Dealing With Sexual Harassment

Q: Let me put it this way. I don't think about the consequenses of sexual harassment *ever*. I never consider the risk of interacting with American women. I don't live fear that some woman I might work with file sexual harassment charges. Why? I don't ever engage in behavior that might result in an accusation. It isn't possible for you to know this. Take the case of Coast Guard Captain Ernie Blanchard, for example. On a January night in 1995 Blanchard drove home from a dinner with no sense that his career was over, let alone his life. In a speech he delivered at the dinner he had told a dozen lame sexual jokes in an effort to lighten up the crowd. When Blanchard learned that some people in the audience had taken offense he immediately fired off a letter of apology. For some (who were not even at the dinner) this wasn't enough. An official top-level investigation into whether Blanchard's remarks constituted sexual harssment was begun. Twelve days later, before the investigation was complete, Blanchard killed himself with a revolver. Someone pass me a tissue. Guess what? If he didn't tell sexual jokes nobody would have taken offense.

A:Granted, however, it doesn't take much common sense to realize that telling sexual jokes in a speech directed to a mixed audience is more apt to result in offending someone than not This is about the third time that you've suggest that I read this book. I am not going to read it. You know why? Feminism is just not much of an issue with me. Obviously it's important to you or you wouldn't be doing so much research on the topic but since I don't feel my qualitiy of life is being effected in any significant degree due to feminsm I'm not going to waste a lot of time researching it. I have better things to do As far as common sense goes, the premise of many sexual harassment cases is that they are indeed nonsensical, and the average person would be amazed they were even allowed into court to begin with. With offending people, we're supposed to live in a free society; as such, we all run the risk of 'offending' one another now and again. The alternative is to restrict speech further and further, which in my viewpoint, and hopefully in the viewpoint of a lot of people, completely unacceptable. This also goes back to the patronizing viewpoint of women, that they're not people, but china dolls who'd crumble at the thought of some salty language. That does no one good.

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