From "Revenge porn drove Katie Hill out of Congress. Would that have happened to a man?/She was taken down by people ‘gleeful’ about sexually humiliating a young woman in power, says lawyer Carrie Goldberg" (The Lily at WaPo).
ADDED: Compare "Katie Hill: Victim or Victimizer?/One misdeed does not negate another" (Commentary):
Hill has repeatedly (and without any evidence) claimed her husband has “abused” her.... She also denounced the political opponents who “happily provide a platform to a monster,” claiming her denouement came only as the result of a “coordinated effort to try to destroy me” and a “smear campaign” against her by the “right-wing media.” There are hints of Hillary Clinton’s “vast right-wing conspiracy” rhetoric in Hill’s self-pitying claims and attempts to deflect attention from her own behavior by attacking those who made it public....
She is clearly the victim of whoever made public deeply private images of her.... But as for the implosion of her Congressional career, it wasn’t a patriarchal institution or a right-wing conspiracy that accomplished that: it was Nancy Pelosi....
A chastened Hill could have acknowledged her errors of judgment and poor behavior, resigned, and then advocated whatever causes she wants to as a private citizen. But by embracing victimhood and refusing to take personal responsibility, all while claiming to be the victim of a right-wing conspiracy against her, she doesn’t look like a bold and trailblazing young woman. She looks like a fool....
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85 comments:
Only #metoo cared one way or the other, not the right.
Katie was taken down by one thing: her own stupidity. She allowed those pictures to be taken. No pictures; no proof.
Do you think the Clintons allow phones or cameras at their sex romps?
Yah, the second one...it was the impropriety of schtupping subordinates what done it not the icky revenge porn. Too much hypocrisy for even lefties to handle.
The timing didn’t help either.
Probably some truth to that. The nude pictures — with the naughty bits blacked out — made sure the case got publicized and then some. But she did violate the rules in a very clearcut, no shades of grey, fashion so Pelosi had no choice. Women who pose for nude photos in the digital age have very poor judgement, that’s for sure. Come to think of it, Anthony Weiner’s dick pics put an end to his political career, too, did they not?
@Althouse, I took your comment at 4:36 yesterday to mean that female Democrat members of Congress deserve special exemption from the rules. You just can’t shake your biases, can you?
"None of those elements would be here if it were a male victim.
Why do we let advocates make false blanket statements of fact? The media hounded Jack Ryan after a sex scandal which broke no laws or congressional rules proving these incidents are not limited to women. Nor did anyone at WAPO or anywhere else call the press reporting that story misandrist - or criticze them in any other way.
Furthermore while Hill has claimed her ex is abusive she's supplied no evidence supporting that - not even a description of what he has supposedly done. This shows those who make such assertions are simply repeating her accusation as fact. This is a widespread problem among feminists who simply assert as fact whatever they wish (Title IX is their effort to codify this practice). Like other leftists they operate primarily in spaces under their complete control so they have become accustomed to their unsupported assertions remaining unchallenged.
Ideology is the difference between Jack Ryan and Katie Hill, not gender.
But by embracing victimhood and refusing to take personal responsibility, all while claiming to be the victim of a right-wing conspiracy against her, she doesn’t look like a bold and trailblazing young woman. She looks like a fool....
Actually, she looks like a future leader of the Progressive movement.
I sent off my first comment before the ADDED link. The media is not right-wing; but pictures of naked, attractive women are going to get published by any news website that wants clicks.
Katie Hill's career has died for Ted Kennedy's sins.
I am Laslo.
Political sex scandals
Pat Meehan, R, resigned, 2018
Trent Frank's, R, resigned, 2017
John Conyers, D, resigned, 2017
Joe Barton, R, resigned, 2017
Al Frankly, D, resigned, 2017
Tim Murphy, R, resigned, 2017
The media lies so blatantly now but it must be a special form of humiliation to uphold anything they say as true. If your first reaction to anything they report isn't 'these people are lying' then you must be so debased yourself that you deserve what you get from them
Don't shtup your staff. Everything else is a sideshow.
Pelosi must have been jealous that her Iron Cross tattoo was bigger than Pelosi's'. Like wearing a patch on her Hell's Angels Colors jacket that was bigger than the Gang Leader's tattoo. Rules are rules.
