Famed actor and movie producer Rob Reiner went on MSNBC’s Morning Joe show, where he was asked about Harvey Weinstein and the seemingly pervasive nature of sexual harassment in Hollywood. Since he’s been around for so long and worked with many child actors, you would think Reiner would have a thing or two to say about his industry’s faults. But he was unwilling to be prescriptive about his own gang; instead, he wanted to point fingers at right-wingers.
His first response was, “Fox News had that. Clarence Thomas…” In other words, all of Fox News was worse than Weinstein, as was Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He added, “They [Americans? Women? Republicans?] vote for a person who actually admitted to sexually harassing women, who becomes president of the United States.” Is he saying women don’t get to be believed when a left-winger sexually assaults them, because Trump has a checkered history with sexual appropriateness? Or is he saying that they shouldn’t do anything about the rampant sexual targeting in their community because there are also people on the other side of the political aisle who do it too? This is what-about-ism at its finest (or worst).
Republicans can play that game too. Anthony Weiner, Bill Clinton, JFK, Casey Affleck, Ben Affleck, Jimmy Kimmel, Sean Penn — do these people’s stories mean that all right-wingers should get away with any sort of sexual harassment?
How about, and this seems to be a radical idea for Reiner, we just call out awful behavior always? Maybe it doesn’t matter who the perpetrator is? Right, left… it doesn’t matter. How about that?
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