Culture critic: Why Weinstein Got Away With It

Ann Althouse on her personal blog recalls that “the 1990s began with a heightening of interest in sexual harassment as liberals tried to defeat the confirmation of Clarence Thomas” to the Supreme Court. Indeed, “the refrain in the fall of 1991 was ‘You just don’t get it,’ as Democrats lambasted anyone who resisted taking sexual harassment in the workplace seriously.” But then along came Monica Lewinsky and “Democrats reversed the message.” Suddenly, “sexual harassment turned into just sex, and those who wanted to take it seriously were derided as prigs.” It was, she says, “the biggest sellout of feminism I’ve seen in my lifetime.” Fact is, “liberals — including nearly everyone in the entertainment business — suppressed concern about sexual harassment to help Bill Clinton” even as many of the earliest alleged Harvey Weinstein assaults were taking place.