Charlie Maxwell Sex andJustice Post

Prompt #1: A high tech-lynching is a non-physical attack performed by a group of people in order to kill one’s reputation. Anita Hill led the charge of Thomas’ lynching by accusing him of sexual misconduct and then the rest of the media who attacked Thomas for these accusations participated in his “high-tech lynching”. Personally, I believe this claim by Justice Thomas was unwarranted and unnecessary. Lynchings took place between members of the different races, but Thomas' accuser was a black woman. Additionally, the lynchings of the past were driven by racially abhorrent views, whereas this “lynching” stemmed directly from Anita Hill’s desire for justice. I wholeheartedly agree with what one of the Congressman on the committee said to Clarence Thomas while he was on trial. He called for the case to no longer be about race or lynching but to focus directly and entirely on the truth.
I also believe the committee, and especially Senator Specter, was unfair in their questioning of Anita Hill. With Justice Thomas, the committee would ask questions setting him up to assert his credibility, but with Professor Hill, the committee would try to point out any possible discontinuity in her story. It was as though the committee was already on Justice Thomas' side, and this may have come from his appeal to their emotions along with his labeling of the trial as a "high-tech lynching."

Prompt #2: From watching the hearings in class, Anita Hill’s testimony seemed to be much more truthful than Thomas’. Justice Thomas would only seek the emotional appeal of the committee and those around him by continuously referencing the damage done to his reputation and his family. In the McCarthy hearings, even if you were proved innocent, your reputation was destroyed simply by the accusation itself. Similarly, McCarthy rarely had evidence for his accusations, but the truth behind the trials were less important than the trials themselves. Accusation was scarring enough for many Americans. As for Justice Thomas, he may have won the case and been approved to the Supreme Court, yet his reputation will always be remembered by this case.