Giles Coren on Weinstein and what a terrible shame it is that women have to power to ruin a sex pest's career

[HeyRoly]

Twitter thread and screenshots for those not on Twitter.

twitter.com/jonathanshainin/status/921424322455068673

I have to say I'm biased and I've always loathed Coren, but holy fucking shit...

'One misfired flirt and I could be out of a job, publicly shunned, end up in prison. The women are out there who could make it happen. '

I would like to know where these women are 'who could make it happen' because so far Cosby, Allen, Weinstein et al are roaming free after literally dozens of accusations including very serious rape allegations (ie not 'just touching' whatever that means). Cosby and Allen at least are still flogging their wares (and despite losing his job Weinstein's films are still out there making money) and very much not in prison.

I never really took the time before to think about the true victims of sexual assault, powerful men who just want to flirt. Poor Giles, this metoo campaign must be very damaging to him. I hope women who have spoken publicly about being sexually assaulted, realise the damage they have done to older, flirtatious men and hang their heads in shame.

It's a clear message to the whining gasbags

Don't harass women and no harm will come to you. Go about your business giving women the respect you give yourself. No need for this self flagellating self pitying bullshit. You can sleep at night not worrying that random women will wreck your career in one fell swoop. While Trump and his ilk can still get elected, you remain safe.Enough already.

That's still grim as fuck. Being 'attractive' doesn't mean your advances are any less unwelcome.

And Victoria isn't all that either. She wrote a really shitty apologetic piece about Polanski too iirc

At no point has he thought, "I won't put xx because it would make me look unprofessional." It's not clear if he's ever even met her face-to-face. Even the people I get in really well with at work, I manage to keep work mails professional. It's possible to keep the xx bits just for non-work mails, and if you don't know someone well enough to send them non-work mails, then just leave out xx. The sky will not fall in, and none of this is difficult to understand.

And in general, it's okay to smile at people in the street, particularly if you're not discriminating on age or sex. If you're only smiling at young women, maybe you should think about what that says.

Half everyone's female friendslist is Me Too, and within days men start fretting that it's awfully unfair on them. As reliable as clockwork.

I suppose because I have always signed off letters and emails with kisses, to both girls and boys. But mostly to girls. And I’ve never meant anything by it. They are only crosses tapped thoughtlessly twice on a keyboard. But they still do mean “kiss, kiss”, and I wouldn’t put them on an email to the editor. I don’t really want to drop a smooch on young Melanie. Do I?

And at that moment I realised the time had come to start being more careful about who I make out that I want to kiss. For we live in a post-Weinstein world now. And we already did, before Weinstein. Though nobody told Weinstein.

A man realises that he probably should treat a younger woman in his industry in a professional manner. WHAT A HIDEOUS INJUSTICE! WOE IS HE, FOR THE WORLD IS ENDING!

Is he fucking serious?

God, I actually think that's worse.

Part of his point seems to be that when he felt young and hot (seriously, Giles? ) women liked him flirting with them. But now he's older, and young women he fancies are more aware of power imbalances, so women might falsely accuse him of being a predator.

Giles, if a man's behaviour is sexually aggressive, it doesn't matter how attractive he is or his age. It's still sexually aggressive and the women he has victimised, for the cheap thrill, will be thinking of it when they write #MeToo. But don't worry, very few of them have the confidence and power to make public, or official, the name of the man who behaved thus.

The bit about not stopping shagging because it would be impolite is disgusting, too. I think this thread might need a trigger warning actually. (Maybe Harvey Weinstein and Giles Coren in the title is warning enough?)

Finally, isn't he married? His poor wife.

Why is the age gap widening as he gets older? Is he unable to flirt with someone close in age. And the just touching is awful.

What an ass.

I've always hated Giles, he comes across as such a nasty, bitter man. And one who'll say anything for attention. He's only had any success cos of his dad! Bloody nepotism gets you places.

I never had a strong opinion on him before now, I have to say. Beyond the superficial, like that he has a very weedy voice.

I've briefly met Victoria, and found her friendly and likeable. But this is about her brother, not her.

XXs on texts from men make me uncomfortable. I am not a texter/whatsapper etc anyway. I will text only when I am unable to speak. I have only ever been text kisses twice from men that I am not married to (and my DH uses them as sparingly I do). Once was a friend and I immediately text back "Don't X me!". The other was a senior work collegue. I don't know him that well but from all accounts and my experience with him he is a truly lovely guy and not one for any kind of flirting. Still I didn't like it but was unable to say anything because of course then I would be making it awkward.... although... would he send a X to a male colleague? Maybe it was just a brain fart on his part but correcting it, again, would make it more awkward.

I wonder if its because I have been with my DH so long, mobile phones were not quite ubiquitous when we got together. I have never done text flirting or anything.

To be fair I find them a bit cringe worthy from women too especially when it's somebody you barely know sending something like "I'll be there at 12 X" . My friend tells me she feels like she is being aggressive if she doesn't put an X on a text. So maybe this (x's on text communication) isn't a feminist thing for me as much as it is that I am basically a curmudgeon.

It’s not one bit better “in context”! It’s self pitying bilge about how the nasty women make such a fuss about perfectly harmless interactions that all the lecherous old fuckers who’ve never done anything “worse” than a bit of mild sexual assault and harassment don’t get to have any “fun” any more. What.The.Fuck?? No.

