IS Anne Robinson right to say today’s young women are “too fragile” to deal with workplace harassment?
Well yes. And no….
Friends and I who worked in television and radio in the 1970s reminisce fondly and say if we could sue every editor or producer who chased us round the desk, or every colleague who laid an inappropriate hand upon us, we’d be millionaires with the resulting compensation. Throw in a quid for every suggestive comment and we could probably be as rich as Bill Gates.
Instead, we did just as Anne Robinson said we should, slapped them down, refused to take them seriously and avoided the worst of the serial gropers.
Full marks, too, to journalist Julia Hartley Brewer who years ago had her knees repeatedly fondled by Sir Michael Fallon, once MP for Darlington and now the newly-ex Defence Secretary. Fifteen years ago she threatened to punch him if he did it again. This week she tweeted pictures of her knees. “Both knees still intact. Get a grip, people. But not of my knees, obviously.”
Anne Robinson clearly finds it odd that today’s women can’t all be as robust as that.
But times have changed. We are all a lot less accepting. Back in the 80s, there was a famous picture of Chris Tarrant pulling the bikini top of Sophie Rhys Jones, now the Countess of Wessex. Oh what a laugh. Maybe it was. Maybe it wasn’t.
Too many cases of sexual harassment are still about power. Not banter or misjudged lunges between equals but downright bullying. When the bully’s the boss, life gets tricky.
At one of our reunions as we laughed about the things that went on in the 1970s, we suddenly remembered a girl who had left suddenly. She was a young trainee who was seduced/raped by a producer at a party. Although the bosses knew about it, no one expected them to do anything. You didn’t, back then.
The producer was promoted. The girl left.
Maybe she should have been tough enough to smack down an older, senior man. But she wasn’t. That wasn’t her fault. It was his.
And that’s why things had to change.
DO we believe celebrities? Not if we’ve any sense we don’t.
Most of us know quite well that most celebrities live on a different planet, probably one inhabited by unicorns.
When they say their beauty regime is no more than a glass of lemon juice (internal) and soap and water (external) and perhaps a dollop of some cheap and cheerful face cream, well, we take it with a lorry load of salt. We know they’ve got personal trainers, live on two lettuce leaves and a grape a day and have a brilliant plastic surgeon on speed dial.
So when celebrities in their 40s and 50s suddenly start producing children, our radar senses IVF, surrogates, expensive intervention.
Now researchers in America are blaming celebrities for so many women failing to conceive in their 40s. The scientists say that because celebrities make it look easy, then the rest of us are lulled into a false confidence and leave it too late to try for babies. They want celebrities to be upfront and honest about the procedures they’ve had.
Really? Some have – Celine Dion, Nicole Kidman and Mariah Carey have all spoken out about their difficulties in becoming mothers. That will definitely have helped other women in the same position to cope.
But some things are private, too painful even for celebrities used to having every aspect of their lives publicised and picked over. Even celebrities have feelings and chatting about your disappointment about something so deeply important isn’t always easy, so let’s cut them some slack.
We can guess the truth. And even celebrities are entitled to keep the innermost failures of their bodies to themselves.
INCIDENTALLY, the researchers who produced the report apparently read 416 glossy magazines in order to find out what was written about older celebrities and their babies.
How lovely to put your feet up with a glossy magazine every afternoon and say, quite honestly “But I’m working!”
MY idea of well-being probably involves a deck chair in the sun, a good book and a glass of wine.
Meanwhile a friend has enrolled on a “well-being weekend” in the Lakes.
It involves a number of different exercise classes, two five mile runs - in the Lake District at this time of year!- a bike ride and a night walk.
Well-being? Sounds more like a boot camp to me.
Still, I expect she’ll feel absolutely wonderful when it’s over.
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