What does a TRUMP presidency look like?

[Berkut]

Well it is not like there is some kind of objective standard. You sexually harassed somebody if they feel like you sexually harassed them,

Not in this case if you invoke the "reasonable person" argument, assuming that's still a thing.  It was in the company-wide sexual harassment training we had to take five years ago.

Obviously common sense and being reasonable is the only defense. But that is also pretty arbitrary. The committee obviously felt like it was reasonable and common sensical to decide against Lebow. And then what can you do? Not much.

This was my main take away from training I get on this subject in the companies I have worked for. Ultimately it comes down to how people feel about the situation. So you better hope you work with very reasonable people.

In this case, it wasn't even people he worked with, right? Just someone he ran into at a conference.

This is why the PC war on the left against speech is so alarming. The only way to respond is to shut up. Which is, of course, what they want.

ANd just like the crazies on the right, the "moderate" lefties defend them out of a sense of tribalism and "the other side is worse!".

[dps]

You sexually harassed somebody if they feel like you sexually harassed them, doubly so when the institutions back them up.

Which is a big problem I have with our current laws/views on sexual harassment.  You should be held accountable for your actions, not someone else's emotional responses to you actions.

[Savonarola]

Actual news story:

J.K. Rowling disses Trump's giant signature

He's probably just over-compensating for his small hands.

[merithyn]

Isn't that exactly what he did though?

Lebow, informed of the complaint, wrote what he said was intended to be a conciliatory response, assuring Sharoni that "I certainly had no desire to insult women or to make you feel uncomfortable" and suggested that Sharoni, born in Romania and raised in Israel, may have "interpreted my remark out of context."

Yes... until he called it a frivolous complaint.

After Boyer informed him of the complaint and asked him not to communicate with Sharoni, Lebow said he wrote her an email telling her he didn't mean to offend her and to explain that saying "Ladies' lingerie" was an old joke from the days when elevators had human operators and people would shout what they were looking to buy in a department store.

"In my view, this is not only a frivolous complaint but one that is damaging to serious issues of discrimination and misogyny," Lebow said.

[merithyn]

In this case, it wasn't even people he worked with, right? Just someone he ran into at a conference.

This is why the PC war on the left against speech is so alarming. The only way to respond is to shut up. Which is, of course, what they want.

ANd just like the crazies on the right, the "moderate" lefties defend them out of a sense of tribalism and "the other side is worse!".

Personally, I think it's overblown, and I'm not defending her, so much as trying to understand where she might be coming from. I wouldn't have taken this up the chain, but I wasn't at that conference, and I don't know what her experiences were prior to that. If she'd already spent time being "deared" to hell and back, I could see this being the straw that broke the camel's back. But that's all conjecture.

There's also a push by a lot of women to finally call out the bullshit that we live with every day. Because of that, stupid things like this are being called out unnecessarily. But again, as a younger woman (than him) and without the cultural context, I could see it being considered demeaning. Again, I wouldn't have taken it up the chain, but I know the context.

[grumbler]

I am still trying to figure out how she could be offended by the concept of women's lingerie even absent a context of department stores.  Is that no longer a PC-acceptable term?

[merithyn]

I am still trying to figure out how she could be offended by the concept of women's lingerie even absent a context of department stores.  Is that no longer a PC-acceptable term?

Two women in an elevator crowded with men and no escape. One man asks what floor, and another man calls out something that is specific to women and isn't generally spoken about in professional settings (women's underwear). In particular, in today's world, lingerie is thought to be highly sexual in nature, the kind of underwear that is generally perceived as something that women wear specifically to turn men on.

Again, she could be considered being a bit too sensitive, but in an environment where these women are probably subjected to a myriad of comments from men in every program and meet-and-greet at these types of conferences that they're supposed to just suck up and ignore because, after all, the guys didn't mean anything by it...

As I said, we have no idea how many times these women have been "deared" prior to stepping into that elevator. It's definitely a factor in how they're going to take the situation.

[PDH]

He should have said "granny panties."  There is nothing sexy about that.

[11B4V]

I am still trying to figure out how she could be offended by the concept of women's lingerie even absent a context of department stores.  Is that no longer a PC-acceptable term?

Two women in an elevator crowded with men and no escape. One man asks what floor, and another man calls out something that is specific to women and isn't generally spoken about in professional settings (women's underwear). In particular, in today's world, lingerie is thought to be highly sexual in nature, the kind of underwear that is generally perceived as something that women wear specifically to turn men on.

Again, she could be considered being a bit too sensitive, but in an environment where these women are probably subjected to a myriad of comments from men in every program and meet-and-greet at these types of conferences that they're supposed to just suck up and ignore because, after all, the guys didn't mean anything by it...

