And maybe I should watch my own on-camera gestures...
Showing posts with label sexual harassment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sexual harassment. Show all posts
Most sex is bad sex, right?
It's important to draw a line between rape and bad sex. And watch what you sext...
And maybe I should watch my own on-camera gestures...
And maybe I should watch my own on-camera gestures...
"The forensic analysis could not establish that Favre sent the objectionable photographs to Sterger."
Aw, come on! Did they examine his penis and compare it to the picture? Yes, the picture may have been fuzzy... but maybe his penis is fuzzy.
Favre has to pay $50,000 anyway, because he "was not candid in several respects during the investigation." Either he failed to cover up in the first instance or he inappropriately covered up in the second.
Favre has to pay $50,000 anyway, because he "was not candid in several respects during the investigation." Either he failed to cover up in the first instance or he inappropriately covered up in the second.
"How to get a workplace spouse to fill in the gaps in your marriage."
Penelope Trunk talks about why you might want to develop a relationship like this — not for sex! — and gives 5 rules:
1. Identify a relationship with a high chance for success....I smell trouble. Lots of trouble. Whatever happened to friends? Trunk tells us she has a husband who wants sex but is "sick of talking" to her. She wants someone to talk to and asserts that "when workplace spouse relationships do cross the line into the sex department, the relationship goes bad." But you can't neatly control relationships, and they do "go bad" — in many unpredictable ways.
2. Talk about a taboo topic.
Once a girl starts talking about sex, then the boy starts talking about sex....
3. Blur the normal boundaries between co-workers....
4. Ask for what you want....
5. Find a good balance between the official relationship and the unofficial relationship....
2 Harvard law students sue Janet Napolitano and the TSA administrator over the airport scanning and groping.
They say it violates the 4th Amendment.
IN THE COMMENTS: lyssalovelyredhead said:
IN THE COMMENTS: lyssalovelyredhead said:
On a related note, I heard from a lawyer today... that his client, an employer, is being sued by a frequent flying employee, who is alleging forced flying under these conditions constitutes hostile work environment.
I'm shocked, shocked to learn that semi-clad models are writhing in the law library!
"... Brooklyn Law School officials rented Diesel its library expecting a tasteful photo shoot for a jeans ad -- but what they got was a steamy display of writhing young models in skimpy lingerie grinding against books and computers."
Wait. Why did they expect a tasteful photo shoot?
What exactly was the school assured of? The models aren't naked. They've got on underwear. And what is even so gross and shocking about this? Man, Diesel is getting way more great publicity than its stupid underpants deserve. Where did this controversy really start? I'm inclined to suspect that the administration is only shocked* after the fact and only because some students have managed to create the impression that the school might be accused of contributing to a "hostile environment" form of sexual harassment.
As for the young woman who is grossed out that a model in panties writhed in the vicinity of a computer she uses... do you realize how many people type on those things with hands they didn't wash after they went to the bathroom?
----------------------------------------------
*Shocked!
Wait. Why did they expect a tasteful photo shoot?
"It's gross. I work on those computers every day!" fumed a female student, referring to a shot showing two bra- and panty-clad women climbing over the machines toward an open-mouthed man....If the law school — I emphasize law school — did not impose restrictions when it took Diesel's money then it has nothing to complain about.
The frisky photos, shot last spring, show off the hot bodies of male and female models as they prowl around the library's floors, tables and bookshelves -- while wearing tight-fitting panties bearing various seductive messages.
"We are as shocked and mortified as you must be by these photographs," interim dean Michael Gerber wrote in an e-mail yesterday to students, faculty and staff.
"When the school gave its permission to do the shoot, the school was assured that the photos would be in good taste. They are not.""Assured" "good taste" — that's not specific enough to make me believe Diesel violated a contractual term. The school took Diesel's money and had to know that any advertising for clothing for young adults is likely to involve some display of sexuality. Especially if the scene is a library. That's what I'd expect.
What exactly was the school assured of? The models aren't naked. They've got on underwear. And what is even so gross and shocking about this? Man, Diesel is getting way more great publicity than its stupid underpants deserve. Where did this controversy really start? I'm inclined to suspect that the administration is only shocked* after the fact and only because some students have managed to create the impression that the school might be accused of contributing to a "hostile environment" form of sexual harassment.
As for the young woman who is grossed out that a model in panties writhed in the vicinity of a computer she uses... do you realize how many people type on those things with hands they didn't wash after they went to the bathroom?
----------------------------------------------
*Shocked!
"Lillian McEwen breaks her 19-year silence about Justice Clarence Thomas."
