Being male means you’re guilty as harassment hysteria grows

Careers are being ruined as allegations are taken at face value without due process

If you’ve ever wondered how the kind of hysteria could happen that swept Salem back in 1692, just look around you at its modern-day equivalent — the sexual assault and harassment allegations that are destroying men’s careers and lives.

In Salem, at least they held trials before the executions. Today, the execution comes first. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has set the bar even lower than it was in Salem: “Sexual harassment is a systemic problem,” he told his caucus last month, “and when women speak up, we have a responsibility to listen to them and to believe them.”

The man whose father brought in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms thinks it’s OK to flout due process and rule of law. Guilt is to be determined just on a woman’s say-so and there’s no such thing as innocent until proven guilty. Women must be believed. It’s as simple as that, according to Trudeau.

As if women never lie, never have agendas, never hold grudges over perceived slights, never misunderstand someone else’s motives or blow things out of proportion. Even in the Victorian era when women were treated as the closest thing to goddesses, their status wasn’t as saintly as Trudeau has declared it to be.

The man who is accused of these improprieties is supposed to crumble on cue, resign from his post and go hide somewhere while some murky “investigation” takes place. We have forgotten what “allegation” means. It is not a synonym for “guilty.”

Everyone should be infuriated at how Calgary MP Kent Hehr has been treated over allegations that have never been proven. I’ve known Hehr for years; we’ve spent numerous hours chatting about all kinds of topics over coffee.

Hehr has overcome tremendous odds to get where he is today. Now, suddenly, he’s out of cabinet because a woman claims that 10 years ago when he was an MLA, she was with him in an elevator when he told her she looked “yummy.”

Trudeau has solemnly announced an “investigation” into this alleged atrocity. But just how does one investigate a conversation that supposedly took place between two people alone in an elevator a decade ago?

Then, some other story surfaced that Hehr had groped someone at a photo op. That’s pretty incredulous. Kent’s disability makes it difficult for him just to shake hands. And other people have suddenly popped up with vague stories about how they had heard from other unnamed sources about Hehr’s behaviours. If any of these people have legitimate cases against him, they should go before a judge. Otherwise, they should stop tarring him.

Hearsay is not admissible in court, but it’s now credible enough in the public arena to figuratively burn someone at the stake. The hysteria swirling around unproven allegations about Hehr and other Canadian politicians such as former Ontario Conservative leader Patrick Brown shows society has learned nothing in the 325 years since the Salem witch trials.

Brown’s accusers are all anonymous, but that hasn’t stopped Trudeau from applauding them. He told the media: “Obviously my thoughts turn immediately to the women who came forward knowing how difficult it is, it can be, to salute them for their courage and their leadership and certainly hope that their example will resonate and that the support of their friends, their families, and the community at large remains with them.”

Courage and leadership? Their behaviour is cowardly and his own is the furthest thing possible from leadership. He has forgotten that all these men are presumed innocent.

I hope Trudeau realizes that in this current climate of hysteria, one woman looking to score a huge political coup with a bunch of unproven and unprovable allegations is all it would take to topple the prime minister of Canada. After all, if women are to be believed, what will Trudeau do if someone comes forward with a pack of stories about him? Tie himself to the stake alongside everyone else who’s already there?