What does ‘Me too’ mean after all? Apparently it means ‘I too have been propositioned’ or ‘Advances have been made to me, too’.
The understanding is that the female speaker preserved her virtue in spite of all the odds and the male predator was sent away with his tail between his legs.
My father’s generation called the men in such cases ‘wolves’; others called them ‘mashers’. Played in the movies by Leslie Phillips or Terry-Thomas or Sid James, they were figures of fun, leering, slavering fools who never ever succeeded in their attempts to corrupt women who were younger, smarter and sexier than they.
Feminist Germaine Greer (pictured) believes the law on rape is due for a radical overhaul. She shared her views on the ‘Me too’ campaign
The behaviour of such lecherous characters has always been pathetic and/or ludicrous, as much of Harvey Weinstein’s seems to be. Anybody who exposes his or her genitalia, the flasher on the escalator, say, may imagine that he or she is displaying sexual power, but the fact is the opposite. Weinstein is not a Don Juan but a sexual incompetent, and, but for his power in la-la land, profoundly resistible.
Accusations of rape are a different matter, of course, but the difficulty is that the issue is one of consent. The case used to be that if a man sincerely believed sex to be consensual he could not be found guilty of rape, but with convictions difficult to come by, this criterion has been loosening.
In my view (not commonly held) the law of rape is medieval and profoundly misogynistic. It is due for a radical overhaul, but in the cacophony of prosecutions and lawsuits that is coming our way, it is unlikely to get it.
What we can expect now is that the people accused of sexual misconduct — so far all of them men — will use every resource available to them to fight the accusations. The principal, and in many cases the only, testimony against them is the narratives of the victims.
All the accused will be expertly defended; while the complainants may believe that they are parties to the litigation they are actually — unless what has been brought is a civil suit — simply exhibits in the case. The duty of the defending team will be to discredit them. Eight women have already accepted payments from Weinstein for their silence; they may well find breaking that silence will have devalued their evidence.
Germaine Greer (pictured in 1974) describes sex as a blood sport as both the aggressor and victim take a risk
It is worth bearing in mind that though almost 60 women came forward with allegations against Bill Cosby, allegations that included rape, drug-facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery and child sexual abuse, the one criminal case finally brought against him has resulted in a mistrial.
In the military, and other organisations founded on similar principles, there has always been a rule that fraternisation between the ranks is not on. A person, male or female, with power over subordinates cannot be permitted to make a pass at any of them because he or she could be using a position of power to secure sexual favours by threat or coercion.
If a teaching assistant only a year or two ahead of you puts a hand on your knee, you’d be a fool to spend the weekend weeping
Teachers may not seduce their students while they are students, though quite a few will marry a student after graduation. If a teaching assistant only a year or two ahead of you puts a hand on your knee during a tutorial, you’d be a fool to spend the weekend weeping. One word of complaint could lose him or her the job, in which case weeping would be appropriate, for him or her, not for you.
Sex has always been a bloodsport and players on both sides can get hurt. The aggressor takes a risk and the victim, especially if he or she is the only other person in the aggressor’s hotel room, runs a risk.
In the Thirties, during the Depression, one of the few ways young women could earn a living was by carrying out secretarial duties for travelling businessmen — in their hotel rooms. In 1932, when Joan Crawford played Flaemmchen in Grand Hotel, the ‘little stenographess’ herself was on the make, with a collection of glamour photos she could show to a likely contender.
She was also sharp, tough and aware that she couldn’t give away what had to serve as her meal-ticket. Not nice, not Doris Day certainly, but more dignified than all this weeping and wailing about unwelcome advances.
Meryl Streep, doyenne of women in film, accepting Best Actress at the National Board of Review awards gala, confused her audience by singing the praises of men: ‘I love men’, she carolled. ‘Oh my God! Yeah, I know it’s the year of the woman and everything, but oh my God! The men! All my mentors have been men.’
Which is not surprising seeing as nearly all the people in a position to mentor her were men.
‘I have experienced things, mostly when I was young and pretty. Nobody comes on to me [now],’ she told The New York Times. ‘But back in the day, when everybody was doing cocaine, there was a lot of behaviour that was inexcusable. But now that people are older, and more sober, there has to be forgiveness, and that’s the way I feel about it. I was really beaten up, but I don’t want to ruin somebody’s mature life. I just don’t.’
