Like many readers of The Rhetorical Situation, Harrogate is a big baseball fan and has been a regular viewer of Baseball Tonight for some time. Recently, however, one of his favorite commentators, Harold Reynolds, was fired, allegedly for sexual harrassment of an ESPN employee.
Clearly sexual harrassment in the workplace has been a hotbutton issue for quite some time, but it is always an extremely slippery thing (no pun intended)to define. Harrogate suggests that flirtations, hugs, etc. infiltrate most workplaces across America. And really, what some consider harrassment others see as "good clean fun."
Harrogate offers no answers to this dillemma, he merely brings it up for reflection and commentary. But it does seem that the idea of The Rhetorical Situation, as currently studied and analyzed by such high-profile theorists as Oxymoron, might provide a useful angle from which to approach such things.
2 comments:
Somethings to consider with the Sexual Harrassment debate:
(1) the relation of power between individuals invovled
(2) limitating someone's speech (an idea I hate)
(3) making laws that would protect speech but punish for physical activity
(4) having active involement from managers etc,. especially when there are multiple incidents
Solon, excellently put. I especially think that your first point operates as a great way to think of this issue as a Rhetorical Situation of the first order.
Also to point one, let's go ahead and tentatively stick our necks out and assume that Reynolds, who's a star, definitely had the power edge in the incident (I'll happily retract this if it comes out differently).
The other three points I need to consider further, and hope that this thread in the end leads to a broader understanding of how to approach them.
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