Has the #MeToo movement become a witch-hunt to a significant degree?

[SuperLuigi]

It can work for the young men if it’s done right, but it takes someone who is skilled and knows what he is doing to pull it off. The behavior described on here is not that.

I think it would be harder in general today just because everyone walks around with a phone and earbuds no one can see. I forget the number of times I thought people on the street were talking to me and instead were just yammering into a really small speaker I couldn’t see.

At least with walkmen and boomboxes you could see people were…busy.

 

[HarryStotle]

You resist being labeled as a feminist yet you sound like one what with calling other posters ignorant, intolerant, and prejudiced. You know what they say about it quacking like a duck.

Are you certain that the “no true duck fallacy” hasn’t taken the teeth out of that possible rebuttal? I mean if ducks had teeth, that is.

 

[PetraG]

Harry, it’s getting so a man can’t even good-naturedly pat a woman on the back and say “good job!” any longer without being accused of harassment. Or compliment her new dress or hair style without being accused of sexual harassment. Unless the person is a minor, I think people are just too sensitive or need more to fill out their day.

Just my opinion, of course.

Would he do that to his boss? To an important client? Under what circumstances? That’s the situation in which he could do that to someone who isn’t his boss or someone else he shows respect without fail and without a second thought. Just show the level of respect. If people are as careful with their personal remarks or their personal physical gestures as they already are when they know the consequences could be serious, I don’t think there is going to be a lot of problems.

 

[HarryStotle]

The point I was making is that when you say “Real men won’t sit back and be told who and what they will be by women, just because women want them that way,” you’re suggesting that men who actually do behave in a civil, gentlemanly, and appropriate fashion aren’t “real men.”

No, actually, what I was saying was that real men won’t let someone else (woman or otherwise) decide for them “who or what they will be.”

Real men would be civil, gentlemanly and a host of other things because they have decided to be those things.

The problem with relinquishing the power to decide what you will be to someone else (or your society or culture,) is that you have from that point on become a non-entity, precisely because you will have no say in what you are.

So it isn’t what real men will be that is the issue, so much as how real men become what they are.

If a man is gentlemanly and civil merely because he has been told to be such by those around him, he is not a real man. He is a puppet, regardless of his apparent civility.

“So what you are saying is…”

Do you realize how insulting that is to men who aren’t going around harassing, pawing and raping?

Is harassing, pawing and raping a necessary qualification for being a “real man”?

You are beginning to sound like Cathy Newman.

 

[starshiptrooper]

Not only that, this is not a discussion about being gentlemanly or civil, this about whether or not we are going to knuckle under to the latest wave of feminist insanity based firmly in ideology rather than reality.

 

[Edmundus1581]

ConstantLearner:

Harry, it’s getting so a man can’t even good-naturedly pat a woman on the back and say “good job!” any longer without being accused of harassment. Or compliment her new dress or hair style without being accused of sexual harassment. Unless the person is a minor, I think people are just too sensitive or need more to fill out their day.

Just my opinion, of course.

Would he do that to his boss? To an important client? Under what circumstances? That’s the situation in which he could do that to someone who isn’t his boss or someone else he shows respect without fail and without a second thought.

I was once in exactly this position, of wanting to give a pat on the back to a female employee who had done a great job. In the same situation I would have given a man an enthusiastic “Well done, mate!”, with a firm pat on the back. I thought a light tap on the shoulder may be appropriate for a woman, but was wary about the situation so instead returned to my desk and sent an email “Virtual pat on the back”.

That was fifteen years ago. These days it wouldn’t even enter my head to pat the shoulder, or send an email.

Then women will complain that they don’t feel like part of the team, which is just a “boys club”.

They won’t with my however, because I will never employ a woman, and I’ll ensure that my business is always small enough to slip under the radar.

 

[HarryStotle]

ConstantLearner:

Harry, it’s getting so a man can’t even good-naturedly pat a woman on the back and say “good job!” any longer without being accused of harassment. Or compliment her new dress or hair style without being accused of sexual harassment. Unless the person is a minor, I think people are just too sensitive or need more to fill out their day.

Just my opinion, of course.

Would he do that to his boss? To an important client? Under what circumstances? That’s the situation in which he could do that to someone who isn’t his boss or someone else he shows respect without fail and without a second thought. Just show the level of respect. If people are as careful with their personal remarks or their personal physical gestures as they already are when they know the consequences could be serious, I don’t think there is going to be a lot of problems.

So let me put on my best Cathy Newman impression…
So what you are saying is that “respect” demands that we should always act in a rigid formal manner (i.e., in the same way we would act with an important client or boss) no matter who we are with and no matter how “familiar” the person is to us? The workplace should never take on a more personal atmosphere?

I thought progressive, modernist types didn’t like Victorian England?

