Power vs Righteousness….Who wins?

We live in a world where what once were bright-line distinctions have resolved into mottled shades of gray.  It really no longer matters what is true, nor really even what can be proven.  What matters is who is in the position of power.  This is a pity, but it is also incredibly dangerous and I ponder whether or not there is an answer.  Let us think about a few situations…

In many situations, the dreaded, your word against mine is the unfortunate situation.  I know of a real situation in which a young teenage girl was prevented from going to her high school homecoming dance by her father due to some sort of misbehavior.  Her response, of course, was to call the child welfare services department where they lived and tell them that her father had been sexually molesting her for years.  Daddy was fairly shortly thereafter arrested and, you guessed it, his daughter went to homecoming.

Not too long afterwards, the daughter went to the prosecuting attorney’s office and tried to set the record straight.  The reaction to her confessing to having lied was that she was threatened with being charged with perjury, unless she maintained her story.  The prosecution continued and the daughter dutifully restated the original story in Court.   Daddy went to prison for a large number of years.  Several times the young woman attempted to convince the prosecutor’s office that she had lied and her father was indeed innocent.  The prosecutors publicly went on record as stating the daughter told the truth in Court, they believed her then  and she was lying now because she was remorseful for having put her father in prison.

Finally, the daughter attempted to win her father’s freedom and went public in a big way, shouting from on high that she had lied, making sworn affidavits to that effect and doing television interviews.  She explained the reaction of prosecutors as turning a blind eye and deaf ear to what she had to say.  The prosecutor’s office maintained they had prosecuted the right man for the right crime and stated the daughter was doing this only because daddy now had cancer and was going to die…in prison.  Daddy died in prison.

At the time the allegations were made, the girl had the power by virtue of the fact that she made the allegation and was the victim of a despicable crime.  She made heinous allegations and no one would believe they could not be true at the time.  Unfortunately for daddy, when the daughter decided to recant her statement, she no longer had the power to do so effectively; the prosecutor did.  He chose the version of the truth most convenient for him and actually threatened the alleged victim with prosecution if she changed her story.  She did not feel she had much choice, as she did not wish to go to jail.  She stuck with the “daddy did it” version to keep herself out of jail.

The daughter never had enough power, nor moral fortitude, to accept the consequences and recant the allegations successfully.  The prosecutor got to determine what was true and what was not.  So, her father died in prison.  She lives with that guilt to this day.

Many people have been in the unfortunate situation in their employment where allegations are made against them.  The truth or falsity of the allegation almost becomes irrelevant in the your word against my word situation.  The supervisor, boss or other person in control makes the allegation and, as it was with the Pharaohs, so it is said; so it shall be written, so it shall be done.  Make no mistake; there is no real justice here.  The response of the employee at the bottom of the counseling form is fairly meaningless.   It is dismissed as a self-serving statement that is untue.  Besides, let’s look at it from an employer perspective, if I have a person who has a write-up for something, especially if it is serious, why take the chance?  You become marked.

Let us take the above scenario, and make the false allegation sexual harassment or even worse, workplace violence.  You got pissed off.  Maybe said something you wish you hadn’t and now you have a supervisor who wants to write you up as if you were John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy and the Columbine Shooters all rolled into one.  You aren’t, never were and never will be, but someone feels a little uncomfortable and, “poof”, you are marked.  In the case of these two allegations, you are marked with giant, Scarlet Letters, prominently affixed to your forehead.  You are also, chronically unemployed, broke, and generally considered a threat to humanity.  Lock your doors and windows folks.  Get the kids inside…all because someone said, “He scared me.” Or “He got really pissed.”  God forbid we should ever say, in the heat of anger, “I’m gonna kill that guy.”  Quick, break out the tar and feathers!!

Words are powerful weapons and false allegations of misconduct that even subtly label us can scar us for life, especially in this day and age of the permanent record on the Internet.  Should there be a higher standard of proof as a result?  Should any one person have the kind of power over us that it affects permanently our ability to earn a living?  Where do we set the bar for employees and employers?

Employers have the legitimate right and, quite frankly, the responsibility, to maintain safe working environments for their employees.  However, there must be a balance between that requirement and giving a sexual harassment or workplace threat label to an individual.  There are those that will say, you have a right to go into Court and sue, for defamation, libel or any number of other causes of action.  Does anyone rationally think that someone who takes their employer to Court is employable in the future?  Enforcing your rights has the same stigma as the allegations originally made.   You lose either way.

We now live in a world of Hitler's "Big Lie."  All you have to do is make the allegation, make sure it is your word against another and watch as the accused slowly swings in the breeze..  In some situations, it really doesn't matterif it is on audo tape or video tape.  A Simi Valley jury refused to convict the police officers who were on video beating Rodney King.  A NYPD Sergeant was asked for the forms necessary to make a complaint against another police officer.  After dismissing the complainant initially, the citizens returned and renewed the request for the paperwork.  The Sergeant walked around from behind the desk and belted the citizen in the face, breaking his nose.  It was on video tape.  What happened to the Sergeant?  He got tranferred, but onl;y after he tried to say that the citizen attacked him and had he had no choice but defend himself.

It is getting to the point where it makes no difference what the truth may or may not be the truth.  It is only important who has the power and who can tell the most outrageous story.  Power is winning over righteousness.