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What a difference a year makes.
When I was in my twenties, I was taught that it was possible that she could not handle sexual harassment on her own – and that if she could not, she did not belong in the workplace. We thought things had changed by 1991 but learned they had not. That was the year Professor Anita Hill described how her then-supervisor Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her boss at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission: he ended up being confirmed as Supreme Court Justice, and she ended up vilified as "a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty ". "Are you a woman scorned?" Asked one senator during the hearings. As recently as 2013, three-quarters (74 per cent) of women said that reporting sexual harassment was a risky career move. (Today, only 44 per cent do.)
This stereotype of the vengeful lying slut silenced most women and vilified those who spoke up. The second stereotype is that sexual harassment is merely naughty. The writer, Ijeoma Oluo, re-examined her harassment by a co-worker in the late 1990s: "Sometimes managers would be in the room, pretending not to hear. Occasionally a manager would shake their head at him and tsk tsk, like he was a naughty child. He was not a child. He was 32. I, on the other hand, was a child. I was 17. "
Only one-third (34 per cent) of Americans thought sexual harassment was a very serious problem in 1998. In 2006 Tarana Burke, an activist, told fellow sexual assault survivors "me too". Alyssa Milano's #MeToo tweet on October 15 2017, making Burke's movement on the face of the world. The percentage of Americans who believed that sexual harassment was high (64 per cent), rising to 88 per cent.
That's called a cascade norms. Typically, social norms change slowly – or used to. Today's social media can mean that we see more of these sharp shifts. Where have we landed?
Many businesses now make risk it was a year ago. Until #MeToo, a well-run business with a sexual harassment. This was the best defence against a defamation suit, which was deemed to be unfairly won. These verdicts can be paid out more than the others. And businesses often decided they could reach no conclusions because it was a "he said-she said situation".
Today, both stereotypes that traditionally protected sexual harassers have waned. Eighty percent of Americans now think that it is a problem, and two-thirds (64 per cent) now say that they are more likely to be accused of being victimized. lying slut stereotype. The view that sexual harassment is simply naughty is waning, too, now that 87 percent of Americans favor zero-tolerance.
All this makes the reputational damage of a sexual harassment claim much steeper, which has changed companies' risk assessments. As of May 2018, nearly 300 high-level US executives had been fired due to sexual improprieties. That's extraordinary, not just because it happened, but because we know it happened. Companies now obviously believe that the risk of not having sex with men is higher than the risk of a successful defamation. Indeed, some insurers have begun to provide coverage for their employees.
The backlash has begun, and proceeds on two quite different fronts. In the business context I hear many reports that they are so often that they will be accused of sexual harassment, that they will not be allowed to go out of their lives, or even refuse to meet with women behind closed doors. All this is illegal sex discrimination. Now, to be more precise, it is perfectly legal to refuse to meet with men. Otherwise it's illegal because, they are not so important, so they are not excluded, their careers will be harmed.
It may well be that it excuses this new excuse. My sense is that they are freaked out by the sudden shift in social norms, and worried because their families depend on their careers. Four out of every 10 men (43 per cent) now say that #MeToo has made them reflect on their own behavior – sometimes, I suspect, with regret.
Some simple guidance can help allay men's fears. First, if you want to date a colleague, feel free to ask her. But if she says no, that's your answer. What if you just know in your gut that she actually wants to go out? Then you can also know she can change her mind. Remember, she's at work. She signed up to be your colleague, not your girlfriend. She's entitled to keep working relationships as work relationships.
The second rule is simple: That can mean you interact with work colleagues. We all know that social interactions, on the golf course, at drinks or dinner, or other social interactions. That makes you feel more comfortable knowing that you're comfortable with a wide range of people. If you want to shift to your breakfast, or drink in a group and know your limit. What if you're on a business trip with a young female colleague? Make your intentions clear crystal, and think of your niece. You would not hit on your niece.
The third rule concerns the general panic about whether a guy can give a girl a compliment. You can say, "That's a nice dress," but not, "You look hot in that dress." What if you say the first but think the second, one gentleman asked me when I was giving a sexual harassment workshop. "Sir," I said, "the law does not care what you think. It cares what you say. But if you're thinking that, watch your tone or hold your tongue. "If you feel that compliments are making somebody uncomfortable, it's not a compliment but a power struggle.
The fourth rule concerns sexual joking. In "Sexual Behavior at Work: Fun or Folly?", Jennifer Berdahl and Karl Aquino found that only 10 per cent of women enjoyed "ambient sexual behavior" such as sexual joking. More surprising is that only 46 per cent of men did. I do not know what you are doing, but you are in the position of having a relationship with others. You are not.
The final rule concerns touching. Do not do it. There are some exceptions. What if you're close to your mother and you're moving to condolence hug? (Does this happen only when I live, in California?) The question becomes: How are you reading? If you do not like it, then it is inappropriate, then you already know the answer. If you're going to be so, then ask before or stick with your sympathetic words. Asking for consent is not awkward. Invading someone's personal space is.
These questions will be answered by professionals, who can now stop worrying and spend their time in the world.
