listen to them (they were pretty good, and had a lot of charisma as I remember). I was actually going to reply, or send you a PM about it, because it was inspiring to read something stated so passionately yet eloquently....when you want to be you can be good writer. But then you later went and said something like the above and I thought, "well, yeah....never mind"

Very kind of you to say! And there's been times when I've enjoyed your posts a lot as well.

This is not one of them. Now is the time for men to listen. You ignored the rest of my post (fair enough I guess) but why can't more men take the path I have chosen? Instead of getting offended, or defensive, or nitpicky, or self-righteous, or devil's advocate, why can't more men go 'hmm, I might just take this time to reflect on myself, listen to what women are saying, and then reflect on how we can make a better world'?

It seems that being a celebrity now renders women mute, powerless, and entirely without agency and dependent upon men to read their minds when hooking up with them in their Tribeca apartments. But at least there are internet publications that will run your story about a bad date with a wildly successful but possibly obnoxious male comedian.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/01/...ent.html?_r=0&referer=https://www.google.com/

Irvine, how you have fallen in my view. What a view to take away from this article. Instead of going on the defence, why don't we have a discussion about how a lot of the things mentioned in this article sound pretty awful?

All the women that I love and respect are saying that the article is rife with behaviours that they recognise, behaviours that have repeatedly throughout their lives made them feel uncomfortable.

It's really disappointing to read a post from a poster as thoughtful as yourself that reads just like every other centrist reactionary on twitter.

This is the kind of thinking I can't support. To make the claim that a man might be branded a sexual predator for asking a woman out or holding a door is simply a tactic to delegitimize a very serious and important movement, an effort to depict women who have spoken up as hypersensitive or misandrist. No one is looking to spin awkward flirting into Weinstein-esque predatory behavior.

Things don't exist in a vacuum, iYup. Surely human intelligence has developed enough that we can have nuanced discussions about both of these things.

Of course the holding the door open thing is silly - Larry David sent it up brilliantly in the season of Curb just gone - but now is the perfect time to talk all sexism and misogyny, from the extremely serious Weinstein behaviours to all the little things. Because the little things are what solidify the attitudes that lead to the big things.

 

[cobl04]

I think if you are talking about criminal sanctions, yes. But the court of public opinion has NEVER worked that way.

And even in the private workplace, if it is a well run place, there is no need for a man to go to trial to be sanctioned by Human Resources for sexual harassment. What happens subsequent to that action with respect to termination, going before labour boards or the courts is a separate matter. But I don't think the women should continue to be harassed until the guy is declared guilty by the courts.

I had a very astute law professor, who actually incidentally attended Yale Law together with Bill and Hillary and had some interesting insights, comment that we have come to expect the legal system to fix all of our social problems but that is neither what the legal system was designed to do nor what it is well suited to doing. The long history of sexual assault and harassment of women, which goes back to the beginning of time, can be dealt with in some extent by the law but that is really the last step, a blunt tool. What we are talking about now is how to change social attitudes, how to better raise our sons, how to look at structural issues within industries, etc. That should not be conflated with fair trials and criminal justice being doled out.

Separately I don't understand the constant references to Saint Meryl Streep. I have never written about her to my recollection, I don't watch movies because she is in them, hell I barely watch anything at all and have no idea how suddenly her name is being put forward as some sort of barometer for those of us concerned with sexual harassment. I don't give a flying fuck whom she supports, what she says or anything she thinks really.

Preach. I love your posts!!!

 

[Vlad n U 2]

I don't see what's particularly defensible about Ansari's actions - he's in his mid-30s and should know better, and especially when his work often concerns a lot of these very same issues. He's hardly a Weinstein-esque figure, and nobody is actually saying this.

 

[cobl04]

Exactly.

 

[Vlad n U 2]

Irvine, how you have fallen in my view. What a view to take away from this article. Instead of going on the defence, why don't we have a discussion about how a lot of the things mentioned in this article sound pretty awful?

All the women that I love and respect are saying that the article is rife with behaviours that they recognise, behaviours that have repeatedly throughout their lives made them feel uncomfortable.

It's really disappointing to read a post from a poster as thoughtful as yourself that reads just like every other centrist reactionary on twitter.

I think this sort of discussion has revealed some people's limits in their support for feminism. It's been fairly enlightening.

 

[anitram]

I think this sort of discussion has revealed some people's limits in their support for feminism. It's been fairly enlightening.

I would also remark that some of the same people who seem to be so vocally concerned about the men this is affecting and premature judgment and branding them as predators etc are the same people who would (reasonably and appropriately) point out anytime we discussed BLM or racism that it's a distraction to discuss how this affects white people and how the worst thing about racism for some is that white people who may not be racist are made to feel racist or branded racist. But when we are discussing the analogous situation with women as the victims suddenly there is much more leeway to be applied to men?

