Deshaun Watson quarterback for the Cleveland Browns has been accused by
literally dozens of women of sexual harassment and assault.
And finally, there are consequences.
Get a load of this.
He is going to be doing a six game suspension,
not six seasons, not six years, six games he won't be paid.
But he also will not be fined for
violating the league's personal conduct policy following all of these accusations.
Since last year, he has now faced 20 for sexual misconduct lawsuits,
a variety of sexual harassment and assault allegations by massage therapists.
And you might be familiar with some parts of this, but
I just want to describe one of the things that was involved the investigation,
something they found about Deshaun Watson.
So he apparently liked to use a towel to drape himself in massage sessions
instead of the larger sheet that you're supposed to use in these contexts,
Sometimes even bringing his own small or medium towels.
So they generally the massage therapist,
these are professionals doing an actual job.
They're not objects for you to either harass or assault.
And that apparently needs to be pointed out, will cover a person up because they
have no interest in seeing their client's private parts.
In this case, he was intentionally trying to non consensually force
them to see his private parts or in fact even touch them.
And again, these dozens of these therapists that have already come forward.
And so look, apparently the person who's been looking into this
had suggested a season suspension, but six games is what we're gonna get Jessica,
what do you make of it?
>> 24 is a lot, I think the craziest part about this story is, yeah,
the comparison of the charges that other NFL players have gotten.
There's all sorts of people writing blogs, right?
Just dudes being dudes saying, hey, don't make fun of this guy, for only being
suspended for six games when people like Ridley got suspended for 17, for example.
And they say that it's because the, the NFL's policy is very
clearly outlined punishments for the kinds of crimes of gambling.
And he specifically gambled on NFL Games and
sometimes where it was against his own team or for his own team.
Okay, then the policies are wrong, like rules and what is right and
wrong are not the same.
Rules and justice are never the same and to criticize the NFL for
not taking situations of sexual misconduct more seriously.
I think it's fair and exactly what we need to do here.
But there's only like 25 to 30% of NFL fans that are women.
And so they're probably not too threatened by the prospective of a boycott or
that their fans and supporters will be upset by this.
And we can't rely on the NFL to be our criminal justice system and
bring about a sense of justice.
But this happened kind of in a professional setting, right?
There's a reason that athletes get massages, this was misconduct.
That's very relevant to what he does for the NFL.
And so they should probably consider that and take it more seriously.
And if he's found guilty of misconduct in these cases or
in these lawsuits maybe then they'll take more action.
Let's hope that's the case.
>> Yeah, I guess, look, and they, they do have to weigh in to some extent,
but it really better not be up to the NFL at the end of the day.
They're not our government.
I know some people are really into football, but
they're not the ones who are supposed to be at the end of the day, dispensing
justice and they appear to have no interest in doing so from what we can see.
Now to put in context, his penalty six games
means six fewer $57,500 game checks.
That's $345,000 lost
off of a $1.035 million.
This is, I'm gonna say less than irrelevant in terms of the actual money.
Maybe missing the games is more relevant in terms of his stats or his record or
his legacy or God knows what.
But I mean, out of the amount of money that he has,
who the hell cares about, $1 million.
And some people are saying in the chat why would you do this?
You're famous, you're now but you have all this money.
I can't speak for any particular person who breaks the law, but
they're not doing it because they have to or they can't think of anything else.
They're doing it because they want to,
they're not forcing themselves on people because they're so desperate.
They have to, they're forcing themselves on people because they want to force
themselves on people.
It is a sexual thing certainly, but
it's a power dynamic that they want to exert control over other people.
Other people who might well fear that their entire career could evaporate if
they say something.
If you're a massage therapist for the NFL, wouldn't you potentially be terrified that
if you were to say anything, well there goes all of your future work,
you don't have a $230 million dollar contract waiting for you.
And so that's what makes this so awful.
It's the power dynamic and the obviously the sexual, the terrible things
that were done really fast though, you pointed out 17 games for Calvin Ridley.
I looked it up,
I assumed 17 game suspension must have been something truly bad.
Mass murder, no, he was gambling as you said, he got way more games for gambling.
And then you can see Tristan Kun has this, you've got weed leading to
an indefinite suspension from Martavis Bryant 25 games for Josh Gordon.
For weed, Darren Waller, substance abuse 16 games.
So in theory, it is way worse to abuse a bottle of whiskey than a woman.
In the ranking from the NFL's point of view, women are important.
Thus the six games, but marijuana way more important.
We need to pay much more attention to that.
It's a weird system that they've got over there Jessica.
>> Yeah, john I'm not really a fan of these complicated moral dilemmas.
It's of what is worse, smoking some weed or assaulting women and
putting them in uncomfortable situations.
I don't know what's worse, tough one, it's really a tough one.
And I think like the reason people do this is because look at the consequence,
it's a slap on the wrist.
He saw his $230 million dollar contract.
And I think it's not like I'm living this great life, why risk it with this?
Because I'm sure he's amassed enough money that even if he was fired from the NFL,
he would be fine and knowing that the consequence will be essentially a slap on
the wrist and he'll still be financially secure regardless.
That's the calculation he's making when he does something like this,
he'll still be living a very comfortable life.
And at that point, you kind of feel like you're above accountability, it seems.
>> Yeah, because you are, this results in a really sick situation where
the unfortunate advice to these massage therapist has to be that.
When you are harassed, try to pause and
get the guy to smoke a joint because that will get him in trouble far
more than the harassment that he is doing at that moment.
So I would carry an edible around with you at all times.
Just offer that to your assailant and that way you might get some justice maybe.
>> Modern problems require modern solutions, John?
>> Exactly, by the way, 11 more thing on this.
So if we can jump ahead of graphic nine,
they the browns put out this statement saying that he we know remorseful
that this situation has caused much heartache too many and
he will continue the work needed to show who he is on and off the field.
We will continue to support him.
So he is remorseful.
He's putting in the work and everything.
Take a look at this clip of him talking about these allegations from just
back in March.
>> I mean, I don't have any regrets.
I said before, the things that are off the field right now that came up,
caught me by surprise because I never did anything that these people are a legend.
>> So these people were lying.
These 24 women, that is a crowd of women were all lying.
He didn't do any of that.
And he went on to say, I'm just gonna continue trying to be a good man and
a good son.
That's what my mom taught me.
>> Yep, the statement ending with we support him is
that's a poor choice of words.
Poor choice of words,
get someone who has studied communications a little bit to help you out with that.
Yeah, and just to have him deny 20 for that's insanity.
>> Here's an idea,
support your massage therapists who help your players actually be able to perform.
Support them maybe,
I know that they don't bring in the Jersey bucks necessarily, but respect them.
Support them.
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