With their fortress of injunctions, these men feel safe to do as they please
It’s the late Noughties and I’m at a party filled with the great and the good, talking to a British businessman. He and I have met before on the odd occasion, but I don’t know him well – and certainly not well enough to feel comfortable with the fact that his arm is around my lower waist, edging towards my hip. Still it’s late, the cocktails have been flowing all evening, and my boyfriend, who is standing opposite us, has just joined the conversation – so perhaps we’re all among friends here, and he’s just being warm, expansive, a little too tactile. It’s really no big deal. Until the businessman, now chatting to my boyfriend, drops his hand to my thigh and slides it up beneath my dress to cup my rear. There it sits, proprietorially but also mockingly – you can’t see what I’m doing to your girlfriend right in front of your eyes – while the two men talk, until I feel I can move away without causing a scene.
“Why on earth didn’t you cause a scene,” asked my boyfriend, appalled, when I told him in the cab on the way home what had been happening while the two of them were having a chat. “Why didn’t you slap him or ask him what the hell he thought he was doing?” And, at first, I couldn’t answer. I’ve always thought I could handle myself in those kinds of situations, but I
‘Why on earth didn’t you cause a scene, asked my boyfriend, appalled, when I told him’
viewed this man as powerful, and I’d heard of his appetite for revenge.
“I find him scary,” I said eventually. But there was something more: the way he’d done what he did was so seamless and entitled that it made you feel like you’d be “making a fuss” or (the misogynist’s favourite) “overreacting”. He was like a medieval king who was testing the ripeness of a piece of fruit – and if he decided he liked it he’d have it, so convinced was he that everything and everyone around him were at his disposal. And doing it so flagrantly in front of the man I was with? That was a little bit of extra spice for him, that was him revelling in his power and laughing at the little people – because they didn’t matter.
Now I’m not going to pretend I was traumatised by the experience. When you’ve worked as a waitress prior to Metoo, not much can shock you in terms of groping and harassment. But when, this time last year, the first Harvey Weinstein allegations were made public and when more and more women were brave enough to add their names to the list, it re-ignited my fury at that man’s behaviour. Because yes, having his sweaty hand beneath my skirt was repulsive, but it was the power play involved that was the worst thing. He loved that I was scared. In fact I’ll bet a lot of the enjoyment for him was knowing that I would be too scared to say anything: that – not the handful of flesh – was what he was getting off on.
I still hate that I was too scared to say anything. And now that I believe he has gagged the press with an injunction banning the reporting of his alleged harassment and racial abuse of staff, their silence can be ensured.
I’d heard talk of The Daily Telegraph investigating allegations of sexual harassment surrounding this man in spring of this year, but doubted any of them would come to light. He would find a way to bully these women into silence. And I remain convinced that any woman who did immediately “make a fuss” after similar experiences with him will have faced reprisals in some shape or form. Had they been employees, he would probably have found a way to get rid of them, or make their jobs untenable. Had they been acquaintances, he might have contented himself with vague threats or simply found a way to embarrass them. Like Weinstein, this wasn’t a man you went up against. And had it not been such a large number of women, the Hollywood movie mogul might never have been brought down. He would still be doing what had probably become the norm to him over decades. Because with all the legal protection those kinds of men can afford – with the fortress of injunctions and NDAS that they can build around themselves – they can feel safe to carry on as they please, can’t they? And carry on doing far worse than what happened to me.
In accordance with the terms of the injunction imposed on The Telegraph, we have not been able to confirm to the writer the identity of the businessman
‘A lot of the enjoyment for him was knowing I would be too scared to say anything. That – not the handful of flesh – was what he was getting off on’