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Originally posted by lilBuddha:

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Originally posted by Doc Tor:
You don't appear to want to listen to men's experiences of how they too suffer under patriarchy.

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I never said they do not. What I am saying is that the problem is not equally shared by men and women. Do you think it is?

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Originally posted by Anglican't:
It does seem rather unfair that some people are on this list for having had affairs or for having specific turn-ons. That's embarrassing, but nothing more. Does make me wonder who compiled this list and why.

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I've seen what purports to be The List.

It's

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Forward the New Republic

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Originally posted by Doc Tor:

It's

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
What is the origin of the list? The reason I ask is that it seems not too dissimilar from the kind of information known as 'Dirts' for which the Tory whips were famous, and threatened to broadcast to bring recalcitrant backbenchers into line.

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Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I don't think anyone knows. I'd be amazed if the most scandalous details turn out to be true (..or provable).

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Originally posted by betjemaniac:
Not for a moment to diminish the items that *are* properly serious.

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Originally posted by Doc Tor:


And then there's the culture of 'breadwinning' that takes men out of the home and away from their children, to see childcare as something that women do, to become estranged from their own kids' lives until they become strangers because they never see each other. No, definitely not fucked up for most men whatsoever. Most of us men have got it peachy and we don't want to change it.

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
As to the standards required of members of the armed forces, one is reminded of Churchill's comment: "Don't talk to me about naval tradition. It's nothing but rum, sodomy, and the lash."

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Originally posted by Doc Tor:
I caught Anna Soubry (MP for Broxtowe - Con) on Woman's Hour. She'd worked for Fallon at Defence for a couple of years, spoke very highly of his capabilities as a minister

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Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I think Leadsom has used the criterion that harassment involves a woman feeling uncomfortable. Well, fair enough, but a few MPs must also be feeling a bit uncomfortable now. But as Doc Tor just said, maybe a bit of discomfort over a sexual advance is OK with an MP, but not a Minister.

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Originally posted by L'organist:
Back to the Fallon resignation.

Q Who advised the PM on whether or not to accept (Parliamentary-speak for force to it) the resignation of Michael Fallon?
A Gavin Williamson, Government Chief Whip

Q Who advised the PM on a likely successor to Fallon?
A Gavin Williamson

Q Who did the PM appoint as Secretary of State for Defence
A Gavin Williamson

You couldn't make it up.

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Originally posted by mr cheesy:

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Originally posted by L'organist:
Back to the Fallon resignation.

Q Who advised the PM on whether or not to accept (Parliamentary-speak for force to it) the resignation of Michael Fallon?
A Gavin Williamson, Government Chief Whip

Q Who advised the PM on a likely successor to Fallon?
A Gavin Williamson

Q Who did the PM appoint as Secretary of State for Defence
A Gavin Williamson

You couldn't make it up.

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Given that there is a suggestion that the Whips office knew/knows a whole lot of stuff that they've not acted upon, is it a stretch to think that Williamson somehow used this as leverage to get a ministerial role?

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If we weren't in a frenzy of denunciations, I wonder when either party would have done anything.....

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
betjemaniac

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If we weren't in a frenzy of denunciations, I wonder when either party would have done anything.....

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Quite so, but why should the whips make the information public? It's more useful if kept secret because the whips can use the threat of disclosure to keep individual MPs in line. That is why I find the disclosure of the information by Conservatives so intriguing. Who complied this dossier? Why was it disclosed now? To what purpose?

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Originally posted by Golden Key:
Q--

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Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I think Leadsom has used the criterion that harassment involves a woman feeling uncomfortable. Well, fair enough, but a few MPs must also be feeling a bit uncomfortable now. But as Doc Tor just said, maybe a bit of discomfort over a sexual advance is OK with an MP, but not a Minister.

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Would you explain that last sentence, please? I can think of more than one interpretation, not all good.

Thx.

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Originally posted by betjemaniac:

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
betjemaniac

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If we weren't in a frenzy of denunciations, I wonder when either party would have done anything.....

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Quite so, but why should the whips make the information public? It's more useful if kept secret because the whips can use the threat of disclosure to keep individual MPs in line. That is why I find the disclosure of the information by Conservatives so intriguing. Who complied this dossier? Why was it disclosed now? To what purpose?

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because, no matter how it's being trailled in the press, this basically *isn't* the whips list. It's a list which seems to have been drawn up by some Tory staffers for the benefit of new arrivals in the house for who to watch out for. It's a *gossip* list rather than the sort of thing the whips would have. Which is why much of it is embarrassing rather than worse, and some of it (not all) has already fallen apart as untrue on the first contact with daylight...

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Originally posted by L'organist:
Apparently Michael Fallon put his hand on Julia Hartley-Brewer's knee - about 7 years ago. That's it. He, being one of the few gentlemen in the Commons at the moment, now realises that this was inappropriate and offered his resignation, which was accepted, etc, etc, etc.

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Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I think Leadsom has used the criterion that harassment involves a woman feeling uncomfortable. Well, fair enough, but a few MPs must also be feeling a bit uncomfortable now. But as Doc Tor just said, maybe a bit of discomfort over a sexual advance is OK with an MP, but not a Minister.

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“... If someone is made to feel uncomfortable, or believes that others have acted inappropriately towards them, they should be able to contact an external, independent, specially trained support team—via phone, the intranet or face to face—so that any issue can be raised confidentially, and appropriate advice and support can be given.”

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My problem with this statement is that I'm not sure that being made to feel uncomfortable is as bad as "being treated inappropriately" or deserves the same response.

I doubt if there's a single person in the history of the world ever who hasn't made someone else feel uncomfortable. But that's totally different from bullying, sexual harassment or other equally unacceptable stuff.

