The Issue of Malignant Vituperation and Reasonable Debate

"Before 2014, it was unimaginable to me that I would become a poster boy for men who are assholes. I had not been a network boss or an executive with institutional power; there had been no formal complaints at work that I was aware of over the years; there were no hush-money deals or nondisclosure agreements. As things came crashing down, I became obsessed with the inaccurate stories and the pattern of salacious details taken as truth in the echo chambers of social media outrage. That foreclosed any focus on my own accountability."
"Since then, I have spent almost four years reflecting on my relations with women I dated. For some, nothing I say here will be enough or be put the right way. Even as I feel deep remorse about how I treated some people in my life, I cannot confess to the accusations that are inaccurate. What I do confess is that I was emotionally thoughtless in the way I treated those I dated and tried to date. As well, I leveraged my influence and status to try to entice women and lead them on when they were interested. There are all sorts of old-fashioned words to describe men like this: player, creep, cad, Lothario."
"But it went deeper than that. I was demanding on dates and in personal affairs. I would keep lobbying for what I wanted. I was critical and dismissive. Some women I cared about went along with things I wanted to avoid my disappointment or moods. I ought to have been more respectful and responsive with the women in my life. To them I say, you deserved much better from me."
Jian Ghomeshi, essay: Reflections From A Hashtag, New York Review of Books 

The New York Review of Books editor, Ian Buruma, has left his post after an outcry over publishing an essay by disgraced former radio host, Jian Ghomeshi, seen here outside a Toronto court in May 2016. (Mark Blinch/Canadian Press)

Jian Ghomeshi, the radio host of CBC's extremely popular "Q" social-cultural-pop-interview program was easily identifiable as an ego-driven, self-promoting star. He was, in fact, the CBC's very special star. His program so wildly popular it was syndicated and could be heard on American radio. He fell steeply and swiftly from grace when a number of women, a few at first but at last count twenty in all, went public in revealing him to be a nasty little creep of a sexually abusive predator. A revelation that brought deep satisfaction to those who detested him, and profound sadness to those who revered him.

Evidently there were rumours of his relentless pursuit of women, his autocratic and insulting behaviour with women, from female interns on the program to more seasoned women with a certain celebrity of their own. No one at the CBC evidently took them seriously; he was, after all, their star. He was, however, a shooting star and he was shot down from the heavens above to his own very personal hell. The relentless flood of news about his character along with instant condemnation from all who knew him and knew of him now identifying him as a low-life, vicious predator.

Like a beaten cur, he couldn't believe what had happened to him. But he did have enough cerebral function left to realize that he had to hire a lawyer who would be not merely competent but outstanding in her defense capabilities and that lawyer was Marie Henein. When it came to his trial, the women who had agreed to be public about their accusations, questioned professionally by the expert Ms. Henein were revealed to have enabled their own humiliation. They were so anxious to be noticed by Ghomeshi that even after he had violently manhandled them they gushed over him.

They collaborated stories and evidence in a pact to humiliate him as he had humiliated them; while they had been complicit in their own humiliation, Ghomeshi hadn't the choice. But the deft defence mounted by Marie Henein led to a discharge; not guilty as charged. Despite which he was pilloried and continues to be. This is a man who may still be a creep, but from what he has written, he understands full well what brought his downfall, identifying his own character faults and deploring them and his previous relationships with women.

Those who cling to the #MeToo movement are, however, implacably unforgiving. Ghomeshi's case is certainly one that verges on the unforgivable, but he has learned a lesson from it, and it's time for him to be able to move on, a chastened and a better man than he was. There are countless men whose behaviour is far more egregious than his, more harmful, more enduringly and relentlessly destructive. These are the men who should be outed, and many are. The thing of it is, the #MeToo movement is insatiable in its voracious appetite for revenge, and that appetite sweeps into its vortex men undeserving of such condemnation.

In the public arena of the social contract between men and women it is undeniable that women all too often get the short end of the stick. That has changed and it is continuing to change. The men that have allowed themselves to fossilize into the old order can be dealt with in ways other than their complete character assassination and professional destruction by bitter, vindictive Valkyries. Clumsy advances, male entitlement choices, these are all social errors in communication, gestures and verbal insults. There are some, like Justin Trudeau, who will never be held to account.

But these are relatively trivial, albeit insulting in comparison to the social/sexual/violent crimes that destroy women's lives. Women themselves are known to be abusive to their sex partners on occasion if and when the mood takes them. Men, however, don't die at the hands of abusive partners at anywhere near the rate that women do. Still, women have made significant gains in forwarding themselves and their aspirations as never before. The beast in some men needs more taming, but the men don't need to be destroyed in the process.

"I am not going to defend his behaviour, and I don't know if what all these women [Ghomeshi's accusers] are saying is true. Perhaps it is. Perhaps it isn't. My interest in running this piece, as I said, is the point of view of somebody who has been pilloried in public opinion and what somebody like that feels about it. It was not run as a piece to exonerate him or to somehow mitigate the nature of his behaviour."
"The exact nature of his behaviour -- how much consent was involved -- I have no idea, nor is it really my concern. [I have] ambivalent feelings [about the #MeToo movement; partly positive as a] necessary corrective on male behaviour ... but like all well-intentioned and good things, there can be undesirable consequences. I think, in a general climate of denunciation, sometimes things happen and people express views that can be disturbing."
Ian Buruma, editor, The New York Review of Books

Ian Buruma, editor, The New York Review of Books   Vincent Tullo / The New York Times

And for this intrepid, honourable editor who simply wanted to place before the reading public whom he assumes is reasonable and intelligent, an argument for discussion, the wrath of Hell has descended. The outraged 'progressive' outcry that has accompanied the publication online of the Ghomeshi piece has not elicited a reasonable debate, but rather calls for this man's head -- on a pike, preferably. So, because the paying sponsors and advertisers of the venerable Review of Books see the writing on the wall from furious #MeToo-ers, he did the honourable thing, and resigned.

Another head rolled out from under the guillotine of vicious retribution visited upon any who dare question the public evisceration of any man deemed to have stepped beyond the boundaries of approved social conduct which places men in the position where women were traditionally expected to be; modest and silent and invisible.

Jian Ghomeshi and Marie Henein, National Post