This is what I was afraid of

Two weeks ago I wrote Androphobia: Fear of Men.
It got an interesting mix of responses. Some responses amounted to saying that I was over-reacting. To which my response is "I'll believe my own lying eyes over your opinion. Thank you very much."
Then today I saw this article.

Now the cascading accusations were reaching deep into the heart of the mainstream media. Charlie Rose … Matt Lauer … Mark Halperin … even liberal outlets like NPR and the New Republic were not spared. For that matter, not even the New Yorker and the New York Times were spared: At the Times, star political reporter Glenn Thrush is under investigation, and the New Yorker has just fired its star political reporter, Ryan Lizza, over “improper sexual conduct.”

Some of these cases were clearly and inexcusably abusive – the actions egregious and the corroborating accounts damning.
Others, however, were less clear.

OK. That's to be expected.
But keep reading.

Normally when a publication decides to fire a reporter for cause, it does one of two things: It quietly announces their departure without stating a reason, giving the reporter some room to find another job; or, when the malfeasance may have impacted the reporting, it announces exactly why the person was fired, publishes the results of the internal investigation, and makes it clear which stories are being corrected or rescinded as a result of the reporter’s misbehavior.

The New Yorker did neither; after what appears to have been a fairly brief investigation, it announced that Lizza was a sexual abuser, but left the rest of us to guess at what sort of abuse might be involved. Lizza, meanwhile, says: “The New Yorker has decided to characterize a respectful relationship with a woman I dated as somehow inappropriate. The New Yorker was unable to cite any company policy that was violated. … This decision, which was made hastily and without a full investigation of the relevant facts, was a terrible mistake”.

Tavis Smiley of PBS reports a similar experience:

PBS launched a so-called investigation of me without ever informing me. … Only after being threatened with a lawsuit, did PBS investigators reluctantly agree to interview me for three hours.

If having a consensual relationship with a colleague years ago is the stuff that leads to this kind of public humiliation and personal destruction, heaven help us. The PBS investigators refused to review any of my personal documentation, refused to provide me the names of any accusers, refused to speak to my current staff, and refused to provide me any semblance of due process to defend myself against allegations from unknown sources. Their mind was made up. Almost immediately following the meeting, this story broke in Variety as an “exclusive.” Indeed, I learned more about these allegations reading the Variety story than the PBS investigator shared with me, the accused, in our 3 hour face to face meeting.

Now, I don’t know the truth of Smiley’s or Lizza’s cases; I don’t have enough detail to form an opinion. And yet, that in itself seems disturbing. It seems safe to say that few of these men will ever work in journalism again; there is a blacklist, and unless they can conclusively clear themselves, most of their names are on it.

Just like I said two weeks ago, you don't date, flirt, or do anything that can ever be interpreted as informal with a female coworker. Not anymore. Not unless you want to risk destroying your career.

Blacklisting people so cavalierly is hard to defend. But with “believe all women” the order of the day, that’s effectively the new regime we’re looking at. No outlet wants to be deemed insufficiently concerned with sexual abuse. And even if a company were willing to endure the public outrage, its lawyers seem likely to advise against it. After all, if you hire the guy who got accused of sexual harassment, and he does it again, the company is going to be on the hook for a whole lot of money.

This is what I was talking about before, when the woman lawyer described what sexual harassment was in a legal sense. She wasn't lying and she wasn't wrong.
If the woman feels uncomfortable then it's sexual harassment. End of story.

That's how employers approach it. It's about liabilities, not right and wrong.
What is actually true is secondary in importance. It costs them virtually nothing to destroy a man's career, but it could be a huge risk to stand behind him.
What do you think an employer is going to do?

Some people don't want to believe that, but that's on them.

Ultimately the norm of reflexively believing every accusation, and meting out harsh treatment to every man who is accused, does grave harm to the cause of fighting rape and harassment. #BelieveAllWomen elides the messy reality that women, like the rest of humanity, aren't always telling the truth—and that even when they are, their interpretations of events is not always the most reasonable one. If we reify too many weak or false claims, the norm will quickly slide toward "believe no women."

That's where she is wrong. We are a long, LONG ways away from "believe no women."
That day may arrive one day, but it probably won't arrive during the remaining years of my career. In the meantime, men better get used to the new normal.

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@Deja @Deja

though I did send in yesterday.
I am not angry, but this business is discouraging to me.

as to "comment" to Jtc.
it does seem that things went south very quickly.

