On Friday Larry Baer, the CEO of the San Francisco Giants, was caught on tape having a loud, public argument with his wife. In the video he tried to rip a cell phone out of her hands, which caused her to tumble off of her chair and to the ground as she screamed “help me!” Baer walked away and made no effort to help his wife or act in any way to suggest that he cared that he sent her down to the asphalt.
It was a disturbing scene and the lack of criminal charges and the couple’s later joint statement that it was all just an embarrassing misunderstanding did nothing to make it better. Whether you or the authorities consider it a crime or not — I think it could be classified as battery, even if I do not believe Baer will actually be charged — you cannot say Baer’s behavior was acceptable. If you saw that happening to your mother or sister or daughter or friend, you would not be blasé about it, charges or no charges. You would consider it abuse.
Yet, so many of my readers and people responding to my stories about it online are blasé about it, or worse. Sometimes far worse.
I’ve blocked dozens of men calling Baer’s wife a “bitch” or worse, or claiming that she was “looking for attention.” Despite clear video of the incident, several people have defaulted to the old stand-by, “hey, we don’t have all the evidence” or “maybe there’s more to the story here, don’t jump to conclusions.” This morning someone commented, saying, “[h]e grabbed for the phone. Perhaps his wife was talking loud on it and embarrassing him. So he appeared to have a negative passionate moment, not a planned one.” I wonder what would happen if a black man or a poor man or — heaven forbid, a woman — upon being arrested for something, attempted to get out of trouble by saying they simply had “a negative passionate moment.”
Over at my website we, unfortunately, have an upvote/downvote system for comments, allowing readers to agree or disagree with other readers. A fun thing is happening with those: anyone voicing criticism of Baer or condemnation of domestic violence is receiving tons of downvotes. Far, far more than comments on most articles ever get. I have deleted the misogynistic comments, but those generally defending Baer or condemning those who would criticize him are receiving upvotes, again, in far greater numbers than our site normally gets. I strongly suspect that the articles have been picked up by various men’s rights forums — which are a cesspool of misogyny as it is — and that they are very sending traffic over to specifically upvote and downvote comments which conflict with their pro-abuse world view. It has happened before, to my site and to other sites.
I, like anyone with decent parents, teachers and other adults in his life, was taught growing up that violence against women was abhorrent and unacceptable. That it was the worst thing a man could do. When I was young I believed, naively, that most people were taught this too. As I got older I lost my delusions on that score. If I held on to those delusions at all into adulthood they were lost after a friend got jury duty on a domestic violence case in the late 1990s. The defendant threw a phone — an old dial-up desk phone that had some weight to it — at his wife, hitting her and splitting her head open. The trial resulted in a hung jury. One of the jurors who would not vote to convict the guy said in the jury room, “I’m not gonna send a guy to jail for hitting his wife with no phone.” This, by definition, was a man who passed a voir dire that, theoretically, was aimed at weeding out people with preconceived views on the matter at hand.
Evidence doesn’t matter to some people. Even when abuse is caught on video it is meaningless to them. The “hey, people are innocent until proven guilty” and “let’s not rush to judgment” responses in these instances are, usually, a dodge and, since we’re not the cops and are not on a jury, they’re also irrelevant.
It’s simply the case that, as most women know but most men, I suspect, don’t quite appreciate, there are a lot of men out there, more than you think, who simply do not think it’s wrong to abuse women. Who think it’s far worse, in fact, for a man to be held accountable for abusive behavior than it is for him to engage in abusive behavior to begin with.
It makes me sad. It breaks my heart. But it’s the truth.