As a woman, it does leave a bad taste in my mouth.

 

[Nick66]

I think this sort of discussion has revealed some people's limits in their support for feminism. It's been fairly enlightening.

Well most people have limits in support of everything, including very laudable ideals. When you don't have limits, it's called extremism.

I'm a strong supporter of freedom of speech. But I recognise that it has limits...you can't directly incite people to violence, you can't distribute child pornography, you can't libel or slander someone, etc. If I was a free speech absolutist, and said that speech has no limits, and should be subject to no sanction, I'd be an extremist.

So depending on how you define "feminism", (and the definition has been the subject of some debate as of late) of course people are going to choose how far their support for it goes. If feminism means women should be treated equally to men under the law, with the same set of rights, I'm all for it. That should be a basic tenant of any society.

But the social media, "shut up and listen"/"always believe women all the time no matter what" feminism? Women as perpetual victims who should be treated as infants without agency feminism? Yeah, not on board with that. The latter in fact is the least feminist thing I can think of...and is part of the difference, for example, in American and French feminism (broadly speaking) that was being discussed earlier.

And yes, the discussion has been enlightening.

 

[cobl04]

But the social media, "shut up and listen"/"always believe women all the time no matter what" feminism? Women as perpetual victims who should be treated as infants without agency feminism? Yeah, not on board with that. The latter in fact is the least feminist thing I can think of...and is part of the difference, for example, in American and French feminism (broadly speaking) that was being discussed earlier.

This is you projecting, and not at all rooted in reality.

This movement is giving women the agency to call out things that have made them feel uncomfortable at best and assaulted or killed at worst.

How you are wrapping this up any other way is beyond me.

 

[Nick66]

How you are wrapping this up any other way is beyond me.

I might just take this time to reflect on myself, listen to what women are saying, and then reflect on how we can make a better world'?.

What you have to allow for and consider is that people can do that and still come to different conclusions than you. Someone not agreeing with you doesn't mean their opinion is ill considered.

If even feminists in France and all across the world have different take on this than you do, have you considered that maybe your opinion isn't necessarily the correct one? Or at least the only reasonable one? Maybe you should "shut up and listen" to women who don't agree with your take on this. There's not a single, monolithic view on what's right here. For example, you've agreed with anitram, but implicitly disagreed with women on here who are taking a different POV. Shouldn't you "shut up and listen" to them as well? Or is it just the women whose opinion you share?

I'm not trying to have a go at you...just asking you to consider you might not be necessarily right...as you've asked me to.

 

[cobl04]

As I said above, all the women that I love and respect - my partner, friends, feminists who I've followed online for years now - share the same opinion of that one article from one French feminist. That it is victim-shaming and gives men an easy out, and that all its points are very easily and objectively dismissible.

Catherine Deneuve is 74 years old and from an older generation. She grew up having these things be socially acceptable. An entire generation of women are now saying that this is no longer acceptable.

Germaine Greer, one of the world's most iconic feminists, is 78 and shares the same view. To treat her as some sort of authority, when she's had many of her views widely criticised, like her view that "you can't cut your balls off and pretend you're a woman", is bullshit.

 

[iron yuppie]

Why exactly France is being presented as some kind of bellwether on sexual ethics is beyond me.

 

[Nick66]

If you think this POV is limited to Deneuve and Greer, you're very much mistaken. And I think if you look you'll find there's much greater diversity of opinion this issue than you suppose, across women (and yes, men) of all generations and nationalities.

Why exactly France is being presented as some kind of bellwether on sexual ethics is beyond me.

And the world should look where? To America? A country a few generations away from puritanism? (and seems to want to go back there). No thanks.

 

[anitram]

What you have to allow for and consider is that people can do that and still come to different conclusions than you. Someone not agreeing with you doesn't mean their opinion is ill considered.

LOL.

Coming from you.

 

[cobl04]

Well let's listen to everyone and not have anything ever change then. Great. Sounds good.

 

[Irvine511]

Irvine, how you have fallen in my view. What a view to take away from this article. Instead of going on the defence, why don't we have a discussion about how a lot of the things mentioned in this article sound pretty awful?

All the women that I love and respect are saying that the article is rife with behaviours that they recognise, behaviours that have repeatedly throughout their lives made them feel uncomfortable.

It's really disappointing to read a post from a poster as thoughtful as yourself that reads just like every other centrist reactionary on twitter.

i think this is a little overdramatic, but i appreciate the kind words about previous posts, and I'm sorry i've let you down, but i'll attempt to explain myself further.

as you know, i have sex with men. i dated men. i've been "Grace." literally, almost everything she's talked about i've experienced in some form or another. i am not unfamiliar, particularly when i was a younger gay man figuring shit out, that older men can be somewhat predatory, that occasionally you stop in the middle of something, or at the end, and wonder what the fuck you are doing and how you got there. and, sometimes, i enjoyed that. imagine that -- you can enjoy being a sex object for an evening! you are empowered to turn down a sex pest as well.

