The list of powerful men fired or under pressure to quit because of "sexual misconduct" is growing by the minute, no second.
Women, who often feel that they have long struggled to gain equality with men in politics, business and the workplace, have found a new weapon. It is a weapon that requires no proof, allows no due process and requires only a simple accusation from a woman.
NBC recently announced that they have fired Matt Lauer, twenty-year host of the Today Show for "inappropriate sexual conduct in the workplace." Lauer was the highest paid anchor on TV, earning more than $20 million per year. He also had the most longevity of any current TV anchor.
NBC issued a statement that offered no proof of misbehavior, only a single accusation by a woman at the network. While NBC initially said there had been no other complaints, they assumed that this was not an isolated incident. In short, a woman complained, we believe her, and you are hereby fired. That simple.
Then, Garrison Keillor (of all people) was fired by Minnesota Public Radio where he'd worked since 1969. Keillor's crime? He patted a female on the back to console her and her shirt was open and his hand touched her bare back! Keillor, by the way, is 75.
Women should not be subject to harassment in the workplace. Period. However, men should not be vulnerable to unproven, unsubstantiated charges without due process in which the charges are validated. As a society, we have gone over the top in trying to protect a class of people by giving them a super-protective status. Look at a woman wrong, or she claims you did, and you loose your job, your career, your life. Nothing needs to be proven.
What needs to happen? There are only two options. One, lawmakers on the state or federal level need to pass legislation that provides anyone accused of "sexual misbehavior" a means of due process: it isn't enough just to accuse. The accusations must be validated or proven, even if we don't hold the burden of proof to to "proof beyond reasonable doubt." There should at least be the burden of proof "by a preponderance of evidence" standard. Of course, that won't happen because women, as a class, enjoy super-protected status in our society. Politicians fear them more than anyone or anything else. The elite media cater to them more than anyone or anything else.
A troubling proponent of this trend is the lack of definition of what constitutes "sexual harassment" or "improper conduct." In the federal law, as well as in most state statutes, the crime is specified and defined. Before a man can be convicted of sexual harassment, he must be guilty of a, b, or c. But in the extra-legal, non-judiciary process of punishing men outside the courtroom, there are no standards. Guilt is whatever you want it to be. It's whatever a woman thinks it should be. And there is absolutely no defense. Most men don't even bother to hire an attorney. As Keillor said, "I'm just not interested in fighting this."
What is most troubling about this trend is the assumption of guilt for anything that makes a woman feel uncomfortable. If a man asks a woman for a date and she declines, it is sexual harassment. If a man compliments a woman, it is improper behavior. There doesn't need to be a pattern, an overt act--it can be anything the woman says it is. And she will always be taken at face value, regardless of the facts, the proof, the pattern....it doesn't matter. We have created a whole new precedent in American quasi-jurisprudence, an extra-judicial method of indicting, condemning and punishing men without a trial.
The second possibility would be for the accused men to mount lawsuits against (a) their accusers or (b) their employer who fired them without any due process or fairness. Without any chance to prove that the charges may not have been true or valid. Here again, this would probably not be practical because the courts have also bought into the "we must protect these delicate, mistreated creatures at all costs."
It is open season on men. If you want to change the power structure, you now have an easy method: accuse a man of sexual misconduct in the workplace. It always works and it is never subjected to any real scrutiny. When is the last time you heard of a man being accused after which the man was found to be innocent? It never happens. Men are 100 percent guilty, every time, regardless of the lack of proof. The assumption is "You are guilty because you are a man and because you have been accused."
No man is safe. And it's not just congressmen, TV anchors and nationally prominent men. It's men in the office where you work, it's pastors in local churches, it's doctors, plumbers and teachers. If a woman in your workplace wants you out, and you are a man, she now has a 100 percent effective method of eliminating you! Of course, women never use this device with ulterior motives.
I would not suggest that all of the men accused are innocent. It's just that they don't enjoy the assumption of innocence until there is some degree of validation.
We have created a whole new precedent in American quasi-jurisprudence, an extra-judicial method of indicting, condemning and punishing men without a trial and with the only evidence being an unsubstantiated accusation: THE ASSUMPTION OF GUILT, against which men have absolutely no defense.
No man in America is safe.
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