The Washington Post has the scoop, including what may be the key sentence: "She has written a memoir, which she is now shopping to publishers."
UPDATE: McEwan in a interview reveals that she had an intimate relationship with Thomas. She says he liked pornography, especially depictions of large breasts. What is the point of revealing something so incredibly banal? Does it corroborate Anita Hill's testimony in any significant way? The issue, in the confirmation hearing, was whether Thomas engaged in sexual harassment in the workplace. McEwan is talking about his private life. First, that's really creepy. Imagine if a man revealed private, sexual things about a woman. McEwan even admits that she's speaking now because she is politically opposed to Clarence Thomas. She doesn't like the way he's deciding the cases.
Since McEwan never says that Thomas talked about pornography in the office, the supposed corroboration is virtually nil. It's true that if we know a man is interested in pornography, it makes it more likely that he talked about that interest somewhere, more likely than if we didn't know whether the man liked pornography. But huge numbers of men are interested in pornography, and only a small subset of them who pester women by talking about it graphically in the office environment. So it just doesn't matter enough to bring it up.
McEwan also talks about the way Thomas thought about women, but it comes across as sheer speculation. She somehow knows he thought about whether women he met in the office would make good sexual partners. Again, this is perfectly banal. It says little about how he might attempt to initiate a relationship with a coworker. Doesn't nearly every single adult look around at other people and think about whether they are attractive and might make a good sexual partner?
This is just sad and embarrassing.
UPDATE: McEwan in a interview reveals that she had an intimate relationship with Thomas. She says he liked pornography, especially depictions of large breasts. What is the point of revealing something so incredibly banal? Does it corroborate Anita Hill's testimony in any significant way? The issue, in the confirmation hearing, was whether Thomas engaged in sexual harassment in the workplace. McEwan is talking about his private life. First, that's really creepy. Imagine if a man revealed private, sexual things about a woman. McEwan even admits that she's speaking now because she is politically opposed to Clarence Thomas. She doesn't like the way he's deciding the cases.
Since McEwan never says that Thomas talked about pornography in the office, the supposed corroboration is virtually nil. It's true that if we know a man is interested in pornography, it makes it more likely that he talked about that interest somewhere, more likely than if we didn't know whether the man liked pornography. But huge numbers of men are interested in pornography, and only a small subset of them who pester women by talking about it graphically in the office environment. So it just doesn't matter enough to bring it up.
McEwan also talks about the way Thomas thought about women, but it comes across as sheer speculation. She somehow knows he thought about whether women he met in the office would make good sexual partners. Again, this is perfectly banal. It says little about how he might attempt to initiate a relationship with a coworker. Doesn't nearly every single adult look around at other people and think about whether they are attractive and might make a good sexual partner?
This is just sad and embarrassing.
"They're All Bullies and Whores!"
Ha! Emily Bazelon and I talk about the election, the gay rights cases, the gender card, what you can say about women, Christian fundamentalism and anti-gay harassment, and all the complexity that doesn't fit into your ideological templates. Feast your eyes and ears on 28 minutes of bullies and whores:
"But the ousting of a wide swath of Democratic women Nov. 2 would chip away at a generation of female politicians inspired by the 1992 election..."
"... which saw a surge of Democratic women inspired to break up the boys’ club of Congress after Anita Hill’s testimony in then-Judge Clarence Thomas’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings the previous year."
Will you shed a tear for the departure of that generation of women politicians? What did they do, what did they change, and what will we think about women — what will the press say about women — when the women in politics are — gasp! — Republicans?
Will you shed a tear for the departure of that generation of women politicians? What did they do, what did they change, and what will we think about women — what will the press say about women — when the women in politics are — gasp! — Republicans?
"The talk in Washington is what the impending elevation of the former Harvard Law School dean and solicitor general will mean for the capstone of the judiciary."
Asserts David Broder, and I have to laugh. 1. There's the inane elevated tone of the writing: "impending elevation," "capstone of the judiciary." You know you're reading bullshit, so, thanks for that. 2. Who can possibly believe the people of Washington are abuzz over the effect Elena Kagan will have on the Supreme Court? 3. Didn't everyone figure out many weeks ago that Kagan, replacing Stevens, is only going to keep things the same?
To his credit, Broder proceeds to posit the theory that is my question #3. He puts it in the mouth of a former attorney general next to whom Broder was seated at a dinner party the other day. Gotta put in the seat-work at those D.C. dinner parties to dig up ideas for WaPo columns, you know. Broder decides this is "probably the conventional wisdom," then begins his next paragraph: "That is what they say, and I have no legal credentials to challenge their conclusion." Yes, but you are some kind of journalist — right? — so you could have asked some more people before you took what that one fellow/lady dribbled out at the dining table as what everyone was saying.