I wasn't real clear. in the comment I saw Jtc directed himself to wink (and zoebear) saying their squabbling was costing readers and should stop. enough already. was there an essay? I don't find one.

my point to Jtc is that the problem is not just those two. not any longer.
all you have to do is read the thread.

in my view this display shows what our enemies have stumbled upon.

CSTMS and Ellen Norrth (women!) made some strong point. In my opinion the activity on the thread confirms the worst fears expressed.

dog help us.
uughh.

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Deja's picture

@irishking
About how we're getting on his nerves (not his words at all, but mine), with our behavior on this topic.

We are getting out of hand. Yes, I've read the repeated cries that it's all orchestrated and propaganda meant to divide. That tells me I'm not supposed to give a shit about myself or other women who experience any of it. Ellen ended up on a tangent about fantasy, and CStMS never replied.

I just asked Plutos Republic to explain it in JtC's essay. Hopefully someone can get it into my brain, because for now, I'm not understanding how an issue that's been divisive since humans came to be is now, all of a sudden, something I should ignore because it's actually in the news.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Deja That tells me I'm not supposed to give a shit about myself or other women who experience any of it. Ellen ended up on a tangent about fantasy, and CStMS never replied.

I haven't been on for a little while. There was no deliberate avoidance of any question of yours.

As for your comment here, I find it extremely distressing.
I believe I've been quite clear that I believe most of the accusers are telling the truth. I say "most," because I don't believe I've read about every accusation.

I've also been clear that the genuine nature of the violation, and the accusations, has nothing to do with whether or not there is an orchestrated media campaign. Think of the experiences, the stories, and the accusations, as raw materials, the media as a factory, and the visible presentation of these stories on TV as the processed raw materials turned into a product, which is then marketed to all of us. The raw materials can be absolutely genuine without changing the fact someone is using them to a particular end, and possibly altering them in the process of turning human experience into media spectacle.

What I've been feeling, more than anything, is that a rather vile exploitation of a most personal kind of pain is going on, and the loss of career and reputation of the abusers is only a partial recompense, and, ultimately, not nearly enough for me.

I don't think any of that suggests that anyone should not care about other women, other abuse victims.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Deja's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
I appreciate your reply. Yours and Mollie's explanations have helped me understand where you two are coming from.

I do remember when videos of the Syrian children were dying in agony, due to sarin gas, and knew something was up, because it was everywhere, in a basic loop. Then, years later, it came out that Her was behind it via Libya.

Mollie explained her belief in the attempt to get Trump to resign or get him impeached by exploiting the stories of other victims of other predators. It's disgusting, but I see it a bit more clearly now.

Thank you both.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Deja @Deja We don't have to ignore anything. I see I'm going to have to take the step I really didn't want to take, and write up my abuse story for the site. There's no other way we're going to discuss this issue apart from the media spectacle.

EDIT: Actually, I'm not sure I'm prepared to do this. Gonna have to think about it some more. It's not a writing job I'd look forward to.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Deja's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
I can't properly respond, because I started drinking - I'm off until Jan 2018. Biggrin

I'm going to bow out, for now.

Have a good night. Please don't do something painful, on account of me. That, most definitely, was not my intention in asking for clarification.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Deja I know that, Deja, of course I do. I don't think you want me to relive that experience. Nor expose myself to possible attack, because I'm one of the ones who only remembers fragments of what happened. At the time, I actually experienced "missing time." I thought I might be going crazy. It was scary as hell, and I thank God for the resilience of youth.

The point is that, unless we stop discussing this in the abstract, and bring it down to the concrete, lived reality of the issue, we will likely keep circling the drain of the media spectacle. My argument has always been that we need to bring our eyes back to the ground, to ourselves and our experience, because that will bring us back to our own power and give us control over the topic. I believe we have only partial control of it now. To some extent, it's controlling us. At least that's what I see.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

up to you of course.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@irishking I sure hope so. I've already considered doing this, and decided not to, once, after the last flame war.

What else can make this stop?

Preferably before we no longer have a site.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Deja

reply buttons gone on this thread.
did find site and commented there.

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@Raggedy Ann

This remarkable construction deserves a moment in the sun.

To me, you saying "we don't know" contributes to the ongoing denial of men in wanting to change their behavior.

I feel better now.
done. thx.

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@irishking that RA never gets a chance to adjudicate a workplace issue involving a woman accusing a man of harassment or be a juror on a rape case.