Seems like the fact it was staffers and campaign people she was sleeping with and paying mattered a lot, no?
As someone on Twitter pointed out, no one was talking revenge porn when Anthony Weiner's wiener showed up on the Daily Mail. Can't have it both ways feminists.
Has anyone proved who posted her nude photos online? I read a glowing report of her by some leftist that Hill was courageously the first openly bisexual congressperson. Did she"come out" during her campaign for office? Or did she bravely admit her status after the story about her"throuple" became public knowledge?
Pelosi decided that this wasn't the Hill to die on.
I am Laslo.
Besides this episode revealing her as a weak-willed pawn of the Dem machine, the disclosures reveal someone with pretty significant mental health issues who is not handling them well. I genuinely wish her the best, but she's clearly unfit for office, disqualifying herself ultimately by her meek, if correct, submission to authority.
"...a misogynist far-right media apparatus..."
Does this "apparatus" involve nipple clamps, or just stirrups?
I am Laslo.
Bull-fucking-shit! (Pardon my French!) She and her husband put her pictures out on the swingers site. That's not "revenge porn." She's an exhibitionist, comparable to Anthony Wiener. And she didn't resign because of that, but because she was diddling the help, violating the code of ethics of an almost ethics-free Congress.
I thought that was Kristen Synema (first openly bi candidate). Tucker Carlson had the editor of Red State on last night, the person who broke the Katie Hill story and published the photos. She wouldn't reveal her source, but she couldn't deny it was the husband either. They were both having a good laugh about what a big story this would be and how differently it would be regarded by the press if it were not one of their own, a Dem, going down. That's obviously true, and Katie Hill's cloaking herself in victimhood is very weak: that's what public figures have to deal with, at least on the right. You need to be ready for your doxxing. It's a terrible rule, but maybe if applied broadly that will become obvious and lead to a renegotiation, terms of mutually assured destruction that will make it less interesting to publicize salacious but not necessarily relevant details of official's lives. Until then, expecting the right to unilaterally disarm is civility bullshit, or privacy bullshit.
But she did violate the rules in a very clearcut, no shades of grey, fashion so Pelosi had no choice.
I haven't seen where the Code of Conduct mandates resignation as the punishment for a violation. As far as I know Pelosi has discretion, and I suspect a more valued colleague might have gotten a slap on the wrist.
“Has anyone proved who posted her nude photos online? I read a glowing report of her by some leftist that Hill was courageously the first openly bisexual congressperson.”
(Now Senator) Kyrsten Lea Sinema of AZ? She was in the House from 2013 through 2019.
I think it was G. K. Chesterton who said, Who among us has not tried to finger a dinosaur's asshole?
Katie Hill can't be held to any standards.
She's probably right about revenge porn. It seems like men are more likely to post naked pictures of their exes on line than women, but men also have vengeful exes who find other ways of getting their own back.
I didn't see the right-wing media leading the way on this, though. Obviously, vengeful ex had to find some kind of outlet, but this wasn't like the Nineties, when you had right-wing media dredging for stuff about the Clintons, and it wasn't something that the National Enquirer unearthed either. I could be wrong - I don't know the exact path of transmission - but it seemed like once the pictures were out there the mainstream media were quick to pick up the story.
Does society have greater delight in taking down powerful women more than powerful men? There are at least a dozen or two disgraced male politicians (mostly Republicans, it seems), who could give enlightening testimony about that. But society did seem to be more interested in the details of this story. It was the pictures. Pictures of naked middle-aged or elderly men don't make it on to the Internet, and when they do, people don't really want to look at them. Naked pictures of a young woman attract more interest and speculation.
Could it be that women are more interesting? Or is it that men so dominate the media and society that their interests dominate the conversation? Women don't get into scandals like this as often as men (Is that because women are still underrepresented in politics or is it because they have more sense?), so when one does, people take notice. People are more interested in the sexuality of young people than of old people, and society (however you define it and for whatever reason) is more interested in the sexuality of women than in that of men, but that doesn't necessarily mean that society wants to destroy powerful misbehaving women more than powerful misbehaving men.
"None of those elements would be here if it were a male victim.
I'm trying to figure out if this is better? Is this author saying nobody cares if it's a male victim?