For blue-collar men, the situation is more complex. Jobs that involve danger, such as mining, often have a tradition of razzing – jumping out and surprising someone in the dark, for example, or even chaining newbies to machines. Anthropologists point out that razzing acts two functions. First, it tests if co-workers are cool under pressure in a context of interdependence, where a colleague's lack of cool can be a life-or-death matter. Razzing also helps with emotion management. Many blue-collar workers face workplace danger, especially when they're under the influence of safety rules. They do not want someone else who is afraid of fear is contagious. Razzing communicates this norm. The challenge in many blue-collar jobs, where sexual harassment is often intense, is to separate out razzing from sexual harassment.
Feminists also have pointed out that, to the extent of their masculinity in terms of their ability to do "man's job", the presence of women can feel emasculating. Sexual harassment sometimes reflects blue-collar for men and women. Thus sexual harassment is broken down by the sharp decline in manufacturing in the UK and the US that has left increasing numbers of less-educated men unable to fulfill the ideal breadwinner.
All this suggests that sexual harassment will be very difficult to eradicate in blue-collar jobs, that the withering of blue-collar jobs will exacerbate it, and will do so until the US and UK prioritize good jobs for those without university degrees. Social class helps explain the backlash against #MeToo in the political arena, as evidenced by the recent confirmation hearing of US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. In a remarkable echo of the Hill-Thomas confirmation hearing in 1991, Professor Christine Blasey Ford testified that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when she was only 15. Ford recounted to the Senate Kavanaugh, then 17, forcibly got on top of her and ground his body against hers while his friend, Mark Judge, watched. When Ford tried to scream for help, Kavanaugh put his hand over her mouth. "This is what terrified me the most," she stated, ". . . I thought that Brett was accidentally going to kill me. "That's the way you feel about this traumatic event." [her] expense. "
The response illustrated how much has changed since 1991 – and how little. Unlike Professor Hill, Professor Ford was not aided or scorned or slutty woman by an all-male bench of senators. The committee was still male-dominated, but they are still in the dark. The vengeful lying slut stereotype was gone, but the result was the same: Kavanaugh was confirmed. Is this the end of #MeToo?
It's complicated.
American politics, arguably beginning with the 1973 Understanding what's at stake requires understanding the Supreme Court's central role in the culture wars Roe v Wade decision that held that states could not regulate first trimester abortions. (This holding was watered down in a subsequent case.) At some level, these hearings were not about sexual harassment at all. They were about abortion rights, a flashpoint for evangelical Protestants and one of the issues at the heart of the self-conscious and successful Republican effort to use class conflict to lure working-class whites away from the Democratic party.
Class is expressed through cultural differences. After 1970, these cultural differences focus on gender and sexuality, as elites embrace gender equality and sexual experimentation as part of their entitlement to self-development. Working-class whites focused more on self-discipline: the kind that gets you up and to work, every day, without an attitude, to an often not-very-fulfilling job. This working-class ethic place has a high value on traditional institutions that helps self-discipline, including religion and traditional family values - both of which have been explored.
Support for abortion rights is stronger among college-educated women than less elite ones. There's a 23-point differential in support for abortion rights between college grads and high-school grads. Elite women identify strongly with their careers and see children as time-and resource-intensive projects, making control over the timing of childbearing seem fundamental. Elite women share with elite men the view that "family comes first". Personal responsibility and abiding by religious and cultural norms play critical role in working-class families. After all, being a mother is one of the only high-status roles working-class women can claim.
Starting in the 1970s, Republicans have offered support for working class anti-abortion views in exchange for working-class support for pro-business positions. This move also appealed to white evangelicals – even those who are not working-class. Dear President Donald Trump, a twice-divorced alleged adulterer. In my view, the charges of hypocrisy miss the mark. Through trump, evangelicals finally won the prize: they have an iron hold on the Supreme Court Roe'S protections for abortion rights will be eroded step by step. I do not call that hypocrisy; I call that understanding your political priorities, and acting strategically and effectively to realize them.
Though the Kavanaugh hearings were more than just sexual harassment, they represent the first truly effective backlash against #MeToo. If conservatives succeed in making #MeToo part of the culture wars, it can become embattled, along with LGBTQ rights, climate change changes, trade treaties, immigrants, and much more.
It all depends on whether liberal elites remain so class-clueless that they keep playing on the hands of the right. It comes back to a single question: will the western democracies respond to the anger being expressed by their fellow countrymen to the gutting of the middle class? The Harvard economist Raj Chetty has documented the demise of the American dream: virtually all Americans born in the 1940s, but only about half of those born in the 1980s, earn more than their parents.
Meanwhile, global elites choose to bond emotionally with refugees and immigrants, using an empathetic language of human rights. Considering their struggles, this is understandable, admirable, human. But it is also self-defeating, if it's paired with the neoliberal "the race goes to the swift and you're not" lens often used to dismiss the plight of formerly middle-class families facing economic hardship.
Sensitivity to the plight of immigrants combined with insensitivity to citizens is a perfect recipe for an immigrant-bashing. If this kind of class-cluelessness continues, it's not just #MeToo that will flounder. Democracy will.
Joan C Williams is a Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of California at Hastings and is the author of White Working Class. Research support for this piece provided by Sky Mihaylo, a policy fellow at UC Hastings
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