"An Inquisitorial Whiff in the Air"

For some time now I have been hearing women murmuring discontent about the #MeToo movement. I have not asked too many intrusive questions, but I have noticed that women in general believe that the movement has gone too far. They seem to understand that if women go to war against men, they are going to suffer. Don’t declare war when you are—excuse the expression—outmanned.

Apparently, my friend Daphne Merkin has been hearing the same thoughts. Now, in a New York Times column Merkin explains her own doubts and misgivings. She has given us an excellent analysis of this peculiar moment in American cultural history.

She begins by revealing that many women, even feminists, are dismayed to see that the #MeToo movement has lost any sense of discrimination— between rape and inappropriate remarks, for example:

But privately, I suspect, many of us, including many longstanding feminists, will be rolling our eyes, having had it with the reflexive and unnuanced sense of outrage that has accompanied this cause from its inception, turning a bona fide moment of moral accountability into a series of ad hoc and sometimes unproven accusations.

It is looking like a witch hunt. Many women notice this in private and still pile on in public. This shows, Merkin explains, that we live in a politically correct culture where people are forced to voice the correct opinions lest they be shunned:

For many weeks now, the conversation that has been going on in private about this reckoning is radically different from the public one. This is not a good sign, suggesting the sort of social intimidation that is the underside of a culture of political correctness, such as we are increasingly living in….

The women I know — of all ages — have responded by and large with a mixture of slightly horrified excitement (bordering on titillation) as to who will be the next man accused and overt disbelief.

Publicly, they say the right things, expressing approval and joining in the chorus of voices that applaud the takedown of maleficent characters who prey on vulnerable women in the workplace.

What do these women say in private? Merkin shares:

In private it’s a different story. “Grow up, this is real life,” I hear these same feminist friends say. “What ever happened to flirting?” and “What about the women who are the predators?” Some women, including random people I talk to in supermarket lines, have gone so far as to call it an outright witch hunt.

It goes without saying that no one is coming to the defense of heinous sorts, like Kevin Spacey and Matt Lauer. But the trickle-down effect to cases like those of Garrison Keillor, Jonathan Schwartz, Ryan Lizza and Al Franken, in which the accusations are scattered, anonymous or, as far as the public knows, very vague and unspecific, has been troubling.

And Merkin is correct to note the outrage suggests that women, after five decades of feminism and after reciting the phrase—strong, empowered woman—as a mantra… are now being exposed as weak and frail, incapable of dealing with even the most banal pass:

Perhaps even more troubling is that we seem to be returning to a victimology paradigm for young women, in particular, in which they are perceived to be — and perceive themselves to be — as frail as Victorian housewives.

What happened to women’s agency? That’s what I find myself wondering as I hear story after story of adult women who helplessly acquiesce to sexual demands. I find it especially curious given that a majority of women I know have been in situations in which men have come on to them — at work or otherwise. They have routinely said, “I’m not interested” or “Get your hands off me right now.” And they’ve taken the risk that comes with it.

The fact that such unwelcome advances persist, and often in the office, is, yes, evidence of sexism and the abusive power of the patriarchy. But I don’t believe that scattershot, life-destroying denunciations are the way to upend it. In our current climate, to be accused is to be convicted. Due process is nowhere to be found.

Merkin continues that these unwanted advances show the power of the patriarchy, and that they are not going to stop because a lot of feminists try to destroy the lives of a bunch of men. 

I take small exception here and point out, as I have in the past, that today's culture was not defined by the patriarchy. It was the work of feminists. Surely, the consequences were unintended, but that does not absolve anyone of responsibility. Having broken down traditional courtship culture, having insisted that women defer marriage and family, and having announced to the world that women want sex just as much as men, feminists produced a culture of impropriety, a culture where impropriety became the new normal.

Merkin believes that we must distinguish between sexual assault and improprieties. This is made all the more necessary because one person is always going to make the first move, and that person cannot really know that the move is unacceptable until he makes it:

And what exactly are men being accused of? What is the difference between harassment and assault and “inappropriate conduct”? There is a disturbing lack of clarity about the terms being thrown around and a lack of distinction regarding what the spectrum of objectionable behavior really is. Shouldn’t sexual harassment, for instance, imply a degree of hostility? Is kissing someone in affection, however inappropriately, or showing someone a photo of a nude male torso necessarily predatory behavior?

Expressing sexual interest is inherently messy and, frankly, nonconsensual — one person, typically the man, bites the bullet by expressing interest in the other, typically the woman — whether it happens at work or at a bar. Some are now suggesting that come-ons need to be constricted to a repressive degree. Asking for oral consent before proceeding with a sexual advance seems both innately clumsy and retrograde, like going back to the childhood game of “Mother, May I?” We are witnessing the re-moralization of sex, not via the Judeo-Christian ethos but via a legalistic, corporate consensus.

So, it’s feeling more and more like an inquisition. And we all  know that this is going to come around to bite women. It isn't surprising that women are uneasy about all of it. They are right to be so:

There is an inquisitorial whiff in the air, and my particular fear is that in true American fashion, all subtlety and reflection is being lost. Next we’ll be torching people for the content of their fantasies.