Great utterances of hypocrisy in the 20th century: "They just don't get it"
Follow me back in time, if you dare:In the late '80's and early '90's, there was a huge backlash against the newly-defined concept of "sexual harassment", neatly summarized by the comment about men made during the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings, which was that Men "just don't get it" when it comes to issues of sexual harassment in the workplace. There were endless newspaper and magazine articles, campus and workplace "Sexual Harassment" speech and behavior codes, new legislation, and a national dialogue denouncing all forms of unwanted and/or inapprorpriate advances.
Being at a majority-female college at the time, I heard about these developments constantly, as newly-empowered feminists indicted the male race, tried it, found it guilty, and sentenced it to a purgatory of "awareness" campaigns, seminars, trainings, pamphlets, and everything else. As this national frenzy crested its crescendo, Bill Clinton was elected president.
Now you can probably see where I'm going with this: Clinton subsequently gets nasty with an intern, is indicted for perjury, and the rest is history - but what was the national response to Bill Sleazy's actions? Suddenly, any and all disgust or even disapproval of this dalliance was itself denounced as simply too uptight, a hangover from the Victorian era, a byproduct of a culture hung up about sexuality, the Europeans were way cooler than us on extramarital matters, and on and on and on - in direct contradiction with the new commandments of the self-appointed feminist police.
In short, the "Sexual Harassment" movement/hysteria went deathly quiet the minute Mr. Bill's womanizing became common knowledge. Fascinating stuff, isn't it?
posted by ET @ 4:46 PM
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