As a member of the Fellowship of The Rings, who must pass through the Mines of Moria in order to save all that is good in middle Earth, I find myself before the enchanted back door into the Mines of Moria, knowing that I must enter and pass though the unknown difficulties that lie ahead, but also knowing that behind me, the Watcher in the Water has been awakened by the rock-throwing of my foolish companions. To retreat is to face a known enemy that is greater than my equal; yet to proceed will just as likely force me to face foes many times greater than my own power to defeat. To proceed I must, because, only the way forward presents a passage for progress. So, with the Watcher in the Water baring my retreat, I press forward into the Mines of Moria, hoping that the Orcs of reaction, and the Balrog of denial, do not deliver my mission its deathblow.
To get through safely, I admit, first requires I take personal responsibility. I must commit never to request, nor engage in, the expectation of improper payment of money, favors, or sex. Yet, I also equally believe, it is only through the power of the group and its communal responsibility, that provides me and others the greatest possibility that no one seeking advancement, or no one having position or power, will engage in corruption or sexual exploitation. Both the arms of personal and communal responsibility will allow us, in the Fellowship of The Rings, to achieve the optimal solutions for any obstacles to our progress. Individuals, relationships, families, communities, institutions, cities, states, nations, and united nations have a responsibility to rid our social intercourse of corruption and sexual exploitation. All must join forces to make it safely through the Mines of Moria.
Both the evils of corruption and sexual exploitation have similar dynamics. Both have perpetrators, victims, co-conspirators, and co-corrupters.
When it is not implemented by force, corruption and sexual exploitation could end overnight if individuals and entities refused to pay either money, favors, or flesh to play. The warranted hue and cry of the victims of corruption and sexual harassment will amass with their swords of indignation and clamor from behind. And still, I will proceed to run forward into the Mines of Moria, and into the darkness and dangers that I know lay ahead. But allow me to arm myself.
Of course, corruption and sexual exploitation would cease to exist if those in positions of power did not improperly solicit money, favors, or sex to advance those over whom they have position and power. But the more important question is: Who bears the responsibility for extirpating corruption and sexual exploitation from our fellowship? Can corruption and sexual exploitation be precipitated by those seeking a quicker path forward? Do individuals and entities sometimes offer improper payments of money, favors, or sex for advancement forward? Yes, and yes. They can, and they do.
But, herein lies the problem and an important difference. Unfortunately, when corruption and sexual exploitation are entrenched among co-conspiring sovereigns and are thereby institutionalized, sometimes individuals and entities, in order to advance, to access justice, to secure freedom, and even to survive, are compelled to engage in corruption and submit as victims of sexual exploitation. However, even when those with power and position do not initiate a corrupt or sexually exploitative relationship, but it is offered by those seeking power and advancement, they are almost never disadvantaged from refusing to accept the improper payments of money, favor, or sex. They almost always have culpability for such improper payments and are almost always co-corrupters in such relationships, and bear equal, if not greater, responsibility with the dis-empowered. Therefore, those with power and position almost always have a greater responsibility to refrain from corruption and sexual exploitation, and to root them out wherever they manifest.
Still, if all those, who wish to live a life within a society devoid of corruption and sexual exploitation, are out of power and position, and those within power and position had become co-conspirators that require the improper patronage of money, favors, and sex, those within the Fellowship of the Ring must ask: Who invariably must act to extirpate corruption and sexual exploitation? Unfortunately, an inescapable reality is that to rid a society of corruption and sexual exploitation, it must start with every individual, then with every family, then within every organization, and so on and so forth until those in power are either contained by cultural mores, constrained by law, or are defeated by mortality.
Yet, because of the differences in our natures as male and female (and, though fluid, there are some differences), the thorny reality of sexual exploitation is that it is usually initiated and precipitated by men with power and position. More perversely, as is corruption, it is not only perpetrated by the coercion of authority and position, but by physical violence. Therefore, just as it is, first, the responsibility of those with power and position to cease from engaging in corruption either as perpetrators, co-conspirators, or co-corrupters, it is, first, the responsibility of men to acknowledge the reality of their greater responsibility for the problem and cease to engage in sexual exploitation and to censure, sanction, and legally proscribe and prosecute it. But still, just as all members of a society must refrain from engaging in corruption, women should also acknowledge that others of their sex do engage in and initiate sexual exploitation by using sex or the promise of sex as a transactional payment for advancement. Women, therefore, should also cease from doing so and should censure, sanction, and legally proscribe and prosecute it when they become aware of those who use sex or the suggestion of sex as coinage for advancement.
Allegations of sexual harassment also have the added complexity that sexual interactions, in any and all settings, are often devoid of manipulation in which one or the other is using the relationship for the unspoken promise of advancement or the continued payment of sexual favors. Sexual relationships are also entered into when one or the other is unaware of the other’s ulterior motives that include the expectation of advancement, or a continued sexual relationship for advancement. To further complicate matters, a sexual relationship, by its very nature, however voluntary and wholesome, usually carries with it expectations, that when both participants are part of an integrated entity, are in conflict with that entities’ interests. More specifically, people in sexual relationships expect the other to be their champion, rightfully or wrongfully so. These realities require our careful consideration of every allegation of sexual exploitation.
In short, as to sexual exploitation, we should not blame the victims, be indifferent to the possibility of innocence of the alleged perpetrators, nor hesitate to label both as co-corrupters when the facts and circumstances so indicate. Instead, we must give everyone implicated in such relationships adequate societal, administrative, or legal processes to present their position. Then, and only then, can we take pains to never fault the victim, to condemn the perpetrators, and to identify the co-corrupters when warranted.
Most important, as to both sexual exploitation and corruption, we all must cease from either requiring or offering the improper payment of money, favors, and sex for advancement while passing through the Mines of Moria.
May we all join in the Fellowship of the Ring of Propriety that decries corruption and sexual exploitation. May we all have the courage to decline to participate in it, even when those who have position and authority have institutionalized it as a requirement for passage. And, may those with position or power refrain from engaging in it, and ensure that those with whom they share power and position refrain from it, and censure, proscribe, and prosecute it.
Loren M. Lambert © October 28, 2017