As I said, we have no idea how many times these women have been "deared" prior to stepping into that elevator. It's definitely a factor in how they're going to take the situation.

[merithyn]

I am still trying to figure out how she could be offended by the concept of women's lingerie even absent a context of department stores.  Is that no longer a PC-acceptable term?

Two women in an elevator crowded with men and no escape. One man asks what floor, and another man calls out something that is specific to women and isn't generally spoken about in professional settings (women's underwear). In particular, in today's world, lingerie is thought to be highly sexual in nature, the kind of underwear that is generally perceived as something that women wear specifically to turn men on.

Again, she could be considered being a bit too sensitive, but in an environment where these women are probably subjected to a myriad of comments from men in every program and meet-and-greet at these types of conferences that they're supposed to just suck up and ignore because, after all, the guys didn't mean anything by it...

As I said, we have no idea how many times these women have been "deared" prior to stepping into that elevator. It's definitely a factor in how they're going to take the situation.

Until the doors opened, they weren't going anywhere. As a woman, that's something that I take into account whenever I step in to an elevator. I rarely step into one filled with men I don't know.

[Berkut]

I am still trying to figure out how she could be offended by the concept of women's lingerie even absent a context of department stores.  Is that no longer a PC-acceptable term?

Two women in an elevator crowded with men and no escape. One man asks what floor, and another man calls out something that is specific to women and isn't generally spoken about in professional settings (women's underwear). In particular, in today's world, lingerie is thought to be highly sexual in nature, the kind of underwear that is generally perceived as something that women wear specifically to turn men on.

Again, she could be considered being a bit too sensitive, but in an environment where these women are probably subjected to a myriad of comments from men in every program and meet-and-greet at these types of conferences that they're supposed to just suck up and ignore because, after all, the guys didn't mean anything by it...

As I said, we have no idea how many times these women have been "deared" prior to stepping into that elevator. It's definitely a factor in how they're going to take the situation.

SOrry, but that is ridiculous.

I should consider every thing I say in any conversation based on the danger that some person might hear me who has had some other bad experience, and hence might take an otherwise innocuous comment ton heart and run to some authority who might then pass judgement on MY comment on the basis of what this person I have never met might have experienced in the past?

Like I said, this is a recipe for just shutting down conversation. A common theme these days in the alt-left.

[Ed Anger]

Actual news story:

J.K. Rowling disses Trump's giant signature

He's probably just over-compensating for his small hands.

#resist
#readanotherdamnbook
#smallhandsgiantpenis

[merithyn]

SOrry, but that is ridiculous.

I should consider every thing I say in any conversation based on the danger that some person might hear me who has had some other bad experience, and hence might take an otherwise innocuous comment ton heart and run to some authority who might then pass judgement on MY comment on the basis of what this person I have never met might have experienced in the past?

Like I said, this is a recipe for just shutting down conversation. A common theme these days in the alt-left.

Oddly, it appears to have had the exact opposite effect, as here we are, discussing it.

And as I understand it, the bigger issue for the board was his condescending "apology" sent to her, rather than the joke itself.

I'm offering a theory for why she may have taken it how she did. You are certainly under no obligation to accept it, or try to understand it yourself. I've said that she blew it out of proportion, in my opinion, but I wasn't there.

[Valmy]

And as I understand it, the bigger issue for the board was his condescending "apology" sent to her, rather than the joke itself.

Which potentially is a bit absurd. I mean being a jerk is not commendable but it is not a form of sexual harassment. It seems like they used it to force him to deliver a different apology, which he did not. Granted I am not aware of what the exact nature of the censure was. So maybe it did make sense. And besides we cannot assume this article is really giving us everything that went down.

As I said, we have no idea how many times these women have been "deared" prior to stepping into that elevator. It's definitely a factor in how they're going to take the situation.

Women call me 'dear' and 'honey' at work all the time. And they certainly call each other that. I was not aware I was being victimized and 'deared'.

Of course being one of the barbarous subhuman savages who is to be feared and loathed I would never do such a thing. I know my place.

[Berkut]

At question isnt conversation on message boards, but rather conversation i the world,

The lesson any man should take from this (and women as well, eventually, because it will come for them as well) is that one should simply not say anything at all when there is a woman in hearing. Who knows how she might take it? And if she takes it poorly, regardless of whether or not reasonable people find it objectionable, you are in trouble

And apparently, if you defend yourself, well, that is EVEN WORSE!

What an asshole he is for suggesting her complaint about words not even directed at her are "frivolous" in response to her attack on his professionalism and character.

That is the true crime here this poor old dude stumbled into - you might get away with inadvertently offending a victim, but god forbid you question their victim status!