UNITED STATES
WHIMN
June 13, 2018
By Cleo Waters
It all started with a few missed calls and then a text message saying we had to meet up. He sounded calm on the phone but his need to see me seemed urgent, so we went out for lunch that day.
It was over a vegan meal my friend told me that a woman he’d worked with had accused him of sexual assault and the police were getting involved.
My first reaction was shock. How could this be? How could this man I know to be a funny, kind, sweet and wholly harmless human being be suspected of such a thing with a barely-adult woman.
He was distraught; not crying, but judging by the puffiness that filled the lines on his 30-something face, he’d done a lot of that already. He sounded embarrassed … devastated that his career might be on the line. But honestly, even as he insisted he’d acted “totally professionally” and the incident had been “taken out of context,” the exchange he described seemed questionable.
Now, let me quell your curiosity when I say that knowing the particular details of this incident isn’t necessary to underscore the fact that sexual misconduct on any level is unacceptable in the workplace, or anywhere else, for that matter. Unwelcome explicit comments (something that was alleged) and unwanted, gentle grazes (also alleged) aren’t okay.
In the current climate of #metoo and #timesup, it’s very easy to class men like Harvey Weinstein in the predator category — more than 80 women have come forward to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct, and over the years, the disgraced producer cultivated an infamous reputation as a bully, notorious even by Hollywood standards — but what to do when someone you know and trust is also accused of similar grievances? “Today” host Savannah Guthrie highlighted this dilemma when discussing her co-anchor Matt Lauer’s sacking after sexual misconduct allegations came to light and wondered aloud: “How do you reconcile your love for someone with the revelation that they have behaved badly?”
How indeed?
It was a question I grappled with during that lunch and well after it, because, as a woman who’s experienced sexual harassment myself, I fully embrace this necessary reckoning that’s seeing many men being held accountable for their usually unpunished antics. I’d be remiss not to acknowledge that the conversations going on right now in offices, schools and bedrooms about women feeling mistreated or threatened sexually are very different from the public discourse happening 10 years ago (or even discussions we were having 10 months ago).
That day, while my friend proclaimed his innocence — and I do believe that no harm was intended — I thought a line had been crossed. And I told him so.
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