Monday, May 14, 2018

It's Raining Men

     The other day the accounts of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's odious treatment of his "girlfriends" stunned his supporters and colleagues.  Here was a "true fighter" for women's rights, an antitoxin to a toxic president who bragged about sexually assaulting and demeaning women. Suddenly, a stalwart defender of women's rights was unmasked as a sexual sadist, misogynist, and racist.

    While Schneiderman's disgrace distresses everyone who cares about equality and decency, the White House is particularly delighted by the news about the New York Attorney General.  Kellyanne Conway tweeted "Gotcha," burnishing her credentials as a true Trumpian.  Her celebration of a political adversary's downfall is particularly sickening, because it displays her indifference for the victims who suffered Schneiderman's abuse.  Has working for Trump blunted so Conway's moral faculty that she's incapable of caring about women victimized by a violent, sadistic man?  Perhaps her years defending Trump's offensive behavior against the more than dozen women who have accused him of groping and forcibly kissing them has extinguished whatever decency she might have possessed before she joined Trump's campaign.

     When the Me-Too movement dragged the repugnant Harvey Weinstein into the public view, I thought an avalanche of just retribution would smother him.  More importantly, I believed the Weinstein revelations would enlighten men in positions of authority to recognize women's inalienable right to not be abused, groped, or harassed in any way; that men in authority might even began to finally treat women as equals.  But almost weekly revelations of men harassing or abusing women has stripped me of that delusion.

     According to an article in The New York Times, ("After Weinstein," 2/8/18)  71 men have "been fired or forced to resign after accusations of sexual misconduct that ranged from inappropriate comments to rape."  The sheer number of men cited in the Times' piece is staggering.  And how can these men knowingly commit clearly criminal acts?   Maybe some, like Woody Allen, would say, "The heart wants what it wants."  "Or the hands."  "Or the genitals."  But what about what the other human being wants?  What about what the woman wants? 

     In her op-ed essay, "The Problem With 'Feminist' Men,"Jill Filipovic examines the Scheiderman's sinister motives in fighting for women's rights.  She suggests that he used "his role in progressive politics"and his feminist-minded political work to advance his own career, to ingratiate himself with the women he would go on to harm, and to cover up his cruelties."  Her formulation of Scheiderman's "thought process" offers interesting possibilities as to his motives and means, but unless he were to admit his guilt, explain every thought, desire, impulse, feeling and intention behind his actions, we can only conjecture, perhaps accurately, how calculating this man has been.
     
     Filipovic's essay elicited many comments that criticized her ideas; a number of them viciously assailed her conclusions and the logic she used in reaching them.  Though her assumptions are suppositions and should be honestly critiqued, the grotesque and absurd vitriol hurled at her by some readers is profoundly disturbing.  One man wrote, "Feminist men are the problem.  Period.  No other thoughts necessary.  Feminism is a cancer to both men and women."  Another wrote, "'Donald Trump, who boasted about sexually assaulting and degrading women'...This is falsehood.  Trump suggested that women will LET you...This suggests consent.  Assault is not consensual.  The question is how much damage they do before their demise.  Feminism is just such a movement...Women tend to be more emotional, shortsighted, informed by the concrete.  Men are more rational, farsighted, and comfortable with the abstract."

     The election of Trump has produced two unintended and salutary consequences.  One is the Me-Too movement, which is tearing down the once impregnable walls covering up the offenses perpetrated the likes of the Trumps, Scheidermans and countless other men.  The second consequence springs from the reaction of men who feel threatened by the effect of the Me-Too movement.   In the past, many misogynist men would successfully hide their behavior because women had no recourse open to them.  Today, women feel empowered to speak out against their abusers.  Without meaning to, Trump has instigated a "kind of wild justice," which it is the misogynist's nature to run from, or to spew venom against (as demonstrated by the comments quoted above).  Either way, Me-Too justice will continue to root out sexists and misogynists and move us closer to gender equality.

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