The Ugly Power of Accusation

What makes you think the before and after images are at all different?

(Did he do it? I don’t know. But this particular civil suit doesn’t bug me anywhere near as much as the Kobe Bryant one does.)

I’ve removed off-topic postings. Please keep on topic in comments. Thanks.

I’m in big agreement with you on this one, Dan. Now please call my wife and explain to her why we can’t string up Scott Peterson until the trial is over, and then only if he’s convicted!

🙂

But in this case the coverage (lead by Drudge of course) started with an O’Reilly attack where he accused Andrea Mackris of extortion. So who is the accuser here? Whose guilt has already been decided?

Senator John F. Kerry made one, and I mean *just* one, public commitment to give a hard news interview prior to the election.

Bill O’Reilly.

This “case” has given him an “sexual harasser” out, and I’m sure he’ll take it.

I agree the news media give too much emphasis to this sort of stuff. But why does it follow that the lawsuit is presumptively “something other than a legitimate complaint”? And as Mr Tippett points out, do you extend the same presumption to O’Reilly’s lawsuit?

I extend the same presumption to the countersuit.

Boy, are the other cable news outfits all over this one. Just another example of our “up the stimulus” culture.

The Left tore up its credentials on sexual harrassment in the 1990s for naked expediency. Does Dan actually think we’re so blind and foolish to forget?

But did Dan stand “neutral”, and extend equal “presumptions” to accuser and alleged culprit, when Juanita Broderick accused President Clinton of rape?

Did Dan side with Paula Jones while she argued all the way to the Supreme Court for the right to have her sexual harassment case against Bill Clinton heard during his Administration? (She won that point before the Supreme Court, which ruled that Executive Privilege did not shield Clinton).

Did Dan critique Clinton for — as is now well documented — directing surrogates to attack Monica Lewinsky as a disgruntled, “mentally unstable stalker” for 10 days after “I did not have sex with *that woman*”, before he did a 180 and confessed to his inner circle?

Now that it’s a case against Bill O’Reilly, Dan wants to be balanced. Sheesh!

Sorry, Dan, you gave up any semblance of balance on this issue long ago, and any claim to *genuine* overriding concern for the interests of alleged women victims.

You have been willing to put the political needs of the day ahead of the rights of women proclaiming sexual abuse, harassment and even rape, when the Left was the target. Your motives for inserting your opinion in this case are suspect.

Let’s see — the image of a cowardly bully before; the image of a cowardly bully after. Where is the difference indeed?

After reading the complaint on The Smoking Gun, it’s impossible to look at him the same way.

Mental images just creep in, and they are just so wrong.

Whether Bill O’Reilly is guilty of anything or not, I have great sympathy for him since he has now entered the legal Twilight Zone of “sexual harassment” proceedings. In a rare moment of agreement between Mr. Gilmor and myself, I am also upset at the “accused = guilty” reasoning in all too many cases.

But sexual harassment is holy war of the left, for which justice has no bearing on attaining the ends: guilt. Like McCarthyism in the 1950’s or the Salem Witch hunts of old, the mere allegation of sexual harassment is “evidence” enought to sustain his guilt. Period. I work for a VERY large company and it’s been made clear — both in policy and in firings — that the mere allegation is sufficient to justify termination. Nowadays, “sexual harassment” can mean almost anything and only needs to be “perceived” by the “victim” in order to have taken place. Several men have been lost all — job, house, career, everything — and been left standing asking, “What did I do wrong?” The answer is befuddling: “It’s not what you did
, it’s how it was how she, uh, ‘perceived’ it.” So there you go; if she *felt* or *perceived* it as harassment — regardless of whether it was — then it’s treated just the same as if he groped her in the hall.

This points to another dynamic in the “accused = guilty” reasoning in these cases: there are no gradations of severity of guilt. Whether he “looked at her in a ‘weird’ way” or whether he outright groped her in front of colleagues, a man merely accused of sexual harassment is met with the maximum punishment — of course after an absurd “investigation” to “prove” the foregone conclusion of his guilt.

Many people rightly decry the seeming injustice of Ashcroft’s kangaroo courts for “terrorists” (wherein the standard of evidence is nill, the proceedings are kept a dirty secret, the prosecution runs the show, and the conclusion is pre-determined). But understand that men — especially white men — have lived under a “accused = guilty” system since the circus of the Anita Hill hearings.

Like many guys living under the fear of mere allegation, I feel for Mr. O’Reilly. Whether guilty or not, I sympathize with him insofar as I can’t stand to see anyone put through McCarthy-style injustice.

I would argue that Dan is being a bit generous in labeling the accused harasser in this case as a “news host”. But I do agree completely with Dan’s sentiments.

I was accused of sexual harassment a few years ago. The charges were completely bogus, but very similar to those in this case. In my situation, only a few co-workers knew about the allegations, so I didn’t have to endure much of the negative publicity and opinion ramifications Dan mentions. But the frustration and anger I felt that something like this could even happen, and the fear of an unknown outcome were damaging enough.

Fortunately, things were resolved in my favor in a matter of days, and the accuser was fired. But the stress was unbearable, and the situation contributed significantly to the end of my marriage. Try explaining to your wife why you need to take a few weeks off from work while you are being investigated for sexual harassment….

I could have (and probably should have) filed suit against my accuser and her lawyer. I chose not to. But I most definitely learned the moral significance of assuming innocence, and waiting to pass judgment until the facts come out in a court of law.

Thanks for the admission. Refreshing candor.

Of course, we’ll be calling you “accused sexual harasser llcooljj ” from now on.

Well, I guess that settles it: the apologists have trotted out the standard “Clinton did it first” excuse, so he’s obviously guilty as sin…

Isn’t this the same O’Reilly who admitted that Fox’s lawsuit against Al Franken was frivolous? Hoist, petard, etc.

While I agree that the allegations are not proven and need to be treated as such–this is not a Senate hearing or a criminal trial, folks. It’s a lawsuit.