Anyway, I disagree. Anthony Weiner was forced out, right? Plenty of Congressmen have been taken out due to affairs.
Personally I paid 000 attention to the stories about her. I saw no demands for her to resign and can't see a reason. If Pelosi wanted it and got it, that's their business. I couldn't care less one way or another.
Doug said...
Has anyone proved who posted her nude photos online? I read a glowing report of her by some leftist that Hill was courageously the first openly bisexual congressperson. Did she"come out" during her campaign for office? Or did she bravely admit her status after the story about her"throuple" became public knowledge?
"Glowing reports" don't usually come with naked photos. She was known to be bisexual when she was elected. According to Wikipedia, she "came out" after high school.
I'm trying to imagine a photograph of a naked Congressman brushing his aide's hair, and keeping his job.
Lesbian staffers apparently don't deserve protection from predatory female bosses.
A loser loses. Yawn.
Doug asked...
Has anyone proved who posted her nude photos online?
As Clyde said, she posted them online. On a wife-swapping site.
Yahoo!
Big Mike: “ @Althouse, I took your comment at 4:36 yesterday to mean that female Democrat members of Congress deserve special exemption from the rules. You just can’t shake your biases, can you?”
Clyde:”Bull-fucking-shit! (Pardon my French!) She and her husband put her pictures out on the swingers site. That's not "revenge porn." She's an exhibitionist, comparable to Anthony Wiener. And she didn't resign because of that, but because she was diddling the help, violating the code of ethics of an almost ethics-free Congress.”
I called BS on Althouse’s stand yesterday. And by the way she sad yesterday’s post was the only one she was going to post on this subject.
She was having sexual relations with two staffers, one male, one female. It is ridiculous to think that if she were a male, everything would be OK. I'm pretty sure that a male Republican, whose wife outed an affair, would pretty much be done and receive the scorn of those who now support Hill because she is a woman and Democrat. How be we take a blind eye to gender because they are equal. Congressperson has affair with staffer/employee or two. Is this OK or not?
Poor her.
"she’s still dealing with somebody who is hell-bent on her destruction."
Hope she looks in a mirror.
My gawd, that picture of her with the bong and the iron cross tatoo under her bikini line with her nether region blacked out sure has that "come-hither, you can grab my pu**y anytime you want" look.
"None of those elements would be here if it were a male victim. It is because she is female that this happened.... Women are just so much more available for slut-shaming and victim-blaming."
Really? Tell that to Carlos Danger.
Actually, none of this would have happened if she had acted with some decorum, common decency and not allowed photos of herself in flagrante delicto. For heaven's sake....use some common sense
NO.
Katie Hill was taken down all by herself. What ever happened to girl power?
And yeah - if Katie Hill were a man? or an R? What do you think would be happening in the media?
Laslo Spatula said...
Pelosi decided that this wasn't the Hill to die on.
you know, Las; the Rest of us are working on getting good grades here TOO
And; We're getting tired of you Acing all these tests
it's Awfully hard for us; when you keep messing up the curve!
Clearly a case of male privilege. for the past 30 years, male bosses have been "trained" that it is a big no-no to have sex with the staff. It's a big no-no to even hug someone who reports to you. No touching, no dirty jokes, zero tolerance.
Her former career was working for a non-profit. They probably didn't bother to provide sex harassment training to her - after all, it's only the big bad men that need the training.
Thus, because she is a woman - and an underling at that - she likely never received sex harassment training and therefor. . . .victim of male privilege.
The good news is she's available for bachelor parties.
A wife who goes public about her hurt over her husband’s affair is usually a sympathetic character. Unless the hubby leaves her for a dude, then he’s a hero (sorry about the 3 kids - whoopsie!)
Hilly husband was obviously hurt. It seems that he put his career on hold for hers. And that they had a deal where she could screw girls on the side but now boys. She broke the deal. So naturally it is the wronged party who is the “patriarchy”.
Also, their leaked text messages show that if anyone was an “abuser” it was the drunken slattern Katie, not her husband who was at least trying to keep her sober-ish.
If it was an actual country named you wouldn't have the The there.
Like "The Holland"!
"You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer." -- F.Z.
The Ukrainians have several The Beers, since The Beer is easy to make.
