#BalanceYourPig, to each his own injury

A look at the news - Loris S. Musumeci

Sexual harassment is very much in the news. Everyone is talking about it, denouncing it more or less in unison. Differences of opinion arise when it comes to the new series of #BalanceYourPorc tweets, triggered by the official disclosures of the Weinstein affair. Sometimes it wins ovation and encouragement, sometimes only blame and mistrust. In any case, a social phenomenon is at the turning point. What does it reveal?

It's a question that deserves serious consideration. It is not, in fact, created out of thin air in the service of an ideology, to provide answers that would be just as biased. Sexual harassment and assault, and of course rape, are real problems, each with its own degree of seriousness. If #BalanceTonPorc revives the memory, disordered relations between men and women are visible. Whistling on terraces, penetrating and shameless glances, unsanitary and insistent rubbing on buses and in discos. The list could go on.

The hygiene risk

This kind of behavior deserves to be reprimanded by others who may be present at the scene, or even a slightly humiliating slap from the victim. The distinction must be drawn, however, with the simple and natural act of seduction, including the slightly old-fashioned wink, the somewhat heavy-handed glass of wine or the sweet but foolish words of a foolish lover. It's all a question of manner. The wink can be expressed in an appealing and interested manner, while remaining benevolent; on the other hand, it can turn into an intrusive attack on a woman's intimacy through excessive greed.

The risk, because of perverse behavior, is to condemn and regulate everything. While the process of sexuality begins with the conquest of love, to watch this impulse with constant fear would be to cut it off from its nature and kill any possibility of a spontaneous relationship. This is the problem of a so-called hygienist society. Geneva lawyer Nicolas Capt touches on this delicate point with precision in a newspaper interview Le TempsOur societies are influenced by strong hygienic movements in many areas, from smoking to food. Morals are no exception, and some would like to standardize all behaviors. Some would even go so far as to propose a court order to punish caddish behavior.«

The media phenomenon

Redirecting the question to the media phenomenon from which it emanates, it's distressing to note how reflection struggles to gain perspective, and above all, to evolve. On the skeptical side, the argument, already repeated many times, criticizes the accusation on social networks rather than in a court of law, the only place where justice has its official place. Passionate, popular vindictiveness thus prevails over the punitive wisdom of the institution.

Still in the same camp, the term «pork» also poses its difficulties, recalling the famous «darkest hours of history.» In connection with the Jewish reference, commentators Elisabeth Lévy and Alain Finkielkraut noted, however, on the show The spirit of the staircase on RCJ, that a hint of anti-Semitism joined the assimilation of Weinstein, Polanski or Allen in various tweet ironically questioning the link between these alleged sexual predators.

Shame and hurt

The new consideration on the debate table, favorable to #BalanceYourPig, aims to resurrect the conscience of the man tempted by a gesture he considers harmless - a caress on the shoulder a little too hard, for example. The wave of complaints on the Web moves him in the long term, and can provoke a beneficial shame, inclining him to greater courtesy.

The danger lies in the group effect. After a rape, a person must go through a healing process of their own. Neither a group nor anonymous Internet users can heal in someone else's place. The feeling of not being alone, reading the thousands of comments invoking a #MeToo, dodges the wound. We'll feel strong because we're united, but the wound will remain. Unplastered. Festering.

Write to the author: loris.musumeci@leregardlibre.com

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