Ann Killion - classy lassy

I don't think you are this dumb, but I'll bite: give me a definition of rape using terms that do not require legal definition.

As for OJ, I'm not sure what the relevance is, although a civil court did find him responsible for the deaths, and I'm pretty sure that's more than any court has decided for or against Winston.

 

I would be curious to hear from editors, perhaps some who have had to deal with something big/obvious/major, and probably, unexpected, like this.

What is the unvarnished, behind-closed-doors reaction they have to this, or something like it, upon seeing it from one of their writers? How does the discussion with the reporter go, particularly when it is one of your "name" writers?

I can't imagine anything other than shock, and, honestly, a sense of not being sure what to do about something that can't really be undone.

 

She obviously thought she did something wrong, since she took the tweet down.

Doesn't matter in the least to me if she calls him a rapist or not. That's between her and Winston. But it's chickenshit to decide you're going to have it both ways.

 

Just to be clear, since my acknowledgment of YF's straw man will probably further steer him away from the focal point of the thread, the question at hand is whether a journalist is acting ethically by labeling a rapist somebody who has not been convicted as such. And, clearly, the answer is no. I'd argue she shouldn't refer to OJ as a murderer either, but, as I noted, given the outcome of the civil proceedings, that is an entirely different debate.

EDIT: Same goes for labeling Cosby a rapist. Another straw man, I might add, since I haven't seen any instance of a self-professed journalist flat-out labeling him a rapist.

 

And that's fine. No one has argued in favor of the tweet.

The question of offense is real. On a basic level, who gives a shit?

The guy is a rapist. So is Cosby. So is Kobe.

When we sit around and wonder how Cosby got away with it for 40 years, let's not pretend it was just because of all of his "power". It was also because people didn't to come out and call him a rapist.

Then, one guy did, and the whole word has been forced to consider and -- mostly -- acknowledge it as true.

Are we going to continue wait 40 years to properly label other celebrities what they are? Why? Because they an throw a football, or shoot a basketball?

 

Speaking for myself, personally, it is because I live in America, which is a country built on the rule of law, and if somebody has not been convicted of an offense under that law, then I am not going to label them thusly. I am going to let the facts speak for themselves.

 

Finally, the public is coming to believe the stories these women have long been telling.

We are in a strange territory, certainly — destroying a man on the strength of the words of women who had much to gain from him during their relationships with him. It is their word against his — just as it was Anita Hill's word against Clarence Thomas' and Juanita Broaddrick's against Bill Clinton's.

Throughout the long history of rape, there have been women brave enough to come forward to say, "He did this to me." When their claims take place outside of the courtroom, it has always been up to us — the listeners, the public, the unofficial judge and jury — to decide which women are lying and which are telling the truth.

Apparently we are hard to convince. And now we know how many raped women it takes to make the case against a serial rapist strong enough that most of us will believe them: a very large number of women, over a long number of years.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/caitlin-flanagan-article-1.2019677

 

So, when Michael Jackson, Bill Cosby, Woody Allen, Jerry Sandusky, Bryan Singer, Jimmy Savile, or Jian Ghomeshi get away with crimes for years, or decades, because people in the position to know better refuse to speak up, doesn't that make all of us responsible for their ability to get away with it for so many years?

Why is it considered a better option to stay silent than to point out that someone is a predator?

Why does society make victims afraid to speak up and seek help?

Why do we seek to protect the powerful, and not their victims, who are often powerless?

 

Is Killion in the wrong here from a legal standpoint? Sure. Legal repercussions? Doubtful.

The larger crime is the "look" this gives. If I, as someone with a visible job, tweeted something like that, I would expect - 100% - to be fired by Monday at 10 am.

 

Hey we had a President that half the country and liberal media enabled for years even though there was credible evidence that he was guilty of sexual harassment and possibly rape.

 

Now one who issues decrees that are clearly illegal.

 

Actually it was built by an act of treason, punishable by death according to most laws.