The sexual harassment geezerhood is finally enduring some tough days, though hardly tough enough. From Bill Cosby to Bill O’Reilly, these dirty old men have the mental acuity of that Japanese soldier who spent 29 years on an island in the Pacific refusing to accept that World War II had ended. How else do you explain a guy like O’Reilly, 26 years after the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill episode, allegedly telling a subordinate that he’d like to rub her vagina with a falafel?
Headlines over the last six months have clearly established that you are never too old for sexual predation. Roger Ailes, the 76-year-old former Fox News CEO, faced sexual harassment accusations from more than 20 women who had worked for him. The initial case had been filed by former Fox Anchor Gretchen Carlson. She settled for $20 million. Ailes lost his job, but walked away with $40 million. O’Reilly, Fox’s 67-year-old star commentator, bit the dust a few days ago, on the heels of a New York Times investigation showing that the company had paid out $13 million to settle sexual harassment suits against him. Fox finally fired him and gave him $25 million. See the mathematical pattern here? Under Fox’s “Fair & Balanced” notion of distributive justice, there is approximately twice as much money distributed to the harassers than there is to the harassed.
Then there’s Cosby, 79, allegedly the Golden Arches of sexual abuse, with – at last count – 58 women drugged and violated. With an estimated net worth of $400 million, the former comedian has assembled a top notch legal and PR team to help him issue repeated denials, just as Ailes and O’Reilly have done. It remains to be seen how well his money was spent. Jury selection begins May 22 in a Norristown, PA court where Cosby faces sexual assault charges.
There is, of course, one prominent septuagenarian in this aging pack of sexual predators who has lost neither fame nor employment from extending his reach beyond the bounds of decency. That would be Donald J. Trump, the 45th president of the United States of America. According to statisticians who track these things, the commander in chief has been accused of sexual assault and/or harassment by 15 women since 1980. A number of those suits remain active.
You might think that dodging the sexual assault bullet, at least for now, would prompt Trump to keep his distance from less fortunate fellow perpetrators. Just the opposite. Trump has served as a highly placed sexual harassment consultant to all of them. For example, drawing on his own approach of castigating, insulting and threatening to sue his accusers, the Donald was dumbfounded that Cosby was using a passive, reticent defense. Here’s what he told the E Channel: “. . . he should say something because he is being accused of terrible things,” Trump said. “And to have absolutely no comment ― I think he’s getting very bad advice from a PR standpoint.”
The president’s role with Ailes and O’Reilly was more breathtaking. He participated in meetings and conference calls with Ailes leading to the $40 million buyout. Early in the O’Reilly quagmire, after numerous sexual harassment accusations surfaced, President Trump declared that O’Reilly “is a good person,” He told the New York Times, “I don’t think Bill did anything wrong.” As president, Trump leads the executive branch, including the agency that handles sexual harassment cases, making his comments a most extraordinary verbal pardon.
Given his coziness with Fox News and its former accused sex offenders, Trump has managed to make one positive and deliciously ironic contribution to the battle against sexual harassment. His behavior is being held out as an example of what not to do in the workplace. According to the Hollywood Reporter, 21st Century Fox, parent of Fox News, is using the infamous Trump “grab-them-by-the-pussy” Access Hollywood tape in human resource training on sexual harassment. In the 2005 recording, Trump is heard boasting that he gets by forcing himself on women because he is famous. Although the revelation didn’t keep Trump from being elected, HR trainers hope the president’s abhorrent conduct will be a reminder for employees on how not to behave.
As much as I’d like to believe that the well-financed fall of two Fox giants represents a cultural sea change for sexual harassment victims, I’m afraid such an assessment is far off the mark. Experts in this field say most people who experience sexual harassment at work don’t come forward out of fear, of losing their jobs, not being believed, how they will look to their family and friends. Gretchen Carlson, a former Miss America making seven figures as a top on-air performer says she kept silent for years out of fear. Think of what it must be like for a minimum wage bank teller or grocery clerk.
Sexual harassment at work is an offense of power. It’s about powerful men (mostly) taking what they want because they can. The revelations about Ailes and O’Reilly didn’t just pop up. Fox spent years and millions of dollars quietly settling litigation with nondisclosure clauses. The company’s business plan was to pay whatever it had to for the sexual harassment by men they saw as profit centers. The strategy was jettisoned only when the harassment costs grew more expensive, including the loss of 50-some advertisers and a possible disruption of Fox Cochairman Rupert Murdoch’s plan to purchase a lucrative British satellite television operation.
And therein lies the lesson from this whole sordid affair. The eradication of sexual harassment will come only when offending employers are hit hard in the pocketbook, much harder than they are now. CEOs would have a quick come-to-Jesus moment on this issue if the EEOC had the authority to levy eight or nine figure fines, on top of punitive damages. Don’t count on that happening anytime soon, not with an unabashed sexual harasser in the White House.