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dfarrah

Big Al's picture

@irishking You can't say we don't know Weinstein isn't innocent, or Spacey, or Louis C.K, etc.
But even so, my point was that some here are extrapolating that because of these accusations, now all men are subject to being accused of sexual harassment even though they may be innocent.
There is no evidence of that yet because we either don't know if all these accused have actually been innocent or not, or those accused have been guilty as charged.
So there's no basis yet that I see to justify a stance that innocent people are and will be charged, fired, etc. because of this spate of accusations and admittances of sexual harassment.
That would have to come from cases of innocent people now being fired which hasn't been determined.

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@Big Al

we either don't know if all these accused have actually been innocent or not, or those accused have been guilty as charged.

so how did I get to be the bad guy?
aargghh. I need a break.

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@Big Al There have been some who admitted, but some are fighting the accusations.

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dfarrah

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal @Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

And let's not forget that there was someone on Twitter looking for volunteers to fake up 8 accusations of sexual harassment against Bernie Sanders to knock off the only person keeping the notion of government working in the public interest alive (edit: in the minds of those restricted to the corporate media) and the only potential Presidential candidate TPTB deeply fear... there's an agenda that goes well with this divide-and-conquer tactic addition - and that of further limiting the access of women to better-paid/more influential career paths.

The People united shall never be defeated - and TPTB know it. Do we?

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

@Ellen North

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... CSTMS and Ellen Norrth (women!) made some strong point. In my opinion the activity on the thread confirms the worst fears expressed. ...

I do know that we're both survivors of rape (me at 17, so also a long time ago, although I still feel, at the least, like punching the guy when the memory is resurrected through such discussion) and that the memories are painful, disgusting and produce cold rage in me - but I tend to get 'cold' angry, rather than heated, and generally only so when cruelty is at issue, and I suspect that CSTMS may be similar in this.

I also suspect that it's harder to manipulate 'cold' emotions than 'heated' ones, and easier to think 'coldly' in self/other-protection when a threat is imminent. I believe this division to be a major threat and adversely affecting the usual clarity and logic in thinking which is normally displayed by a number of people here for whom I have a great deal of respect, a result which terrifies me.

I have seen nobody here defending rapists or sexual harassers, merely stating that some guys sometimes think about it, although mostly never acting on it, because they do have self-control, just passing thoughts, and I doubt that they're typically visualizing actual rape. I'll admit that reading that makes me uncomfortable but it's evidently true, in at least some cases, and facts cannot be avoided and must be included in all considerations, just as we must admit that electoral cheating is now routine.

And, of course, there are those mentioned concerns that even a look or word might trigger some accusation against them - because of this created division, for which much of the American population has been primed by decades of media propaganda and manipulation - which strike me as legitimate self-preservation concerns, on top of the division issue, although, on the other hand, I can obviously see where emotions would be roiled in a discussion of this type, which I also believe to be an essential one, in order to establish and negate the purpose behind this.

We generally wind up, sooner or later, working with people with whom we may disagree on perhaps even very basic issues, but in paid/most volunteer employment, we continue to work together toward whatever common goals despite this. If we cannot work together on last-ditch survival issues even on a comment site, we are in very, very serious trouble. Actually, we already were, and this is evidently aimed at a universal divide to end all chance of solidarity.

Nonetheless, I still have hope that the savvy and aware congregating on this site will come to recognize this tactic as what it so successfully is.

We cannot become our own enemies to helpfully serve the destructive purposes of those who have already manipulated us very near to a looming universal death. It seems apparent that nobody can save us, but ourselves. I hope that we at least won't obligingly help them by continuing to fall for the 'same-old, same-old' any longer.

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

@Ellen North @Ellen North

If we cannot work together on last-ditch survival issues even on a comment site, we are in very, very serious trouble. Actually, we already were, and this is evidently aimed at a universal divide to end all chance of solidarity.

I encourage all here to read the entire thread to see this at work.

edit. sorry for name typo.

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SnappleBC's picture

Just like I said two weeks ago, you don't date, flirt, or do anything that can ever be interpreted as informal with a female coworker. Not anymore. Not unless you want to risk destroying your career.

The way I was told was, "The ONLY appropriate interaction with a female colleague is work related... period." At the time I found that sad since it cuts off all human contact between the two genders but I also understood that significant abuses had occurred and needed to be corrected. It was around that same time that I learned that the only thing a corporation cares about is liability so "the woman is always right" was the rule of the day.

In both cases my hope was that as the original sins got fixed the pendulum would swing back to somewhere more sane in the middle. As it turns out, the original sins did NOT get fixed and the feminist movement was taken over by the Democrats. Surely we all remember the primaries wherein I learned I was a sexist because I voted for Jill over Hillary? Obviously, the Dems are weaponizing feminism itself which bodes ill for the future of men and women both.

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

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