Case Study 2: #MeToo Far

1. Ethical Issues and collateral issues

The #MeToo movement, that was first used to call out sexual predators and sex offenders
through social media, is now becoming a witch hunt through a trial by social media, wherein
people, mostly male, are accused quickly on crimes such as sexual assault. This is evident in the
example of the Ariana Grande and minister situation. This in turn causes the boundaries
between harmless flirtation and interactions to be twisted into something grave such as sexual
harassment or even sexual assault, thus causing moral panic among men in industries and
institutions, while working with women. Some of its collateral issues include the practice of
making accusations without proper regard of evidence and causing a rise in terms of false
accusations and speculations, which causes harm and damage to the reputation of the accused
entirely on baseless accusations.

2. Response to the issues identified

a. Maintain due process- In terms of allegations and accusations of sexual
misconduct, maintaining due process is imperative, despite the notions put
forward by people in social media. We shouldn’t just believe people calling out
sexual harassment without proper evidence and materials to back up this claim.
b. Penalize false accusations- To deter people who would use the movement to
cause harm to others’ reputations or careers
3. Virtue Ethics Approach

Using the ideas under Aristotelian Virtue Ethics to address concerns regarding the #MeToo
movement, it is an approach that focuses on character traits, looking at the example of Ariana
Grande and the minister, as a minister it can be easily assumed that he himself lives a virtuous
life, but after the incident where he was seen to be too intimate to the singer, it is easy to
dismiss his actions as intolerable and wrong. When this happens, it is easy to judge him as a
hypocrite, because as a pastor, he should have already known what was right and should be
living it in practice himself, but the action he has shown, regardless if it were on purpose or by
accident, seems to have been the opposite of what was expected of him to do. In general, when
sexual abusers are accused people would want nothing more to do with them, thus knowing
someone’s character and if their actions reflect that character is important when it comes to
virtue ethics, in light of the #MeToo movement society would agree that sexual abusers should
be punished regardless of how much difference they have made to the greater good.

The #MeToo movement, was a successful movement in a sense that it was able to give
women the courage to be able to speak out on instances that they were sexually harassed,
although this courage can also be taken in excess. Courage is a virtue where a person fears and
endures the things he or she should, and for right purpose, although in excess of this could lead
to rashness, and as rashness if regarded to be a closer extreme to courage, than cowardice, it is
easy to fall into this vice. The #MeToo movement, potentially can cause people to act rashly in
terms of accusing or taking certain actions as sexual harassment, and because of this, men are
now more reluctant in engaging with women in certain ways.

4. Personal take on the Virtue Ethics Approach

On the first point where, one’s action must always be in accordance with one’s character,
and one must always act in accordance to what virtuous people would, but this is too idealistic,
and humans are susceptible to doing bad actions, or actions that go against their character.
Some may argue that one bad action does not make a person evil, the same way how one good
act doesn’t make us virtuous, but the fact of the matter is that a bad action does make a person
less credible in terms of morals and character, and bad actions are always and should be
subject to punishment or corrective action. When It comes to the courage that #MeToo
provides, although I do think that it does help women speak out more on instances of
harassment, being rash and twisting the idea of #MeToo to antagonize harmless interactions is
in itself wrong, and in a way hypocritical. #MeToo is a movement with good intentions,
although it does leave out bad ramifications in excess or when left unchecked, and thus should
be properly monitored.