***and it goes without staying that all this happens OUTSIDE the context of work, as it did with Ansari. the workplace is an ENTIRELY different situation.***

but the main thing is that there is no crime here. there is no imbalance of power here, unless we're going to assume that being a celebrity male gives you a power that leads women to say yes when they really mean no. there is also no due process, no privacy, swift rushes to judgment, and i think we'd be naive to think that, with the benefits of online anonymity, that some bad actors won't take this movement as a chance to air grievances and ruin careers.

for what it's worth, i believe her. but i don't agree with her.

all this behavior is indeed regrettable. he sounds like he was a jerk. but i didn't need to know ANY of it. this is not my business, it is not your business. it's gossip and hearsay, and also probably true. this is the airing of dirty laundry, of a date that went poorly when an entitled, selfish celebrity treated someone not well. and i also believe that women have agency, that many women would have ended the date, or, you know, not consensually received and reciprocated oral sex. or, if they did, at least understood how that was going to be perceived, and then not described it in lurid detail to a website as "THE WORST NIGHT OF MY LIFE."

what bothers me most about the presentation of "Grace's" story is that sex is something that men do to women, that it's men who hold the power in any hook up and must read minds. it is precisely the fact that i am a feminist (and have identified as one since the mid-90s, i was in a gender equality club in high school and talked about rape culture to other sophomores who looked at me like i was crazy) that i find this situation exactly what #metoo needs to not be doing. training men to be better is one thing, but training women to be assertive and speak up is another, because if you don't do both, all the power stays with men.

 

[cobl04]

but the main thing is that there is no crime here. there is no imbalance of power here, unless we're going to assume that being a celebrity male gives you a power that leads women to say yes when they really mean no. there is also no due process, no privacy, swift rushes to judgment, and i think we'd be naive to think that, with the benefits of online anonymity, that some bad actors won't take this movement as a chance to air grievances and ruin careers.

for what it's worth, i believe her. but i don't agree with her.

all this behavior is indeed regrettable. he sounds like he was a jerk. but i didn't need to know ANY of it. this is not my business, it is not your business. it's gossip and hearsay, and also probably true. this is the airing of dirty laundry, of a date that went poorly when an entitled, selfish celebrity treated someone not well. and i also believe that women have agency, that many women would have ended the date, or, you know, not consensually received and reciprocated oral sex. or, if they did, at least understood how that was going to be perceived.

what bothers me most about the presentation of "Grace's" story is that sex is something that men do to women, that it's men who hold the power in any hook up and must read minds. it is precisely the fact that i am a feminist (and have identified as one since the mid-90s, i was in a gender equality club in high school and talked about rape culture to other sophomores who looked at me like i was crazy) that i find this situation exactly what #metoo needs to not be doing. training men is better is one thing, but training women to be assertive and speak up is another, because if you don't do both, all the power stays with men.

Very thoughtful response

I agree that perhaps there is no ‘crime’ here. I agree with that.

But what the women in my life are saying is that it doesn’t HAVE to be a crime for it to be a big deal.

That’s the discussion we need to be having.

My partner’s take: “As much as the Aziz Ansari thing upsets me I'm very glad it's come to light because people are talking about coerced consent or consent when it's not really wanted to be given and that's such an important conversation. I really hope it will open a lot of people's eyes.”

I am very, very uncomfortable with yours (and others) comments like “i also believe that women have agency, that many women would have ended the date, or, you know, not consensually received and reciprocated oral sex”. I have spoken with women in my life about this very thing. They have been in situations where they has performed such acts consensually when they never really wanted to. And such comments like that completely dismiss those feelings, and that’s really unacceptable.

Yes, maybe some bad actors will take it opportunistically, but they are going to be a very small percentage, and we absolutely should not be giving them equal weight or men the benefit of the doubt, because then we are back to square one.

Maybe it is gossip and hearsay, but if it’s not aired, then when will men ever look at their own behaviour and try to be better?

 

[cobl04]

(I don't mean to attack you or devalue your own experiences here, by the way. I've seen maaaany people say similar things.)

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

Women definitely need to be assertive and speak up. There is still that socialization that men can't quite understand or experience in the same way. That he won't like you if you do, that men won't like you, that you have to make him happy. I'm long past the age where I give a damn about any of that. But I was 22 once like that woman. She liked who she thought he was and who she projected he was. Been there, done that. Still do it when feeling very vulnerable.

But I just read that Babe article and I believe she did mention about her movements being restricted. I'm really tired so maybe I'm wrong-but that makes me very uncomfortable. I believe in making these matters very honest and verbal. That's not "unromantic", it's not a mood killer. And it's empowering for everyone. But I'm not her nor was I in her situation.