I guess I had you pegged all wrong.

I’ll have to remind myself not to stereotype individuals because individuals are not all the same. Just like men are not all the same and women are not all the same.

 

[starshiptrooper]

Gotta love the fallout from feminism, effectively hampering advancement opportunities for women. Of course this is your fault for being an evil sexist pig. It has absolutely no connection to their impossible to meet, contradictory standards, and the fact that failure to meet those standards leads to hysteria and ostracism.

 

[HarryStotle]

I forget the number of times I thought people on the street were talking to me and instead were just yammering into a really small speaker I couldn’t see.

At least it provides cover for the real psychotic ones who yell at the sky or really tall buildings.

I remember the first time I went to a large city when I was young and a fellow was screaming at the tall buildings and cars. My “down home” view of human nature disappeared at that moment. It hasn’t ever returned since. The crazies now hang around in much larger groups, carry megaphones, and wear pink pussy hats, or black bandanas. Still screaming at the sky, though.

Sure is revealing about how far we have “progressed” in fifty years.

 

[Xantippe]

Real men would be civil, gentlemanly and a host of other things because they have decided to be those things.

The problem with relinquishing the power to decide what you will be to someone else (or your society or culture,) is that you have from that point on become a non-entity, precisely because you will have no say in what you are.

So it isn’t what real men will be that is the issue, so much as how real men become what they are.

If a man is gentlemanly and civil merely because he has been told to be such by those around him, he is not a real man. He is a puppet, regardless of his apparent civility.

Internalized virtue is a best case scenario–but behaving properly because those are the rules of one’s society and culture is also not to be sneezed at. And realistically, people typically start by doing the right thing, and then only later acquire the internal virtues associated with doing the right thing. (Example: small children are made to say “thank you” even when they don’t feel thankful, in order to help them eventually develop a feeling of gratitude.)

I have to say that the ideas that you are outlining sound a lot closer to Nietzscheanism than to conservatism or Catholicism or pretty much any form of Christianity or traditional belief. Doing the right thing is good, even when it’s not part of some sort of reevaluation of all values/will to power dealio.

 

[Xantippe]

Not only that, this is not a discussion about being gentlemanly or civil,

Yes it is.

 

[Xantippe]

They won’t with my however, because I will never employ a woman, and I’ll ensure that my business is always small enough to slip under the radar.

That’s…interesting.

 

[starshiptrooper]

I never knew that a set of rules which would effectively require a signed and notarized consent form and a blood test were part of being a gentleman but you learn something new every day.

 

[Xantippe]

I never knew that a set of rules which would effectively require a signed and notarized consent form and a blood test were part of being a gentleman but you learn something new every day.

Nobody has suggested that but yourself, but now that you mention it, a blood test is a great idea.

 

[ConstantLearner]

I never knew that a set of rules which would effectively require a signed and notarized consent form and a blood test were part of being a gentleman but you learn something new every day.

You sure do. I learned the only laws I cited were “the ones on the books.” Don’t know whether to scratch my head or laugh out loud. Guess I’ll laugh.

 

[starshiptrooper]

It heads off the bogus claim of, “My one drink absolves me of responsibility for my choices.”

 

[Edmundus1581]

starshiptrooper:

I never knew that a set of rules which would effectively require a signed and notarized consent form and a blood test were part of being a gentleman but you learn something new every day.

You sure do. I learned the only laws I cited were “the ones on the books.” Don’t know whether to scratch my head or laugh out loud. Guess I’ll laugh.

I wasn’t able to navigate back through this particular conversation, but is this a similar issue to developments in Australia, where the absurd on “consent” has now become the law?

SYDNEY University students will be taught they cannot kiss on campus unless they get an “enthusiastic yes” from the object of their desire under a radical plan for a mandatory course on sexual harassment.

I’ve checked the back story to the Sydney University web site, and this is a very reasonable paraphrase of the directives.

The university labels contravention of the directive as “criminal” behaviour. Every student must pass the “consent” course to enrol, and to keep his enrolment.

 

[ConstantLearner]

Good grief! Kind of kills any kind of spontaneity, doesn’t it? Feminism has shot itself in the foot as far as I’m concerned.

I got a lovely bouquet from a male client the other day, and the card read: “Thanks for being so nice to me when I needed it.” I suppose feminists would consider that “harassment,” but I loved it, and all I did was help him devise a PR plan at a cut-rate because he’s been struggling so long and is really a decent sort of guy who deserves better.

 

[starshiptrooper]

Yup, you are expected to be initiating, escalating and spontaneous and timing it perfectly. If you misread a social cue, you are now rapist. That sounds like so much fun.

 

[ConstantLearner]

It’s scripted life, Starshiptropper, stereotypes, total, boring predictability. But no harassment!