He's dredging up material from the 80s "In a Different Voice" Women's Studies era, and it's borderline insulting. It's Broderline insulting.
To his credit, Broder proceeds to posit the theory that is my question #3. He puts it in the mouth of a former attorney general next to whom Broder was seated at a dinner party the other day. Gotta put in the seat-work at those D.C. dinner parties to dig up ideas for WaPo columns, you know. Broder decides this is "probably the conventional wisdom," then begins his next paragraph: "That is what they say, and I have no legal credentials to challenge their conclusion." Yes, but you are some kind of journalist — right? — so you could have asked some more people before you took what that one fellow/lady dribbled out at the dining table as what everyone was saying.
But, as I told my dinner companion...Oh, lord, the thrill of being transported to this scintillating dinner party, in Washington, with an ancient pundit extracting conventional wisdom from a once-powerful lawyer!
... I suspect that he is wrong and that Kagan's joining Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor on the bench will change the high court in ways that no one foresees.Quelle riposte! Oh! Would that I could be in such company! The elderly lawyer manages to say something mind-crushingly obvious, and the old pundit, keeping the colloquy going, with no legal knowledge, disagrees.
I say this based on what I saw happen in The Post's newsroom and many others when female reporters and editors arrived, in increasing numbers, starting in the 1970s and '80s.Now, our trusty columnist does the hard work of dredging up memories from 30+ years ago. I saw those female reporters in the 70s... humming "I Am Woman" as they changed the world of men for the better... And yet you still have your job, cluttering up the pages of the Washington Post with this self-indulgent nonsense. Why hasn't some brilliant lady ousted you yet? I mean, this column has you recounting a conversation that — if I'd participated in it — I'd have gone home feeling ashamed that I'd been so dull at the dinner-table. Yet you serve it up as leftovers in a Washington Post column. And now you are feeding me this warmed over Women's Liberation stuff that is refuted — refudiated! — by the fact that you are still here writing this column.
They changed the culture of the newspaper business and altered the way everyone, male or female, did the work.And this has something to do with Elena Kagan, coming onto the Supreme Court, where there isn't ONE Justice who hasn't shared that bench with a woman. Stevens — have you noticed? — was the last Justice who served on an all-male Supreme Court.
The women who came onto the political beat asked candidates questions that would not have occurred to male reporters. They saw the candidates' lives whole, while we were much more likely to deal only with the official part of it. So the scope of the candidate profiles expanded, and the realm of privacy began to shrink.They saw the candidates' lives whole... Broder's elevated diction goes wild. The realm of privacy began to shrink... Please don't reveal your shrinkage problems, Dave! I don't want to hear about your realm... your domain....
He's dredging up material from the 80s "In a Different Voice" Women's Studies era, and it's borderline insulting. It's Broderline insulting.
They also changed the rules for reporters themselves. When I joined the press corps in the 1960 presidential campaign, I was formally instructed by a senior reporter for the New York Times on the "west of the Potomac rule." What happened between consenting adults west of the Potomac was not to be discussed with bosses, friends and especially family members east of the Potomac.Look out! The floodgates have opened! Broder's going back to 1960!
It was a protective, chauvinistic culture, and it changed dramatically when more than the occasional female reporter boarded the bus or plane.Hey, Broder. Remember the 90s? How'd you guys do with the Clinton sexual harassment story? Are you keeping up with the allegations against Al Gore?
I don't know how having three strong-minded female justices serving simultaneously for the first time will change the world of the Supreme Court. But I will not be surprised if this small society does not change for all its members.That's right. You don't know whether 3 women with 6 modern men will be different from 2 women with 7 modern men, and you haven't gotten up out of your antique comfy chair to do one thing to find out. Yet Broder, at this point, has run out of material on his subject. Go to the link and you'll see that he pads out his column with 200+ more words on other Kagan-related stuff that was casually rattling around in his... eminent dome... his venerable cranium... his... nugatory noggin.
"She said she was meeting with a rape crisis unit, stuff like that. She said it was a high authority person who has a lot of power. She was scared of him."
The Gore accuser made a contemporaneous statement to her friend, according to the friend.
What is the evidentiary weight of a contemporaneous statement like this? It was taken very seriously when aimed at a notable conservative.
What is the evidentiary weight of a contemporaneous statement like this? It was taken very seriously when aimed at a notable conservative.
Drudge digs in, and The Smoking Gun has the transcript depicting Gore as "a giggling 'crazed sex poodle.'"
