Not all scandals are created equal
I’m almost reluctant to power on my laptop in the morning.
“What man will be accused of sexual misconduct today?” I wonder, as the drive boots up and the screen glows to life. “Who will be next?”
The floodgates that burst open as that horny ogre Harvey Weinstein floated into view atop a torrent of heinous alle- gations — rape, assault, harassment — have ripped off their rusty hinges and vanished into the abyss. There are no more floodgates. There is just daily reckoning and a swooshing gush as one disgraced man after the next bobs atop whitewater rapids, floating past the cultural riverbanks where we gather to hiss and shake our heads and give succour to victims.
At this point, I’m a little surprised Vegas bookies are not accepting bets on who will be next. I mean, Charlie freaking Rose? Are you kidding me? If Mr. PBS harassed at least eight women, allegedly parading around in the nude or confessing sexual fantasies during work calls — “Um, Charlie, what do my panties have to do with our upcoming interview with Bashar Assad?” — anyone can be next.
And this sense of ubiquity, of inevitability, is hazardous for two reasons.
The first is scandal fatigue, which you can already feel setting in as new accusations are levelled against Kevin Spacey or John Lasseter announces a six-month sabbatical over what he’s calling “unwanted hugs.”
Our capacity to make sense of this never-ending horror show is getting sapped by the rotating cast of alleged scoundrels and monsters. The ticktock of who’s next is making it impossible to keep track of what’s happening.
The risk is not just mass desensitization.
In a perverse way, scandal fatigue is impairing our judgment. The grim tales are coming so quickly and so ephemerally — Roy Price, James Toback, Terry Richardson, Brett Ratner, Jeffrey Tambor, Louis C.K., Nick Carter — all that’s left is a blur of morphing faces.
A sign of this watershed moment can be found on the New York Times website. The paper, which broke the Weinstein story and is presumably working hard to break more, now maintains a regularly updated list of “high-profile men” — 34 and counting since last month — who “have resigned, been fired or experienced other fallout after accusations that have ranged from inappropriate text messages to rape.”
Included in the chart is Glenn Thrush, a Times political reporter, who this week was suspended pending an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.
This leads to the second problem: scandal homogeny.
That Times chart would not look out of place on ESPN. These stories are fusing together right before our eyes like the most depressing sporting event in history. The established narrative arc — “Accusation,” “Fallout,” “Response” — is impacting our ability to distinguish amid the stats.
Accusations that should be weighed individually are getting lumped together and treated as another rotten spot on the same diseased apple. Is this really the right response? In the long run, is this climate of zero tolerance and eternal damnation the most enlightened path toward a no-abuse future coveted by every decent person? Or is this #MeToo moment likely to be submarined if, heaven forbid, someone is falsely accused and the next trending hashtag is #NotHim or #YouSee?
There’s a reason our criminal justice system operates with an “innocent until proven guilty” bedrock principle and why similar crimes can receive different sentences.
Frankly, if we are going to rely on charts, maybe what we need is something closer to the colourcoded advisory system conceived by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for terrorist threats.
I’m not making light of this bleak situation. I’m not downplaying what anyone is accused of doing or minimizing the impact on victims. That said, you can’t possibly tell me Al Franken deserves to be lumped in with Roy Moore.
If we had a colour-coded Creep Threat Warning System, Weinstein would rate as a Red, or as a “Severe” threat — even to potted plants. But if Weinstein is Red, then perhaps Jeremy Piven — who has denied sexual misconduct allegations and this week reportedly passed a polygraph test — should be graded as Blue, or a “Guarded” risk, pending more evidence?
Admittedly, some of these threat assessments will be tricky to accurately plot.
Is Tambor a Blue, Yellow or Orange threat? What are we to make of Andy Dick’s head-scratching denial: “I didn’t grope anybody. I might have kissed somebody on the cheek to say goodbye and then licked them.”
I can’t recall ever licking someone goodbye. But maybe that should be another reason to try to understand what’s going on instead of either cynically relenting to scandal fatigue or assuming the accused are equally guilty and uniformly evil.
As a general rule, it is never wise for an advanced society to voluntarily obliterate all the grey area and live within a realm of black-and-white.
You can’t make the world a better place without nuance. vmenon@thestar.ca