I know older men in a professional setting who in a pre-feminist era might have enjoyed being able to behave however they wanted towards women. Possibly, they do complain among themselves about that. But unlike Giles, they're able to master basic stuff like: signing off with a xx is a bit weird and unprofessional. And so is getting off with much younger colleagues. It's just basic manners and self-restraint. He comes across as really spoiled and entitled in general (which he doubtless is; that name meant he didn't have to struggle very hard)

www.the-pool.com/news-views/opinion/2017/42/mel-mcgrath-on-naming-the-man-who-sexually-harassed-her

Look at this old creep, got away with it too.

He's got it confused
It’s time for me to stop smiling back at young women in the street
And when one female accuser comes out, more come. Inevitable as the rain. Sometimes it is hundreds, as with Weinstein. And then without any cross-examination of the stories, the man is finished. No trials or second chances. Even if nobody said “rape”. Even if it was just touching, or saying things, or simply standing there in a bathrobe being an ugly fat old slob, looking as if you would quite like to have sex (a crime of which I myself am frequently guilty), the man is finished.

And rightly, I suppose. Women have suffered sexual microaggressions (and macro ones) at the hands of men for thousands of years. All of them, from what I can make out, by all of us. And I don’t want to run the slightest risk of being seen to have any part in any of it any more.

damn - computer submitted before I'd finished.

I mean - that no, smiling back at a woman who's smiled at you is normal, polite, human behaviour.

Demanding that that woman smiles at you, or going over to that woman and touching her un-invited, or refusing to take no as an answer when she tries to get out of the conversation - that's the bad stuff.

Exchanging a bad joke with a waitress - they've heard it before, but pleasant customers aren't a problem.

and that 'I suppose' - as though this is something academic, to be debated, as though perhaps women could just shut up and let men flash women without complaining - as if things were better when we didn't point out it wasn't acceptable to do that.

I've seen an ex-boss in a bathrobe - but then there were a number of us staying at his house, and it was early in the morning. He wasn't trying to flash us (and didn't - he was in pjs underneath). That is fine and normal. I think we all know what is meant when we hear that Weinstein opened the door in a bathrobe.

It's a badly written article which expresses what appears to be his fundamental misogyny perfectly although I doubt that was the look he was going for; he's getting a lot of flak for it on Twitter, fortunately, from men as well as women. Victoria has spoken out in his defence, though...

He does acknowledge that the "just touching" was clumsily expressed - given he makes a living out of writing, you might have thought he woukd have spotted that before sending it to print but there we go. But then he whinges that everyone has taken the quoted paragraphs out of context, cutting them off after saying that accusations of sexual assault finish a man's career but before he says "And rightly." But what he actually says is "And rightly, I suppose." How grudging does that sound?! Really resentful that a man's career might be finished over something so trivial! What a twat.

I've seen male colleagues in a towel before - away for a number of days on work, staying in a house with one bathroom, scuttling past each other in the corridor. No-one feels sexually harrassed or intimidated, it's just people getting on with their lives.

Had they come into my room in their towel, or insisted that I go to their room to speak to them rather than waiting until we were all in a communal area, stood against the door, asked me to touch them, exposed themselves to me, been in a position of power over me at work, it would all have been very different. Context is everything. But Coren is deliberately and disingenuously ignoring that so that the experiences of these women can be minimised, silenced, so that we can focus on what really matters here: the rights of men not to feel uncomfortable at work.

I'm not on twitter, so I don't know how it's going down over there, but the issue absolutely isn't the phrase "just touching". The thrust of the whole article is that the problem about women complaining about sexual assault is that it makes men feel icky. Take that premise away and there's no article. The "just touching" is neither here nor there and it changes nothing - rephrase that to something less idiotically clueless, and you still have Giles complaining that women highlighting sexual assault isn't fair to men. Which is a dick move, Giles.

i tend to find Coren’s writing thought provoking. The main thought they provoke is this; what the hell was going on with Oxford’s admissions policy 25 years ago? I hope they’ve fixed it.
Reading anything by Toby young has a similar effect.

One misfired flirt and I could be out of a job, publicly shunned, end up in prison. The women are out there who could make it happen. The historical crimes, real or imagined, are waiting to tumble upon one wrong move

Funny enough Giles, I've managed for my whole professional career, which is 32 years long right now, to not inappropriately touch a colleague nor have I ever sent kisses in a work email. If you have overstepped the mark, don't blame the women for the mark that YOU overstepped, and if you don't know the difference between how to behave with women and men, just treat women the same way you would treat men.

It is not hard, is it?

His grip on the basics of English law seems rather tenuous, for a supposedly educated man.
If what you were doing involved risk if imprisonment, twat face, it was a bit more than flirting.

If he’s worried at allegations of sexual assault about Harvey Weinstein are stopping him flirting, he’s having trouble seeing the line between flirting and assault.

Women are finely tuned as to what constitutes misogyny when it’s being papered over. Tells everywhere.

For instance:

’m not counting anyone who might have shagged me just to be polite. We’ve surely all done that: got to the point where stopping now would simply look rude and just gritted our teeth and pushed on through.)

If you’re shagging a woman who is getting her teeth, it’s unsurprising that you can’t tell the difference between flirting and assault.

And no, trying grade assault on a sliding scale, where good looks or otherwise are the decider, is also a tell.