Drudge. Smoking Gun:
In a bizarre statement to police, the Oregon woman who claims that Al Gore fondled and groped her during a massage session described the former Vice President as a giggling "crazed sex poodle" who gave a "come hither" look before pouncing on her in a Portland hotel suite. In a taped January 2009 interview with cops, the 54-year-old woman, a licensed masseuse... detailed her alleged October 2006 encounter with Gore at the Hotel Lucia.... It is unclear why, two years later, she approached Portland police and sought to memorialize her allegations against Gore, who she portrayed as a tipsy, handsy predator who forced her to drink Grand Marnier, pinned her to a bed, and forcibly French kissed her. The woman's statement--which could be mistaken for R-rated Vice Presidential fan fiction--describes Gore as a man with a "violent temper as well as extremely dictatorial commanding attitude besides his Mr. Smiley Global Warming concern persona." After fleeing Gore's suite, the woman returned home to discover, a la Lewinsky, "stains on the front of my black slacks." Suspecting that the stains were Gore bodily fluids, the woman made sure not to clean them.
Al Gore and the massage therapist.
She went to the police, but then she did not want to go forward:
The case reopened in January 2009. Detectives interviewed the woman but determined there was insufficient evidence to support the allegations.
In a transcript of the interview, the massage therapist said she was doing requested abdominal work on Mr. Gore when he demanded she go lower.
“I was shocked and I did not massage beyond what is considered a safe, nonsexual area of the abdomen,” she said. “He further insisted and acted angry, becoming verbally sharp and loud.There are so many questions. How credible is this woman? Women can lie, but if we reject them reflexively, it means that men can always get away with this crime, which occurs in private. What did the police say to her that discouraged her? Why is she coming forward now? Was she offered money/favors to back off or is she pressing forward for money now? Gore is a billionaire. If Gore really did what she said, does it suggest that he's had other massages and developed a modus operandi of requesting abdominal work, etc. etc. Is the abdomen a normal part of a legitimate massage? I've had a lot of full body massages in my time, and the abdomen was never included. But I am a woman. Maybe it's normal for a man. Or do you have to make a special request? Like Al's abs could be really knotted up from too many crunches. Look at him. How could he need abdominal work? As opposed to abdominal play. But, of course, the argument from his side has to be that the woman is lying. How awful this all is? And what of poor Tipper? Could this have something to do with the marriage breakup?
”I went into much deeper shock as I realized it appeared he was demanding sexual favors or sexual behaviors.”
She alleged he later tried to have sex with her.
“I did not immediately call the police as I feared being made into a public spectacle and my reputation being destroyed,” she said. “I was not sure what to tell them and was concerned my story would not be believed since there was no DNA evidence from a completed act of rape.”
"WHAT HATH CATHARINE MACKINNON WROUGHT? Woman Says Citibank Fired Her Because She Was Too Hot."
That's Instapundit's take on the truly annoying lawsuit/lawsuit-as-publicity that I mostly don't want to talk about.
Why blame Catharine MacKinnon? MacKinnon is the key figure in the creation of claims for sexual harassment.
Why blame Catharine MacKinnon? MacKinnon is the key figure in the creation of claims for sexual harassment.
A psychologist at University College Cork is subjected to a "a 2-year period of intensive monitoring and counselling after discussing a scientific paper with a colleague."
The paper was titled "Fellatio in fruit bats prolongs copulation time," and Dylan Evans is accused of sexual harassment.
"There was not a shred of a sign of offence taken at the time," Evans says. "She asked for a copy of the article."
A week later he got a letter informing him that he was being accused of sexual harassment. Evans says the whole case is "utterly bizarre". The complainant's side of the argument is that she was "hurt and disgusted", and asked Evans to leave a copy of the paper with her as way of cutting short the meeting.
"The guys who run these places can't control themselves. They're around beautiful naked women all night..."
"... but they don't understand they have to keep the hands off."
Says Matthew Blit, the NY lawyer who's been successful with sexual harassment lawsuits brought by the dancers who work in those places that are called "gentlemen's clubs."
Says Matthew Blit, the NY lawyer who's been successful with sexual harassment lawsuits brought by the dancers who work in those places that are called "gentlemen's clubs."
Allegations that Massa has "groped multiple male staffers working in his office."
I figured there was more to it than a stupid, drunken joke at a party. Otherwise, why wouldn't Massa stand his ground?
I wonder how much substance there is to this staffer-groping business? Was it annoying over-friendly arm-around-the-back stuff or something more? "Groping." There's a loaded word. Can we have some details?
