Witch hunt?
Matt Lauer, American television journalist and host of the “Today” show with an annual salary of USD25 million has fallen from grace. He was recently fired by NBC for sexual misconduct.
Finally. The day of reckoning has come. And it’s a day women worldwide should celebrate—when sexual predators are taken to task, held accountable for their actions and suitably punished for their misdeeds—regardless of who they are and how much they are worth.
It began with the epic fall of Harvey Weinstein. Then, one by one, these men with power and privilege across different industries—secret, serial sexual predators who preyed on the young, weak, subordinate and vulnerable, began to fall like flies.
Whether we admit it or not, the old boys club shamelessly creates a culture of misogyny where women are routinely objectified and sexual misconduct is normalized.
Why is locker room talk, after all, considered normal? It is not. It’s abhorrent and abnormal. It enables sexual misconduct. And every time we say, even in jest, “boys will be boys” we perpetuate the lie of normalcy.
It is locker room talk that reduces women to sex objects and allows sexual misconduct like catcalls, flashing, groping, lewd jokes, sexual innuendos and sexual assaults to thrive. It is locker room talk that inculcates young men with a perverse sense of sexual entitlement that can dangerously evolve into a rape culture. The shocking level of sexual misconduct across industries is appalling and to know, for a fact now, that sexual predators are not as uncommon as we think, is truly devastating. Take a good, hard look at the men in your own circle—men you see every day—at work, in school, on the street, men you know, men you admire, men you look up to because of the success they have achieved in their professional lives.
Some of them are also guilty of sexual misconduct in the most common form, namely unfunny, lewd jokes that make you uncomfortable. And for the rest who are not guilty, they sadly dismiss such sexual misconduct as normal, male behavior.
In a sense, we are all guilty. We may not be perpetrators but as spectators who have chosen to stay silent, we are just as guilty. Those among us who have failed to call out inappropriate or abusive sexual behavior are complicit to sexual misconduct.
To truly put a stop to sexual misconduct, we must not tolerate it. We must not accept it. Most of all, we must not normalize it. We must call it out for what it is—dehumanizing, aberrant and criminal behavior.
Matt Lauer will not be the last man to fall. Should men shudder in their shoes? They should. But only if they are guilty. Decent men need not fear. They are not under attack.
Is this a witch hunt? I think it’s just the era of male, sexual impunity ending and justice finally being served.
Should men shudder in their shoes? They should. But only if they are guilty