the trial

The campaign against sexual harassment may have started out as a noble cause, but is the cure becoming worse than the disease? One of the major figures in the Spin trial speaks out. BY CELIA FARBER | i have a story to tell, but it's trapped in the rubble of dead language. "Sexual harassment," "discrimination," "environment," "toxic," "sexism," "inappropriate" -- these are the kinds of words George Orwell would have labeled "pretentious diction," words that "are used to dress up simple statement and give an air of scientific impartiality to biased judgments," as he described it in "Politics and the English Language." These are now big words, signifying words -- the words we use in the post-feminist era to define our positions in the revolution. What revolution? Let's call it the Revolution Against Transgressive Behavior in the Workplace, a k a "Sexual Harassment," the battle against which has recently grown to zeitgeist-defining proportions. The French speak of "Le Mistral" -- a terrible wind that blows, fiercer, more determined than any other wind -- it whistles through every keyhole, and it carries an ominous mood of threat. "Sexual harassment" -- the very phrase now feels to me like such a mistral, a force that nobody dares question, lest they be targeted next, lest they be thought of as improper, insensitive, sexually warped, anti-feminist. The irony, of course, is that the self-appointed morality police, who speak so quiveringly of wanting to defend the delicate, honorable souls of women, are often startlingly brutal. It's an ancient dilemma: If virulence is what is required to correct a social injustice, how do we then correct the new virulence so that it stops short of hurting innocent people, or even of hurting not quite innocent people, badly? The new generation of feminists at the forefront of the new sexual wars must, absolutely must, address that problem. At present they seem to have taken the stance that no amount of excess, of injustice, of sheer insanity in the name of combating sexual harassment is to be regretted, now that it's finally time to fry the bastards. I disagree. And I speak from close personal experience.

Do "tall, thin blondes" have more fun?