Are the Democrats really policing their own? Does every member of Congress at Massa's level of touchiness get investigated, or was this selective investigation?
UPDATED: Massa says it was a tickle fight.
I wonder how much substance there is to this staffer-groping business? Was it annoying over-friendly arm-around-the-back stuff or something more? "Groping." There's a loaded word. Can we have some details?
Are the Democrats really policing their own? Does every member of Congress at Massa's level of touchiness get investigated, or was this selective investigation?
gropeI think they are all groping in one way or another.
1: to feel about blindly or uncertainly in search <grope for the light switch>
2 : to look for something blindly or uncertainly <grope for the right words>
3 : to feel one's way
UPDATED: Massa says it was a tickle fight.
Is it really so terrible that David Letterman has a bachelor pad in the building where he tapes his show?
Why should we mind if the TV star has an apartment in the building to retreat to before and after the show? He has to commute into town. He has to be fresh and energetic to do the show, which depends largely on his performance. He should be able to easily get away from the workplace to nap, watch TV, eat, and, yes, have sex.
But perhaps an exception should be made for a great late night talk show host. The funnyman's mood and ego need boosting. Just as he must have an office full of people who can write jokes and comic routines — who must share a lot of not-that-businesslike comraderie — he needs pretty ladies to keep his senses well-honed. It's part of the structure of a business that revolves around a performer. The funnyman needs his supply of sex, and the paying career positions on the staff can be used to create a pool of potential sexual partners who will keep the old man bolstered up.
Perhaps, I said. Perhaps. Please discuss. And take into account the other examples we've seen lately of great men to whom the rules arguably do not apply: Roman Polanski (movie director might be allowed to rape), Harvard students (elite collegians might be allowed to stalk), Richard Prince (important artist might be allowed to display child pornography), Brian David Mitchell (man of God might be allowed to rape). And not so recently: Bill Clinton (Presidents of the United States might be allowed to have sex with subordinate employees).
An ex-"Late Show" intern unmasked herself Saturday as one of David Letterman's former flings - and sources revealed the randy funnyman keeps a bachelor pad atop the Ed Sullivan Theater.Ha ha. I love that quote. Get the fuck out of here. We're being offered a lot of money for this shit. Reporters! Trying to get the story for free!
"I was madly in love with him at the time," said Holly Hester. "I would have married him. He was hilarious."...
[There was a] year-long, secret romance... she said, until the funnyman called it off because of their age difference.
Outside what is believed to be Hester's country home in Sebastopol, Calif. - in ritzy Sonoma County - a middle-aged man lashed out at a Daily News reporter last night. "Get the f--- out of here. We're being offered a lot of money for this s---," he said.
An ex-"Late Show" staffer said Letterman kept a room insiders dubbed "the bunker" that was open only to his favorite young female underlings....And there you see why we speak of "sexual harassment" even when the employee getting the sex is eager to receive it. It hurts the rest of the employees. It skews the work assignments in a way that feels unfair.
A woman identified as a former paramour, Stephanie Birkitt, 34, remained in hiding Saturday. She was, until recently, dating Joe Halderman, who was arrested Thursday for allegedly threatening to go public with Letterman's dalliances unless he was paid $2 million.
A "Late Show" office worker in 1997, Birkitt quickly developed a role as Letterman's Girl Friday. She went on to appear in several skits as his comic foil. Behind the scenes, their relationship became intimate, sources said.
"The creepy relationship that Letterman maintained with Stephanie was obvious and not normal," an insider said. "She was able to do anything and everything ... It was pretty well known that Stephanie was the one that Letterman was having fun with."
But perhaps an exception should be made for a great late night talk show host. The funnyman's mood and ego need boosting. Just as he must have an office full of people who can write jokes and comic routines — who must share a lot of not-that-businesslike comraderie — he needs pretty ladies to keep his senses well-honed. It's part of the structure of a business that revolves around a performer. The funnyman needs his supply of sex, and the paying career positions on the staff can be used to create a pool of potential sexual partners who will keep the old man bolstered up.
Perhaps, I said. Perhaps. Please discuss. And take into account the other examples we've seen lately of great men to whom the rules arguably do not apply: Roman Polanski (movie director might be allowed to rape), Harvard students (elite collegians might be allowed to stalk), Richard Prince (important artist might be allowed to display child pornography), Brian David Mitchell (man of God might be allowed to rape). And not so recently: Bill Clinton (Presidents of the United States might be allowed to have sex with subordinate employees).
"If you came here tonight for sex with a talk show host, you've got the wrong studio."
Leno. Funny at last, taking a jab at Letterman.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
