Source: BBC
I really hoped I wouldn’t have to write another article about sexual abuse during this presidential campaign.
But the latest allegations against Donald Trump have prompted an important national conversation about the wider abuse of women.
It’s a conversation that is long past due, about something too many women have experienced in painful silence, and men for the most part are unaware.
Every woman who has been the victim of unwanted sexual advances – and I don’t know very many women who haven’t – has strong emotions about this and a lot of unanswered questions.
The political fallout of the New York Times and People Magazine accounts is pretty clear.
Trump has vehemently denied the allegations, but women are deserting Donald Trump. His chances of winning the White House are diminishing. His campaign is in disarray, he himself is sounding increasingly apocalyptic.
So let’s try instead to examine some of those more awkward abuse questions, because they reveal something rotten in our society.
Why do we have to put up with sexual harassment?
A lot of women, especially women just starting their careers, encounter men who do or say things that are sexually inappropriate.
It’s worth noting that Donald Trump, Bill Clinton and Dominique Strauss Kahn (to name a few) have been the subjects of multiple allegations, whilst no one has ever accused Barack Obama, George Bush or Ronald Reagan of groping.
Most men would never dream of doing such things, but women quickly learn who not to get stuck with in an empty office.
Men in powerful posts are particularly dangerous because the higher you get, the less people say no to you. That’s true everywhere – in business, in politics, in the military, in the civil service, even in journalism.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESRachel Crooks says she was 22 when Trump kissed her without consent. She had introduced herself to him because her employer did business with him. When he later asked for her number, she acquiesced – because, the Times says “of Mr Trump’s influence over her company.”
Occasionally, men too get put in an uncomfortable position by a female colleague – but the scale is incomparable.
What happens to women who complain of abuse?
A colleague from the New York Times described interviewing young women who’d been held by Boko Haram: they would admit to beatings and torture but swore they’d never been raped. The women knew that if they said they’d been raped, they’d never be able to return home.
The United States is not Nigeria, but even here women who talk about sexual abuse are often called liars or shamed publicly.
Categories: America, The Muslim Times, USA, Women