This extraordinary statement doesn’t bear thinking about. The cocaine was illegal, but the sex wasn’t. What ‘beaten up’ means in the context is unimaginable.
Perhaps Streep will be subpoenaed one day and made to explain herself, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. No one has accused Weinstein of doing cocaine and as Streep has said he was ‘a champion of really great work’.
The original Me Too movement was set up nearly ten years ago by black activist Tarana Burke to address the problem of sexual abuse among black female blue collar workers. As such, it was massively ignored by white feminist activists until, in October last year, actress Alyssa Milano sent out a tweet inviting women protesting against sexual harassment to post #metoo as a status update.
When Time Magazine put Me Too on the cover as person of the year, Tarana Burke was not included on that cover.
AND WHAT GERMAINE’S PEERS THINK…
EVERY WOMAN I KNOW HAS BEEN SEXUALLY HARASSED
Bestselling author Shirley Conran, 85, advised working women in her book Superwoman, that ‘life is too short to stuff a mushroom’. Divorced from Sir Terence Conran, she has two sons, Jasper and Sebastian.
During the Sixties, sexual harassment, and indeed sexual molestation, were everyday risks. Yes, people got fired — but it was the women, not the men.
What I remember about the men back then is that they were always vicious in their punishment if they were turned down. And they had long memories. They would see that you didn’t get promoted, or were even demoted. A man in a rank above you found it easy to punish you for not giving in to him. And if you complained? No one ever took you seriously and nothing at all would happen except you may find yourself suddenly given a worse job to do.
Shirley Conran (pictured) says she doesn’t think the women behind the current ‘Me Too’ movement need her generation’s help
In the late Sixties and early Seventies, I led a group of women journalists in protests, sit-ins and demos for gender equality. We were fighting for equal pay and equal opportunities, and there was even a torch-lit march on Downing Street. Yet I haven’t felt the need to add my voice to the MeToo movement today. I don’t think the women behind it especially need my generation’s help — they’re getting on just fine by themselves.
As for the French women who wrote that long-winded whine of a letter, well, they’re in a very lucky position: they are powerful and are perfectly able to make it clear to a man that they don’t want his attention. But that’s not the case for all women. It’s easier to see off unwanted advances when you’re rich and famous.
Having said that, I’d be astonished if Catherine Deneuve hadn’t been sexually harassed or molested in all her years in the film industry — if she hadn’t had her knees touched, if we could put it as daintily as that. Every single woman I know has, at some point in her life, been sexually harassed. I suffered severely from it.
Is touching a woman on the knee a crime? I think touching anywhere needs to be forbidden as then it’s clear: a person must not touch someone else’s breasts, bum, big toe . . . anything.
Shirley Conran says men don’t need to touch a woman to make his meaning clear
If a man wants to make a sexual advance to a woman, he has eyes to signal and a mouth to tell her she’s beautiful or ask whether she would like a drink, to which she can respond as she pleases. He doesn’t need to touch to make his meaning clear. Touching may give an unattractive man a sexual frisson but annoy a woman who feels that if she objects, the man will say: ‘Oh, it was accidental’.
Fundamentally we should all have our own space and no one should invade it. And if a man engages in frottage on the Tube, then of course that’s wrong and women should jab back with their elbows, or better still, an umbrella. It’s actually very simple. If you try to touch a goldfish in a bowl, it will dart away to the other side. In my view, we should all be untouchable in our own space, just like the goldfish.
In any case, feminists have other battles on their hands right now. I think we should set our sights very firmly on the BBC and on big private corporations, where women are still not being paid as much as men for doing the same work.
It’s illegal, and I don’t know why people aren’t in prison for it. I find it hard to believe — and extremely depressing — that almost 50 years after our marches and protests, almost 50 years after the Equal Pay Act, our public broadcaster still doesn’t have parity of pay.
WHY DIDN’T I SPEAK OUT IN THE SIXTIES?
Writer Elisabeth Luard, 75, partied with high society in the Sixties. She is the widow of former Private Eye owner Nicholas Luard, with whom she had four children.
Coming of age in the Sixties, I considered myself a feminist to the core — and still do.
When I married Nicholas Luard, I refused to obey as well as love and honour, but I stuck to the rules. Not so Nicholas, who was busy from dusk to dawn at the satirical nightclub he owned with his friend Peter Cook.
