SUDDENLY, RULES CHANGE
Turning point lands with a vengeance after decades of sexual misconduct
There’s a scene from the 1961 movie The Misfits, starring Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable, that comes to mind every time there’s a sea change in societal mores that leaves well-known business, political or Hollywood icons getting excoriated for doing something that was, for a long time, the norm.
In the movie, Gable plays Gay ( yes, that’s the grizzled old cowboy’s name) who isn’t so concerned about the biblical verse “the wages of sin, is death.”
No, for him, wages is sin — as it means the death of his freedom — the quality he prizes above all else. As a result, he makes his living by rounding up wild horses to sell to an abattoir.
In the final scene of the movie, which was written by Monroe’s then-husband Arthur Miller, Gay, and Monroe’s character Roslyn, drive out to the Nevada desert along with another mostly drunk, rodeo cowboy, Perce, played by Montgomery Clift. Guido (played by Eli Wallach), flies his old prop plane into the desert to help corral wild mustangs through the mountains into the valley and a dried up lake bed.
When Roslyn comes to realize that the capture of the horses is to kill them for dog food, rather than for riding, she grows despondent and her impression of Gay is violently flipped on its ear, like a small steer in a calf-roping contest.
“They used to be for riding,” explains Gay. “They were Christmas presents for kids because they’re small horses you see, kids loved ’em for Christmas. But kids ride motor scooters now.”
After waxing on about the stamina of mustangs and how the West couldn’t have been settled without them, he says: “Somehow or other it all got changed around, see. I’m doing the same thing I always did, it’s just that they changed it around.”
An activity that was once accepted, suddenly turns rank — appearing depraved and dishonourable seemingly overnight.
The first time this scene popped to mind was when author and former media baron, Conrad Black, was on trial in Chicago for fraud and other charges in 2007.
Numerous days of that often farcical trial were spent belabouring a lavish corporate gathering in December 2000 that celebrated the 60th birthday of journalist Barbara Amiel, Black’s wife. The prosecutors were trying to portray the $62,000 corporate event at La Grenouille in New York (which Black charged $43,000 to Hollinger, the public holding company he created) as proof of Black’s misappropriation of corporate funds.
I recall a bewildered girlfriend calling me in Calgary from Toronto asking how holding a costly corporate party was considered illicit. If that was wrong, then virtu- ally every successful corporation we had been involved with was similarly guilty. After all, we had both worked at the Toronto Sun in the late 1980s and early 1990s and participated in corporate bashes that took excess to entirely new levels. Was it opprobrious for the Toronto Sun to rent the SkyDome for its 20th anniversary party? We thought it was great at the time.
I accompanied my husband to numerous events for his industry where often lavish gifts — like carved crystal bowls from Tiffany’s or Waterman gold-tipped fountain pen sets — would be at every woman’s place setting.
“But you know what you’re doing isn’t right, don’t you?” asked Roslyn of Gay.
Well, no. At the time no one gave a second thought to copious corporate exuberance. It was viewed as the cost of doing business. The only time I questioned it was when a government monopoly or utility, like Enmax, held an extravagant party. The goal was, make sure your customers have a memorable time and remain loyal to you because of the deep relationships built over a few too many single malt scotches and shared secrets.
Black’s birthday bash for Babs was considered appropriate at the time it occurred in late 2000. The very next year, Enron’s accounting fraud scandal was exposed, and by the time Black’s trial rolled around seven years later, the ordering of every canapé and glass of cabernet at many corporate events was examined like a cancer cell under a microscope.
Abruptly, Black became a misfit because his pre-Enron, pre Worldcom actions in 2000 were scrutinized in the court in 2007, when cash bars at corporate functions became the norm and staff had to absurdly buy tickets to the company Christmas party.
The same is happening again on a different issue. Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein is Enron. He’s the turning point and a similarly repulsive one as well. He deserves the severe censure he has publicly received, if only a fraction of the dozens of accusations against him are true, and there’s no reason to doubt the veracity of any of them.
Now, however, every straying hand of a now powerful man from 40 years ago and even every unwanted proposition is being outed as being akin to sexual assault and it’s highly possible that good, respectful men who misread a smile or a boozy giggle are having their reputations ruined.
Most women are delighted that dozens of boorish, abusive and powerful men are being called out for their unacceptable behaviour, including rape, and are being booted out of their positions of respect as violently as Perce was flung from a bucking bull in the movie. It likely means that this kind of behaviour will finally be curtailed sharply everywhere, which is undoubtedly a positive development for women.
But you can almost see a thought bubble over the head of U.S. Democratic Senator Al Franken, thinking: “This used to be considered funny, didn’t it?” as he contemplates the now infamous, 2006 photo of him mugging for the camera as he appears to grope the breasts of a sleeping Leeann Tweeden, a radio talk show host, on a military plane, when Franken, a former Saturday Night Live performer, still worked as a comedian.
What not one commentator has mentioned, however, is that Tweeden’s breasts couldn’t be groped because they’re completely inaccessible under military body armour.
Franken is also accused of putting his hand on her rear end. He’s right to apologize and feel shame, but should he lose his job as a senator for behaviour that happened more than a decade ago when he was working for laughs rather than legislation?
In the movie, there’s a famous bar scene where Monroe is enthusiastically hitting a paddleball, while men in the bar count and bet how many times in a row she’ll hit the ball. A man in the crowd ends up groping Roslyn’s rear end and she just keeps on going . . . “one, two, three, four, five . . . ” the crowd counts.
So rife was sexual assault back then and into the ’70s and ’80s, it was part of almost every movie and a common occurrence for most women. Well, the turning has finally happened. One has to wonder though, how many years is it reasonable to go back to reveal an unwanted kiss or a straying hand? At what point does the presumption of innocence get reintroduced into the equation?
That’s the problem with becoming a pioneering misfit at the time of the turning. All of the old rules — including some of the good ones — get thrown out with the bad.
Somehow or other it all got changed around, see. I’m doing the same thing I always did, it’s just that they changed it around. Clark Gable from The Misfits It’s highly possible that good, respectful men who misread a smile or a boozy giggle are having their reputations ruined.