Tubbs

[ 03. November 2017, 11:15: Message edited by: Tubbs ]

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"It's better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it up and remove all doubt" - Dennis Thatcher. My blog. Decide for yourself which I am

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
What I find somewhat bizarre in the present situation is that Sir Michael Fallon is seen fit to remain an ‘Honourable Member’, a member of the Privy Council, and have his knighthood unquestioned, but unfit to be a member of the government.

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
A question that needs to be raised concerns how sanctions might be imposed on an MP who has transgressed the prevailing moral norms. It is difficult to see how such decisions can be made by an ‘independent’ authority given that any recommendation for the suspension or expulsion of an MP, preventing him/her from voting, could have critical political and partisan consequences when the government’s control over parliament is fragile, as at the present time. That is why historically an important privilege for MPs was ‘freedom from arrest and molestation’. Is it desirable that the transgression of an individual MP, or several MPs, should be allowed to subvert the collective decision of citizens in the previous general election? At the end of the day, however dressed up, any decision on sanctions will be political rather than judicial in character, unless criminality rather than morality is involved.

What I find somewhat bizarre in the present situation is that Sir Michael Fallon is seen fit to remain an ‘Honourable Member’, a member of the Privy Council, and have his knighthood unquestioned, but unfit to be a member of the government. Does that mean that only the righteous can serve as members of the executive? Reform might promote virtue, but is more likely to enhance hypocrisy and political blackmail to the advantage of the whips, not to mention the yellow press.

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Originally posted by Adeodatus:
Phew. Don't things happen quickly?

I confess I have very few ideas to deal with this problem, but this thread has certainly given me plenty to think about: without debate, we all have silos in which our thought tends to be confined.

One thing I'm sure of is that we can't just wait for human nature to improve by itself. Parliament and government must tighten up their disciplinary procedures. That said, I know personally how difficult it is to raise a grievance against someone in a senior position. The more senior they are, the more evidence seems required to mount a case, and if you're the poor idiot who first raises the grievance, they can make your life intolerably uncomfortable in the meantime. I can only imagine it must be nigh-on impossible to bring a case against someone in the position of an MP.

One thing I think Parliament should do to improve discipline: close the bars. British MP must be one of the few jobs left where you can turn up to work drunk, and still have a job at the end of the day. Impose a rule of absolute sobriety on MPs while on official business. There's nothing like clear-headedness to make men think twice before allowing their hands to wander.

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Originally posted by L'organist:
Apparently Michael Fallon put his hand on Julia Hartley-Brewer's knee - about 7 years ago. That's it. He, being one of the few gentlemen in the Commons at the moment, now realises that this was inappropriate and offered his resignation, which was accepted, etc, etc, etc.

BUT if its not appropriate for him to be SoS for Defence, how is it appropriate for him to be an MP?

(IMO while JH-B may not have welcomed the hand is that really worth the resignation of someone who was actually doing well at Defence? Really?)

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One of those things - power and gender - is the chicken and the other is the egg; it's hard to know, I suspect, whether men tend to be abusive because they tend to be in power, and power is constructed so as to include violence; or whether people in power become abusive because they tend to be men, and masculinity is constructed so as to include violence. But it is all a construction, which means we can take it back apart and re-construct it differently if we work hard enough. For Christians, Jesus is a great example of de- and re-constructing both masculinity and power!

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Originally posted by mr cheesy:

It has been reported that the hand-on-knee wasn't the inappropriate action that led to him having to resign, but instead that he said something inappropriate to Andrea Leadsom.

Now it sounds a bit like even this wasn't absolutely terrible and could possibly be explained away as a very bad joke or stupid comment that slipped out.*

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Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
churchgeek wrote:

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One of those things - power and gender - is the chicken and the other is the egg; it's hard to know, I suspect, whether men tend to be abusive because they tend to be in power, and power is constructed so as to include violence; or whether people in power become abusive because they tend to be men, and masculinity is constructed so as to include violence. But it is all a construction, which means we can take it back apart and re-construct it differently if we work hard enough. For Christians, Jesus is a great example of de- and re-constructing both masculinity and power!

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These are interesting points, but I would suggest that the 'construction' of masculinity, and also patriarchy itself, are social things. In fact, it's often called 'social construction'.

Another point is that these things are also unconscious, well, that is arguable, but it strikes me that way.

The problem then is how we are to deconstruct such things, if they are collectively carried out and unconsciously carried out.

I don't think it's impossible, as we can see from the current news events, but it's difficult to do it by lifting our bootstraps.

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The Tories should suspend / remove the Whip from their MPs while investigations are on-going in the same way Labour has.

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Originally posted by Kwesi:
Tubbs

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The Tories should suspend / remove the Whip from their MPs while investigations are on-going in the same way Labour has.

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The problem is that this would occasion the collapse of the government given the number against whom accusations have been made. Labour, by contrast, is not so inconvenienced by suspending the odd MP at the present time. The difficulty is how to sanction an MP while securing the essentials of democratic government..

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Tubbs: The Tories should suspend / remove the Whip from their MPs while investigations are on-going in the same way Labour has.

Kwesi:The problem is that this would occasion the collapse of the government given the number against whom accusations have been made. Labour, by contrast, is not so inconvenienced by suspending the odd MP at the present time. The difficulty is how to sanction an MP while securing the essentials of democratic government..

Tubes: I’m not seeing that as a downside...

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Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
An American congresswoman is heroically trying to clean out the Augean stables that we call Capitol Hill. I think the only solution, especially in relatively closed environments like the government, is for the members themselves to step up and fix it.

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Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:

If Fallon has said such inappropriate things as reported, and that is enough to resign, then there are likely to be a lot more people due for the chop. Because I have had that sort of comment said to many more times than I can remember.

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