Have you ever noticed that the media can't seem to handle more than one social outrage at a time? How long has it been since you heard anything about Black Lives Matter? The MSM have gleefully dropped this and other topics and embraced one that they find much more interesting and, perhaps surprisingly, safe - sexual harassment. Now I'm not saying this isn't an important issue to address but the attention it's getting compared to other equally or even more important issues... Well, I want to call it astounding but we all know this is how the media operates so it's really no surprise at all.
It has slowed down somewhat but for a while it seemed like every day another famous man was revealed as a harasser. We have been on pins and needles wondering what beloved actor we will have to start hating tomorrow. But we are never given any details. Was it rape? Was it groping? Was it inappropriate comments or overly aggressive flirting? Exactly how much hate and outrage is appropriate? And is forgiveness ever possible?
I have never experienced anything like sexual harassment. It would be too easy, and not at all fair, for me to talk about my life and what kind of person I am in connection with this subject. Girls of my generation were taught that if you dress modestly and act like a lady men will treat you with respect and it seems that it worked for me but to make this assumption ignores the fact that other women have experienced sexual harassment in spite of following the rules. Personally, I think it's comparable to the old saying about locks - that they only keep out honest people. Just as a thief will still break into your house or car in spite of locks, not even a burka will slow down a true scum bag.
What doesn't get talked about much is respect, or the lack of it. Sexual harassment is just much farther along the same spectrum of disrespect as condescension and mansplaining. (No, I'm not saying they're equivalent. Pay attention.) Sexual harassment and sexual violence are more widespread than most people realized but the underlying disrespect is even more widespread. It would be nice to think that the light that is currently being shone on the problem of harassment will lead to bringing an end to it but unless something is done about disrespect for women little will change.
If you are a woman you have been condescended to and mansplained to, and if you challenge the man who does this he will invariably react with hurt and outrage. I firmly believe that the vast majority of men do not even realize that they are doing it. If you point it out to them they will righteously swear that they were "just talking" and go away convinced that "you just can't talk to women" or some such dismissive thoughts.
I don't have any hope that things will ever really change. There's a small, stubborn, old-fashioned part of me that feels life was easier when men were free to condescend unchallenged and women laughed and talked among ourselves about how immature men are and what fragile egos they have and "you just have to let them think they're in charge" and all that sort of talk. But that fails to acknowledge all the horrible things that were swept under the rug in those days. We have to keep shining the light, even when it hurts to look.
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