Do rich and powerful men ever commit rape? Evidently many people – including Bernard-Henri Levy, the French philosopher, and Ben Stein, the conservative American writer and TV personality – think that the eminence of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former managing director of the International Monetary Fund, could be guilty of the charge of attempted rape brought by a hotel maid who, as they both point out, is a mere nobody.
Public opinion polls indicate that a majority of the French people, and an overwhelming majority of French socialists, think Strauss-Kahn was set up. And judging by the comment threads of some of the on-line articles I’ve read, there are many Americans who think a white Frenchman who pays $3,000 a night for a hotel room is inherently more credible than an African immigrant maid.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn
The fact is that hotel guests who sexually abuse hotel maids often get away with it. Hotels want to please their guests. Hotel maids – often women of color, often poor immigrants, sometimes illegal immigrants – are often working on the margin of economic survival, and know they can easily be replaced. If a hotel guest gropes them, or exposes himself, or worse, it is risky to mention it. The hotel has every incentive to believe the guest rather than the maid.
If you can do something with impunity, a certain number of people will do it. There are rich people who think their wealth gives them impunity. There are international civil servants who think diplomatic immunity gives them impunity.
The maid allegedly raped by Strauss-Kahn was a poor immigrant from Guinea, in West Africa. She might not have spoken up if not for a supportive employer, the Sofitel hotel corporation, and a strong labor union, the New York Hotel Trades Council. Holding a union card, being protected by a union contract, meant that she did not have to face with wealth and power represented by Strauss-Kahn on her own. As the old union song, “Solidarity Forever” goes, What force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one? But the union makes us strong!
My newspaper training tells me to use words like “allegedly” and “accused of” so as not to assume that someone is guilty of a crime until the person has been found guilty in a court of law. I will say that, based on the facts that have come out, the police had probable cause to make an arrest, and prosecution to bring charges, and let it go at that. But the burden of proof is on the prosecution, as it should be. Dominique Strauss-Kahn will, I am sure, enjoy the full benefit of the law in presenting his defense – if the case even goes to trial. I’d say the odds are that the alleged victim will be offered a huge cash settlement to keep the charge from ever coming to trial.
Phil Ebersole's Blog 