Lessons Learned

It started with Weinstein, but the snowball has gathered size and speed and appears to be unending. The problem of sexual harassment is, well, huge. Charlie Rose went down quickly. Garrison Keillor defended Rose and soon went down himself. Jeremy Piven's Wisdom of the Crowd was canceled after multiple accusations. Kevin Spacey has been accused by at least 14 men and was fired from House of Cards and All the Money in the World. Comedian Louis C.K. admitted to sexual impropriety and his I Love You, Daddy was shelved. Amazon Studios Head, Roy Price, stepped down days after a producer accused him of sexual harassment. Matt Lauer is the latest, losing his job on the basis of one accusation and facing the possibility of losing the 16,000 acre farm he purchased in New Zealand over it. And then there's the huge story with over 180 accusations of sexual impropriety at Massage Envy.

There is a list of folk from the news and publishing world such as NBC News, the New Republic, NPR news, Rolling Stone magazine, Billboard magazine who have been accused and are suffering the consequences.

Politicians like Roy Moore, former president George JW Bush, Democrat John Conyers, Senator Al Franken, California lawmaker Raul Bocanegra, two Minnesota lawmakers, and more are under fire and going down quickly for the same thing.

The lists and the impact seem to expand every day.

So, what have we learned? Well, sexual abuse is prevalent and horrible, sure, but what else? 1) Clearly most (if not, according to some, all) men are sexual abusers or at least potential abusers. 2) Sexual abuse appears to be solely a male thing. 3) Sexual proclivities are sacrosanct, but sexual harassment is the sin of the day. It overrides everything. While some have admitted to the accusations, those who have not have been tried and convicted by the court of public opinion and found guilty without anything more than the accusation. "Innocent until proven guilty" has no bearing in this case. The primary judge and jury appears to be Twitter these days. 4) All this has made Pence look like a genius when he denied such a possibility with his refusal to meet with women alone without his wife being present. Of course, the media ridiculed him on that, but he's looking pretty brilliant at this point.

In the end I wonder if we've learned anything at all.