Tag: Roy Moore

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Life is a Beach

My wife and I were driving down Highway 307 through the Yucatan last week, on our way to a vacation in the sunny climes south of Tulum for the Thanksgiving holiday. We were passing through the region below Cancun known as the Mexican Riviera, an area that’s home to countless seaside mega-resorts that lure tourists from all over the globe. A flashy billboard caught my eye. It asked an interesting question: “When was the last time you did something for the first time?”

Whoa. Let that sink in. So deep.

The billboard was decorated with illustrations of people scuba diving, hang-gliding, and wind-surfing — all presumably activities that one might do “for the first time.” But that question stuck with me, and it got me to thinking — because what else do you do when you’re on a long drive?

One reason travel is exciting and appealing is because almost everything you do is something you’re doing for the first time — walking a fresh beach or a deep jungle trail, finding a hidden cenote, tasting street food in a tiny village, listening to a strange orange bird in the tree outside your window singing a foreign song. You are alive, open to the world, all your senses fully engaged in ways they are not when you’re in your workday routine. We crave the “new” like a drug.

Travel awakens us, gives us new day after new day. Travel makes us realize how easily we fall into patterns that shorten our days into routines that pass the time but don’t accomplish much else. Most of us are tied to our phones and social media during our waking moments. Why? Because, social media offers stimulation, stuff we read “for the first time” — information we can share or respond to. It’s almost like mini-travel, an escape from work or day-to-day drudgery. It’s “news.” What’s Trump done now? They fired Fizdale? What did Roy Moore say? Garrison Keillor did what? And always, of course, What’s Trump done now? But like cheap tequila, the buzz wears off, and you’re just reading out of habit — or routine. Digital stimulation pales in comparison to the real thing.

In Mexico, I took long sunrise walks on the beach. I spent hours lying in the sand, listening to the surf, smelling the sea air. I thought a lot about how to bring the sense of joy that travel brings back home, about ways to make each day a fresh adventure, even if it involves going to work five days a week and sleeping in the same bed, night after night.

I kept coming back to that billboard in my mind, and the concept of doing something for the first time. I thought about the quote from Heraclitus (I was deep into my third cup of Mexican coffee and on a beach, so cut me some slack.): “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” And I thought about the zen concept of being present in each moment, about finding enlightenment by simply being aware that everything is new in every breath you take.

I decided the answer to the question, “When was the last time you did something for the first time?” is always, “Now.” And I resolved to keep my senses open and look for ways to break up my daily routine when I returned to Memphis. I would get up early and do yoga. I would bike to work. I would make ceviche for dinner, and learn to speak Spanish.

Then I ordered a bloody Mary and checked my Twitter feed.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Show and Tell: 59 Men and Counting

CREDIT: Denis Makarenko | Dreamstime

It’s a given that men are dogs and pigs, but, my God, the description of Harvey Weinstein’s conduct was shocking to me — then I talked to my wife. In my naivete, I never realized this ugly conduct happens all the time. Melody was and is an attractive woman, which means that since she was 16, practically every man she’s ever known has hit on her, including a cop and a former teacher. She’s seen it all — flashers, gropers, masturbaters, heavy breathers, and aggressive advances from acquaintances and co-workers both young and old.

And her female friends said these encounters are common with them, as well. Everyone had a tale to tell. Some of Melody’s stories were too harrowing to repeat. Fortunately, she escaped these incidences unharmed. The 30 women who accused Weinstein of sexual abuse over 20 years weren’t so lucky. Weinstein’s victims include a Who’s Who of Hollywood actresses — Gwyneth Paltrow, Ashley Judd, Angelina Jolie — and Rose McGowan, who refused a $1 million hush-money offer and called out Hollywood talent agencies as being “guilty of human trafficking.” It only took one brave woman telling her story to The New York Times to open Pandora’s Box, so to speak.

Weinstein initially denied engaging in nonconsensual sex, but his unspeakable behavior was common knowledge at Miramax, the company he founded. Weinstein has reached seven settlements with other victims.

Weinstein’s predatory conduct was appalling because it was so disgusting. He invited women to his quarters and reappeared in a bathrobe, exposing himself. Ashley Judd was asked to watch him shower. Other unassuming targets were told that watching him masturbate would help their careers. Weinstein has been accused of giving alcohol to a minor, rape, and assault.

The bloated, bearded swine blamed his behavior on coming of age in the 1960s, when the rules were different. No they weren’t. Only in Hollywood could a dirtbag feel so entitled and powerful that women would surrender to his nascent charm. He had the power to make or break an actress’ career, and if rebuffed, he would go out of his way to punish them. After the Weinstein allegations, 59 more men in politics and entertainment have been accused of abhorrent sexual behavior, and the list is growing every day.

Denis Makarenko | Dreamstime

Harvey Weinstein

For 20 years, viewers spent their mornings with Matt Lauer. After learning that he had a button under his desk to lock women in his office and pull the old Harvey Weinstein bathrobe routine, I feel duped. It’s like if Dick Van Dyke were arrested in a child pornography sting. Same goes for Charlie Rose, fired by CBS, PBS, and Bloomberg for making lewd phone calls and incidences of groping. Thoughtful and soft-spoken political analyst Mark Halperin, co-author of Game Change, masturbated behind his desk while meeting with a female colleague. The hot comic Louis C.K., writer and director of the classic movie Pootie Tang, did bits about masturbation in his stand-up act. Now we know he wasn’t kidding. Accused of exposing himself and asking women to watch him masturbate, his upcoming comedy special and a new movie release have been cancelled.

