A sexual harassment claim against the creator of the show "Mad Men" may be one of the ultimate ironies of the #metoo movement. After all, the show reflects on the cultural misogyny of the 60s and the rise of the women's rights movement. Many an episode featured men struggling with women's changing role in the office and the workplace.
Mad Men” creator Matthew Weiner is denying sexual harassment allegations made against him by series writer Kater Gordon. Now that he’s returning to TV with “The Romanoffs,” he’s reflecting on the claims.
In a recent interview, instead of completely writing off the claims that he told Gordon that she “owed it to him to let him see her naked” one night while they were working late, he says that he simply doesn’t remember. Vanity Fair reports him as saying, “I’m not hedging to say that it’s not impossible that I said it, but I really don’t remember saying it.”
But then it gets weird.
Vanity Fair also reports that later when the journalist asked him to clarify what he meant, he said that he “can’t imagine using the word ‘hedging.’”
Despite the confusion, what is clear is that he’s maintaining that he doesn’t remember what he said to Gordon during the alleged incident around 10 years back... and he strangely relates it to his experience with the reporter over the word “hedging.” “When someone says you said something, like the experience we just had right now – I don’t remember saying that,” he explains. “I never felt that way and I never acted that way towards Kater.”
So was Weiner trying to make a point? That a man often doesn't remember individual instances of what he said that was offensive to a woman? That's how I take his focus on the word, "hedging."