For those who come across this piece in some distant future, it would be helpful to state what’s happening in the U.S.A. at this moment, November/December 2017. An outbreak of accusations against well-known men by women who accuse them of sexual offenses (harassments, manipulation, pressure, molestation, and such) is a daily occurrence. Prominent men are resigning their positions or being fired by their boards. No one thinks we’ve seen the worst of it, but everyone expects this to be the leading edge.
A woman friend tells me she’d love to see a movement of men stepping up to say, “Me, too,” in some kind of admission that they are partly at fault for the climate of sexual harassment in our culture. “Either they have done the things we’re talking about–the sexual innuendos, the flirtatiousness, the manipulation–or they have been complicit by their silence,” she says.
I’m still thinking about that one.
It’s a minefield walking out in front of the world to say, “I’m to blame.” Particularly if you feel you aren’t.
And that’s what prompted what follows.