Mhairi Black: The conversation on sexual abuse must continue

The whole thing snowballed from there. More and more women in the entertainment industry came forward to share similar stories. Disturbingly, but not surprisingly, Weinstein wasn’t the only one being accused.

Harvey Weinstein: accused of abusing and exploited many young actresses

Actresses that most would think are powerful enough in their own right shared their similar stories. People with money and power throughout the industry were abusing women and getting away with it. It was systemic. Then it was more women, from different industries. But it wasn’t just more industries – it was all industries. Women and men sharing their stories of childhood abuse, and rape and sexual assault, and stories from their teenage years.

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Michelle Thomson, then the MP for Edinburgh West, detailed her own experience of being raped as a teenager, in one of the most powerful speeches I’ve ever seen delivered from the green benches of the House of Commons.

Then it was staff in the House of Commons itself – sharing the gory details of a disgusting culture that was entirely similar to the culture in Hollywood. It was women we know: friends, mothers, sisters, cousins. And on and on.

Everyone had a story and an experience, and they shared it. The bravery of so many people sharing their stories turned what could have juvenilely been called a sex scandal, was now being called a movement. Time was up.

It was eye opening in a strange way. Shocking and upsetting and surprising. But was it surprising? Not really no. This was something, I think, we all knew was happening. This was proved out in the number of jokes that resurfaced, from years-old TV shows, about Weinstein’s behaviour.

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It was borne out in the fact that the President of the United States of America had bragged about “grabbing women by the pussy” and how “when you’re a star they let you do it”, and then been elected. We had known, we just didn’t know we knew – and that was what was different.

The realisation was creeping up on everyone that enough was enough. Women have culturally been putting up with this for too long. That was the good that could come out of the horror: times up.

These men were finally going to be held to account for their actions. It was going to be legal action: criminal where the statute of limitations hadn’t been met, civil where it had.

Campaign groups formed to push for statute of limitations laws to be changed and amended because they were inadequate, and in some places it worked. Statues were changed.

People like Weinstein lost their careers and now were facing trials for their actions. Processes for reporting harassment and assault were reviewed – amended where they didn’t work, and created where they didn’t exist. The shame in being sexually harassed and assaulted was finally going to be eradicated. Debate raged. It was a tipping point.

For a while it seemed like that might be true – the stories didn’t stop coming, and still even now, nearly two years after I wrote my first column on this issue for The National, more stories are appearing. But it’s quieter now. A mention of sexual harassment or assault online will get you a barrage of abuse from bots and trolls claiming that “MeToo has gone to far” and a bunch of other redundant, meaningless soundbites.

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Many women still wait for their day in court, but it is coming. American Supreme Court nominees find their confirmation hearings stalled because of credible sexual assault accusations, but they still get appointed.

Political candidates are accused of having assaulted underage women and don’t get elected, but the margin of loss is slim and they still got the full endorsement and backing of the Whitehouse. So, has progress been made? Maybe a little. Or certainly that’s what I thought.

Until I saw a video doing the rounds on Twitter. The video is a short clip of a comedian set at an event called Actors Hour – a platform for young actors. It turns out Harvey Weinstein has been invited to the event and given a private booth by the organiser Alexandra Laliberte.

Apparently, the credible accusations from countless women that Weinstein had assaulted or raped them when they were young aspiring actors didn’t bother Laliberte when she decided to invite him into a room filled with young aspiring actors. The comedian in the video makes some jokes about him being there as part of her set and a rousing chorus of men start booing her, one shouting at her to “shut up”.

It’s a disgraceful sight and I applaud the comedian for taking a stand against this man. Seeing that video made me realise somewhere along the way, the conversation about sexual harassment has in many ways fallen back to a whisper in the past two years.

The men who committed the acts of violence are now subtly sneaking their way back to their comfortable lives, and those who point out that it’s wrong are shouted at and told to shut up.

We have to restart the conversation, before the silence becomes complacency, or worse, the assumption that everything is now better.