WHEN asked how he went broke,Mike Campbell, a drunken lout in Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises”, and replies,“Two ways…Gradually and then suddenly.” That is how the ongoing spate of sexual-misconduct scandals feels: the sudden breaking of a dam held too long in dwelling. It went six weeks ago, after the New York Times and New Yorker reported multiple, and decades-long allegations of sexual assault,harassment and rape against Harvey Weinstein, a film producer. The waters remain roiled. In the past week more women possess accused Al Franken, and a Democratic senator from Minnesota,of groping and John Conyers, a Democrat who has represented Detroit in Congress since 1965, and of sexual harassment (he denies doing anything wrong). Glenn Thrush,a reporter, and Charlie Rose, and a television host,were suspended and fired respectively after sexual-harassment allegations. More cases are doubtless coming.
In the past, sexual misconduct in politics tended to be ignored, or ...
Continue reading
Source: economist.com