What porn? Topless photos? Really?
I may not be able to define pornography, but I know what I like.
Sounds like she's proud of the photos. Remind me...was Anthony Weiner proud of this dick pics? I don't think he ever walked anything back with humility.
Based on what I've seen and read I would say that poor young woman is a total headcase who has no business being in a position of power, period. This has nothing to do with sexual double-standards or party-based doubled standards, or misogyny or 'far right media' or anything else. She should never have been elected. She obviously, OBVIOUSLY, lacks the judgment and maturity for the position. A seat in Congress is not supposed to be group therapy for troubled youngsters.
The media class in this country is a bad joke. The political class is as bad or worse, though.
I think the GOP would have welcomed the idea of Katie Hill remaining in Congress and advocating for Democrats.
But by embracing victimhood and refusing to take personal responsibility, all while claiming to be the victim of a right-wing conspiracy against her, she doesn’t look like a bold and trailblazing young woman. She looks like a fool....
When did this article become about Hilary?
So what about the other women in the office who weren’t willing to frolic with Katie?
Shut up! Democrats explained.
Nancy is the only grownup in that party.
I think most people are ignoring the text messages, or perhaps, don't even know about them. Katie drinks quite a bit of alcohol, while taking antidepressants.
For her sake and her health, it's good that she's getting out of DC. I'm just sorry that she had to place the blame on other people.
https://www.redstate.com/jenvanlaar/2019/10/24/texts-reveal-concern-katie-hill-drinking-missing-flights/
Journolistic defense of warlock trials, #MeToo #HerToo, and diversity.
April 1st can't come soon enough.
Sounds like there was more that could come out (heavy drinking, cheating, divorce), not to mention the potential blackmail angle.
Pelosi decided she had to go, pulled the trigger, and got her to resign.
Pelosi makes the house rules, so saying Hill broke them and had to go, is disingenuous.
I don’t look to personal lawyers for principled, insightful comments on public issues.
Schadenfreude, thy name is Katie.
She seems to be kind of slutty, if you know what I mean. Should sh be ashamed of that?
She was taken down for violating House rules she voted to implement. Her ex didn't violate those rules, the far-right anything didn't create those rules, and it wasn't society that was fucking over the younger woman and man in the office. It doesn't really matter what the WaPo writes when facts can be gathered elsewhere. After all, the WaPo tried like others to ignore this story for over a week, and now they are making excuses inconsistent with the facts.
and she was on the intel committee, so essentially the flipside of mike Kelley's character in house of cards,
I wish these people could hear themselves.
Women never smear or attack or ruin the reputations of men, right? I mean we weren't JUST talking about Sulkowicz/Mattress Girl, about Kavanaugh, about the UVA fraternity, or about the Duke lacrosse guys, right?
Why is the idea that only women are vulnerable, or victims, in so many areas of life so very important to women and those on the Left? The old gag was the newspaper headline would be "World To End Tomorrow: Women, Minorities Hardest Hit" but that mindset honestly explains around 70% of what you actually read in real Media reports.
Katie, you ignorant slut
> abused her
They all play the woman card.
So easy to do.
She just came from the wrong state. If she'd been from Massachusetts, home of the swimmer, and Barney Frank, she'd have been OK. Or New Jersey, they like crooks and sex perverts too.
Maybe she can try in a couple years, when California gets even more Democrat.
Does no one remember how the Barack Obama, the Lightworker himself, was first elected to Senate? That's all just down the ol' memory hole, huh? Nice centrist people like the Professor aren't interested in the sordid details I guess.
Well in 2004 Obama ran against Jack Ryan. Jack Ryan had been married to Jeri Ryan, an actress best known for being very physically attractive. Jack and Jeri divorced and in the course of that unhappy proceeding Jeri made a number of nasty allegations about Jack. She put a lot of information about their (alleged) sexual activity into the record as part of a custody fight, but both Jeri and Jack agreed to have those records sealed.
The political power that decided to back nice clean Obama, though, decided to press to unseal all the records. Both Jeri and Jack opposed that and said doing so would be harmful to their son...but they were unsealed anyway. Obama's team made sure they were spread far and wide and that the allegations--mainly that Jack encouraged Jeri to go to sex clubs--got as much airplay as possible. It was a big, salacious story, and Jack's campaign collapsed. Obama beat the late-replacement Republican candidate by a huge margin and became a Senator.