Elisabeth Luard (pictured) says she didn’t tell anyone that one of her school friends fathers had wondering hands when she was 14
That famous photo of Christine Keeler in a striped swimsuit at Cannes? It was taken at Nicholas’s request for a movie he was trying to get funded at the festival. During the trip, he shared a room with Christine — for ‘economic reasons’, he said.
It’s hard to explain why I didn’t object to a philandering husband. For those of us ill-educated at girls-only boarding-schools, those were the rules. We kept quiet. If you told on anyone, you were a spoilsport. And society, as Christine found to her cost, didn’t like spoilsports.
Growing up, I’d spend half-term weekends with school friends and their parents. I was 14 when one of the fathers asked me if I was homesick. What started as a comfort hug went on too long and his hands were suddenly everywhere. Instinct told me what he was after and I escaped with a just few popped buttons.
I never told anyone at the time or since. Why not? Perhaps I knew I wouldn’t be believed. I still remember the name, the place and the events 62 years later.
Elisabeth (pictured n 1988) questions if current generations were betrayed by previous generations not speaking out against harassment
During my (younger) career, I encountered an ancient, ugly Hollywood producer, who was considering, or so he said, investing in a TV cookery series I was to host. The offer, it turned out, was dependent on the casting-couch. I didn’t co-operate, but I never complained.
So the MeToo experiences of the new wave of feminists are all too familiar to my generation. They’re a reminder of how much we didn’t achieve. They also pose an uncomfortable question: did we betray our sons and daughters by not speaking out when it happened to us?
TODAY FEMINISM IS ABOUT WHAT YOU CAN’T DO
Writer and broadcaster Carol Sarler edited Honey magazine before launching current affairs programme Watch The Woman.
When I was ten years old, I was lured by a stranger in the park. Once out of public sight, he held a knife to my neck, dragged me behind bushes and sexually assaulted me. Twenty years later, I was at a party when a senior male work colleague placed a paw on my thigh.
Can you imagine, now, how I feel about today’s prevailing message that there is no difference between those two crimes? That if you dare suggest otherwise, you’ll be met by outrage?
Last month, Hollywood actor Matt Damon felt the furies when, in the heights of Harvey Weinstein fever, he said, ‘There’s a difference between patting someone on the butt and rape or child molestation’. Based on my own experience, I’d call that stating the obvious. But based on the instant condemnation, he’ll be lucky to work again.
Carol Sarler (pictured) was sexually assaulted at age 10 however she is unwilling to join the ‘Me too’ campaign
No wonder so many women of my generation have reached their 60s not only unwilling to join that ridiculous MeToo brigade but even to call themselves feminists. There was a time when the emerging women’s movement was inspiring. We who had really known what oppression and inequality were really about marched to our anthem: ‘I am woman! Hear me roar!’
Yet how quickly it went downhill. That kind of feminism was all about what women could do; today’s ninny version is all about what women can’t do: they can’t stand up to a lecherous man, they can’t take sexual banter without suffering post-traumatic stress and they can’t understand that as long as we emphasise our weaknesses we can never assert our strengths or exercise our choices.
When I was ten, with the knife at my throat, I had no choice. I was a child. But 20 years later, with the paw on my thigh, I was a grown woman. Like all grown women I had a choice. And I exercised it.
The first time, I asked him, please, to stop touching me. The second time, there was no please. The third time I slapped his fat face, then back-slapped the other cheek for good measure. The room fell silent.
Then, to his eternal credit, the host — male and also junior to the nuisance — asked him, not me, to leave the party. A hundred people watched as, with cheeks flaming, he drooped down the stairs.
Nobody of my generation, reading that, will be surprised. Not because violence is to be applauded, but because they remember the days when we discovered the sublime pleasure of taking control of our lives: sisters, doing it for themselves.
When it came to unwanted attentions, we stood our ground without needing the support of hundreds of others, each clamouring for the fashionable status of ‘victim’. As a result, our individual but effective battles were a damn sight more life-affirming than anything achieved by raucous rabbles. One day at a time, one man at a time. Result.
While writing this, I’ve been trying to remember the name of the man who touched my thigh. Yet, for the life of me, I can’t. But I’ll bet you he hasn’t forgotten mine. And, more to the point, I’ll bet that he didn’t do it again.