What are the consequences of your actions?

I would like to talk about an issue that has been in the news recently along with some other incidents that I have witnessed. Now the story that I wish to start with is #shirtgate/#shirtstorm - this story centres around scientist Matt Taylor's "sexist" shirt which he wore during an interview and then he was forced to give a groveling apology. There was then a backlash against those who forced Taylor into an apology but the opinion has been split on the issue.

Now you are of course entitled to your own reaction about #shirtgate/shirtstorm - but here's my reaction: is the shirt tasteless? Yes it was. Was it inappropriate? Yes it was. Should he have considered wearing something else as he was giving an interview on TV? Yes he should have (hindsight is 2020). Did people overreact to his attire? Yes, some people certainly did. Nonetheless, it still doesn't change the fact that Taylor had exercised a gross error of judgement in being oblivious to the consequences of choice of attire for that interview. At the very least, he made himself look quite silly (and that's putting it mildly). It makes one wonder how much social interaction he has on a daily basis and how he could have made such an error of judgement despite being an obviously highly intelligent scientist.

Did he set out intentionally to offend women and feminists? No he didn't. Did he caught offence? Yes he did. Does the lack of malicious intent let him off the hook? No, I'm afraid it doesn't - such is the real world we live in. We need to bear responsibility for our actions. Some people have said that as he is a scientist geek, we cannot apply the same kind of social norms to him so he should be able to plead ignorance and forgiven for this. I find this attitude rather condescending as Matt Taylor is not only an adult, but supposedly an extremely intelligent scientist - one of the best in his field, so why should he be allowed this 'get out of jail free' card?

This is an interesting case study because we have to always make a careful balance between doing/saying what we want and considering what effects our actions may have on those around us. Sure Matt Taylor had the right to wear what he wanted to work but did he spend a moment thinking what others may think about it? Clearly not - and that is something we all have to take away from this episode: always spend a moment thinking about the consequences of your choices on those you may interact with. These may be your family members, your colleagues, your friends, your neighbours and in Matt Taylor's case, it was all the viewers of the interview he gave on TV on that fateful day.

Allow me to compare this to another incident I had witnessed a while ago: now some of my regular readers will remember that my nephew is autistic. He has a very short attention span and finds it hard to focus on tasks that require him to sit still for a long time. So even something like family dinners are tedious for him - he may get up in the middle of the meal and start wandering around (or these days, he would take out his phone) instead of trying to participate in the conversation amongst the family members.

So at this family dinner at a very nice Chinese restaurant (this happened when he was about 5 or 6), he got up, left the table and started running around. He bumped into this older PRC lady on another table and caused her to spill hot soup of her fine dress - she was very upset indeed. My dad rushed over (being the fluent Mandarin speaker) and apologized profusely: his words were as follows: "小孩子无知, 他不是故意的, 他有自闭症 - 我很抱歉, 请你原谅!" (The young child is ignorant, he didn't do it on purpose, he is autistic - I am so sorry, please forgive!) So I suppose you can plead ignorance and beg for forgiveness on that basis if it is a young disabled child who does something stupid like that - but can Matt Taylor even begin to think about pleading ignorance? Can he even contemplate that option?

No, he didn't and he offered an apology - that was the right thing to do. He took responsibility for his mistake and hopefully has learnt a lesson or two from the process. Those who think that he should be allowed to plead ignorance are just being condescending. After all, does the absence of malicious intent allow you to get away with offensive actions? I don't think so. Here's another incident I witnessed recently which is another good example of how someone ignorance has caused grave offence.

There is a London tribute memorial to the victims of the 2002 Bali bombings - it can be found on the Clive Steps opposite St James Park and comprises of a marble globe with 202 carved doves on it.  When I was passing through the park earlier this week, I saw a group of teenagers shooting a low-budget music video on it. There was a singer who had climbed on top of the globe - he was singing and dancing on the globe whilst his friends were filming him. Now this was deeply inappropriate and offensive and it wasn't long before the police turned up and told them to get off the memorial at once. "Do you know what this memorial is? Do you realize how disrespectful you are being by climbing on top of it?" The teenagers pleaded ignorance, they said they were just looking for an interesting place to shoot a scene and had stumbled upon the memorial without realizing what it was - they had not even heard about the 2002 Bali bombings and had really no idea it was a memorial for the 202 victims who perished in that terrorist incident.

The policeman simply moved them along after the teenagers had apologized for their actions - I thought that was borderline whether or not they should have been allowed to plead ignorance. After all, you only had to take a moment to read the words around the memorial to realize that this was a memorial for the dead, it was a sculpture that should have been treated with respect - it should not have been treated like a children's playground structure for climbing. The fact that these teenagers may have been ignorant didn't change the fact that onlookers like myself felt deeply offended by their inappropriate actions. I think the policeman should have at least issued them with a formal warning instead of just moving them along.

Lastly, let me tell you what happened last night - I have a neighbour who has been in ill-health and sometimes, he has friends who come round to take care of him. I was awoken at about 2 am in the morning by someone singing and I had to go round to knock on his door to say, "hey, it's two in the morning and I have just been awoken by bad singing - what the hell is going on here?" The woman who answered the door apologized and said, "he is in pain and I didn't know what to do, so I thought I would sing him a lullaby to take his mind off the pain. I didn't realize that you could hear me and I am sorry I woke you up." Did she have any malicious intent? No, she was caring for a sick friend. But did her actions have consequences? Yes they did - she woke me up and I wasn't happy about it as I had to work this morning!

So there you go - the bottom line is that the absence of malice intent doesn't mean that there wouldn't be any consequences as a result of your actions. Hence coming back to Matt Taylor, No, I am not going to say, "oh he didn't mean to cause offence, so it's okay." No it is not - people are not judged on the presence or absence of malicious intent but rather on the consequences of their actions. Maybe a 5 year old autistic child gets to play the ignorance card - but no, adults and teenagers should not be allowed to play that card. What is your take on this issue? Are you prepared to excuse Matt Taylor's shirt on the basis of ignorance? Or are we all just being a bit too harsh to him? Do let me know what you think about the issue - please leave a comment below. Many thanks for reading.