The list goes on: Kevin Spacey, Jeffrey Tambor, Dustin Hoffman, Garrison Keillor (!) for God’s sake. Bill O’Reilly paid out $13 million to five women. Former Fox News host Gretchen Carlson successfully sued Fox Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes for $20 million for “unwanted sexual advances.” Ailes took the easy way out and died earlier this year. Of course, there’s accused child predator and our probable new Senator from Alabama, Roy Moore, cruising teen hangouts to make new friends. He claims all of his accusers are lying.

We have obviously reached a tipping point in male-female relationships. The old dinosaurs are going down, and the push is finally on for women to be believed. But must we blindly believe all women? Case in point is Senator Al Franken and his accuser, radio personality Leeann Tweeden. On a 2006 USO tour in Afghanistan, when Franken was still a comedian, Tweeden said Franken forcibly kissed and groped her. She later wrote Franken, “grabbed my breasts while I was sleeping and had someone take a photo of you doing it, knowing I would see it later and be ashamed.” Franken immediately apologized and called for an ethics investigation on himself, which was smart, because it could force Tweeden to testify under oath. The photo mentioned was childish and sophomoric but contradicts Tweeden’s account. She is asleep in a cargo plane wearing a flack jacket while Franken’s hands are hovering over her chest while he smiles for the camera — obviously a joke — a stupid one, but a joke just the same. Tweeden was a regular on Sean Hannity’s nightly propaganda broadcast, and a Trump supporter. Sounds like a hit job to me, yet some are demanding his resignation. Which brings us to the most blatantly hypocritical pot-and-kettle dilemma. Over the past two decades, taxpayers have paid $17 million for hush money and to settle Congressional sexual harassment charges for 264 Congressional staffers and other legislative employees. One other question remains: When is Donald Trump going to sue those 20 women who accused him of predatory sexual behavior, like he promised?

Randy Haspel writes the “Recycled Hippies” blog.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Sticky Fingers

For the past week or so, I’ve been working my way through Sticky Fingers: The Life and Times of Jann Wenner and Rolling Stone Magazine. It’s an enormous (550 pages or so), densely detailed biography that takes on Wenner’s life from his tumultuous childhood through his equally tumultuous adulthood. Author Joe Hagan seemingly interviewed everyone who ever interacted with Wenner, and few details of his complicated and messy personal and business relationships are spared.

Wenner founded Rolling Stone in San Francisco 50 years ago this month. By the mid-1970s, what began as a small music magazine had morphed into the bible of the counter culture, with groundbreaking writing on politics, drugs, race, sex, and, of course, music. Wenner’s little rag began attracting many of the country’s best writers, illustrators, and photographers.

The mercurial editor and his staff lived the life they wrote about. Office supplies included cocaine, pot, and hallucinogens of every description, and everyone slept with everyone, including the rock stars they covered — and, in some cases, shamelessly promoted.

Wenner was gay but also slept with women — many women — as did his sexually ambiguous and long-suffering wife, Jane. One of the overriding themes of the book is the casual debauchery of seemingly everyone involved in the magazine and the music business. Reading about the sex-and-drug escapades of Annie Liebowitz, Hunter Thompson, Mick Jagger, Jackson Browne, Joni Mitchell, David Crosby, and dozens of others is titilating for a while, but it soon becomes almost wearying in its excess.

The 1970s were a different and complex time. Despite the rise of feminism and androgeny, machismo and misogyny were rampant. Being openly gay was a brave and uncommon decision. Sexual liberation, open relationships, and rampant party drug use often led to more seriously self-destructive behavior. What is now perceived as sexual predation was often standard operating procedure in the anything-goes disco era.

But it was all happening behind closed doors. Devoted readers of Rolling Stone knew little about the personal lives and predilictions of their favorite writers and photographers — or the stars they covered. Today, with the advent of social media, it’s much harder to keep secrets. Today, Wenner and others from that era would likely be outed by irate staffers for initiating various improprieties.

It’s probably worth noting that Jann Wenner and Alabama Senatorial candidate Roy Moore are the same age. About the time Wenner was hitting on anyone who walked into his office in San Francisco, Moore was reputedly wandering around a mall in Gadsden, Alabama, chatting up teenage girls.

The fact that so many (but certainly not all) of the men who’ve been accused of sexual predation in recent months — Bill O’Reilly, Harvey Weinstein, Donald Trump, Bill Cosby, and Moore, to name but a few — are in or near their 70s is no accident. They are dinosaurs from an era when powerful men could get away with just about anything. Those days appear to be ending, as more and more women come out with tales of harassment and predation.

Which makes it a bad time to be running for Senate if you have Moore’s purported sexual history. His support among his fellow Republicans — including his possible future colleagues in Congress — seems to be evaporating as more of the creepy details of his predatory behavior emerge. But polling shows that Moore’s Trump-core base, including the evangelical right, are mostly unmoved by the increasingly lurid and detailed allegations against him. And the candidate himself, at this point, anyway, appears determined to stay in the race.

I predict he will come to regret that decision, as the sins of the past — and the sticky fingers of the truth — come out.