But please, tell me more about how slut-shaming can only happen to women. Ridiculous.
Katie was "taken down" because she abused her influence as an employer/supervisor over a subordinate (or two). She's another privileged whack job.
Or it could be Katie had perverted behavior unfitting to public office (but hey, so did Dollar Bill Clinton.)
nothing says 'empowerment' like claiming victim status
Shades of Jim McGreevey.
Seen elsewhere:
I guess we found out that even in California the swing vote isn't big enough to save Hill.
phrasing, yes and similar strategems were employed by axelrod, and through a future Obama chief of staff, who had worked for the previous democrat governor of Alaska,
Any male Representative who was caught in such a scandal would have had to resign, too. Everyone knows this, including Hill and her lawyers. So, I think Hill should have resigned just for this lie itself, though I actually thought she should have not done so. Once she played the victim in this manner, I lost all sympathy.
MayBee said...
Lesbian staffers apparently don't deserve protection from predatory female bosses.
I agree with the basic concept, but the structure should be:
MayBee said...
Female staffers apparently don't deserve protection from predatory Lesbian bosses.
Cart vs horse. Men who engage in throuples are far more likely to engage in revenge porn. It's just very hard to find a man with traditional values and a sense of chivalry on swinger sites.....A lot of racists were very glad to see Bill Cosby in prison. Likewise lots of anti-Semites are hoping Weinstein gets put away. I understand that these men are to some extent guilty, but when we allow the racists and anti-Semites to win, then America is the net loser. We should free Cosby and drop the charges against Weinstein. In that way the forces of diversity and tolerance will triumph.
Every one is supremely evil because a horny Democrat couldn't keep her pussy in her pants.
Democrats spent ten years trying to oust Senator David Vitter over private sex stuff that there wasn't even any real proof about.
I like slutty. Especially pretty and slutty. But she should have kept her staff out of it. I mean, she is a member of Congress, I am guessing she had her subordinate pegged as likely to go along. We really don’t need to strap on a whole new POV to understand this.
"A lot of racists were very glad to see Bill Cosby in prison." Probably a lot of "liberals," too. I remember when Cosby dared ignore the Party Line on race, and how the Hive immediately began to swarm.
Wikipedia - Chris Lee (New York politician)
On February 9, 2011, Lee was found to have been soliciting at least one woman on Craigslist. Claiming to be a 39-year-old divorced lobbyist but using his real name, he used a Google Gmail account to send a woman a shirtless photo taken with his BlackBerry phone.[35][36] The woman searched his name, discovered he was a married congressman, and turned over her email correspondence to the New York news blog Gawker. After confirming the facts, Gawker published its exposé on February 9, 2011.[37][38][39]
Lee resigned from office the same day.[2] He also issued a statement of apology, saying, "I regret the harm that my actions have caused my family, my staff and my constituents.... I have made profound mistakes and I promise to work as hard as I can to seek their forgiveness."[10] Lee did not return to Western New York after his resignation.[40]
Democratic Erie County clerk Kathy Hochul filled his seat after winning the special election on May 24 set by Governor Andrew Cuomo
It would never happen to a maaaaaan! So stupid.
Hill: It's NOT MY FAULT. Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuur it isn't.
Why are there no pictures of me naked or the vast majority of us for that matter. She did something stupid. Most of us are not public figures and even we know better than that. It was just dumb, and nobody's fault but hers.
Al Franken could not be reached for comment.
Simple rule. Don’t f your staff.
Katie Hill started off in Congress tickety boo then was gone lickety split
How dare people find photos she posted online to attract sexual partners.
--Carlos Danger
yes and now he represents Russian oligarchs like deripaska, at mercury partners without any legal liability,
Katie Hill *was* taken down by unscrupulous people.
She was taken down by her husband.
And her husband and a female campaign worker.
And a male staffer.
And a gardener.
Plus that guy at the post office.
And that couple down the way.
Plus those two college guys.
And the mailman.
And that pizza delivery driver.
Katie Hill was taken down a lot.
No shame in her game.
She had a brush with consequence.
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