'Witch-hunt or a great awakening?: Tensions surrounding the #MeToo movement'

Description

In Australian Book Review’s June–July Film and Television issue, Felicity Chaplin contends that the #MeToo movement, while not without its merits, is a debate within feminism itself. Much of the resistance towards the more militant aspects of the movement cite the cultural revisionism and puritanism of its proponents, many of whom are in the Hollywood film industry.

Extract: ‘This debate ... is centred around a number of critical distinctions: between rape and harassment, between seduction and coercion, between violence and what the French reaction to the movement called “the awkward attempt to pick up someone”, between sex and power, between women as “victims” and women as “empowered”, between actresses and so-called “real” women, between experts and laypeople, between political correctness and free speech, and between due process and “witch hunts” or “trial by Twitter”. This list is probably not exhaustive, but it goes some way to demonstrating the complex and multifaceted issues raised by the #MeToo movement, which cut across almost all aspects of Western culture.’