"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature,
the heart of a heartless world,
and the soul of soulless conditions."
--Karl Marx --
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the heart of a heartless world,
and the soul of soulless conditions."
--Karl Marx --
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I will reserve my thoughts on Herman Cain's sexual harassment problems, where the claims came from, who dug it up and why, whether it means anything or not, blah blah blah.
But listening to some of the arguments, I've concluded that in general, victims can't win.
If they report it to HR, they might get some money from a settlement, but it comes with a requirement that they can't ever talk about it. Companies often settle these claims because it's cheaper than the legal fees of fighting it would be. Almost all individual victims end up settling, because they'd be an individual fighting a company/corporation in court, and who's going to pay their legal fees if they lose against a corporate army? Companies often settle without the permission of the accused harasser, and a settlement is therefore not an admission of guilt.
The end result is that the accused harasser can claim that it never happened, that the accuser is a liar, and the accuser/victim, we don't know which, really, cannot refute that under the terms of the settlement.
Either way, settlement or go to court, the alleged victim will be either branded forever a money-grubbing liar, or face a high probability of bankruptcy.
If they don't report it to HR, if the victim realizes there's no way to win and it's a sure way to lose a job, and good luck getting a good reference when you look for another, then when she (or he) finally does report it, everyone assumes that it's obviously not true, because if it were true, why wasn't it reported earlier? Therefore it didn't happen, and the accuser is a publicity-seeking liar.
All accusers who can't afford to fight an army of lawyers in court become a liars, regardless of the truth.
It reminds me of rape accusations, back in the 50's. In most states the victim had to produce TWO witnesses to the rape, or a bruised and battered body she could have acquired in no other way, otherwise she was lying. Most victims never reported the rape.
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2 comments:
Two of my friends were raped. One was accused of provoking it because she was wearing a mini-skirt. The other one never reported it. It happened at a summer camp where she worked.
I was (and still am) terrified of being raped. Of course, it's not about sex, it's about power and destroying a woman's personhood.
Three of your friends.
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