Sexual harassment is just SOOO funny, isn’t it?

Today’s bath water is truly horrifying. I had planned on including it in the previous post, but I ran out of time, and I try to keep to one topic per post anyway. For background on David Gibbs Jr., see the previous post.

Let’s talk about the fact that Gibbs was chosen by IBLP to conduct their farce of an “outside” investigation of Bill Gothard and the accusations of sexual harassment against him. Much has already been made of the fact that Gibbs is far from independent or outside; he’s long been a featured speaker at IBLP conferences. Bloggers have also made quite a bit of noise over Gibbs’ involvement in the case of Jack Schaap, where Gibbs advised church members with knowledge of criminal conduct to come and speak to him (the church’s lawyer), rather than advising them to inform the police. But as far as I am aware, I don’t think anyone has brought up this very telling clip that we will look at today. Without further ado, let’s hear it from the horse’s mouth:

I’ll never forget, I was in the hospital, and I was in a lot, a lot of pain. I didn’t understand I was having a gall bladder attack. And I walked into that hospital and I said, “Man, I need a doctor. Boy, I need a doctor.” And this lady came walking in, and she said, “I’m Doctor So-And-So” and I said, “No, no, no, I need a real doctor. (laughter) I need a man.”

She said, “Well, let me explain to you. I’ve got something here in this needle that will take all your pain away, or you can wait for a ‘real doctor.’”

I said, “Doc, you’re looking more beautiful all the time! (louder laughter) Come on, come on!”

This is a man chosen to investigation charges of sexual harassment, and here we see him joking about a time he sexually harassed someone!  I’m having difficulty finding the words to express how truly horrible this is. It shows such an utter and complete disregard for women and their abilities, and a complete inability to see a lady as anything beyond just a body that can do something for him.

“No, no, no. I need a real doctor. I need a man.” This is his idea of a joke. It’s funny to make fun of a female doctor, because obviously no woman has the knowledge, experience or talents needed to be a doctor. Ha ha ha! Let’s everybody laugh at this ridiculous lady and her silly ideas that she might know something about medicine. Real doctors are male.

And once she offers the painkiller, he doesn’t say that she’s looking more professional, or more knowledgeable or more capable. No, of course not. She’s looking more beautiful! Because really, that’s all women are good for, isn’t it? They’re just a body that ought to look beautiful for men. They don’t have brains, or talents or dreams, or any chance of making impact in a manly profession like medicine.

And what could be creepier than his final “come on, come on”? Why is it so easy to imagine a sexual predator saying those words to his victim? Maybe because that’s the kind of thing a predator thinks. A predator views his victim as non-human, without value beyond what they can provide for him. I’m not accusing Gibbs of being a sexual predator, but hearing him tell this story makes it abundantly clear that he lacks the basic respect for women needed to understand sexual abuse and sexual harassment.

This is the man chosen by the IBLP board to investigate accusations of sexual harassment. Can you imagine him interviewing a woman, asking her to reveal details about a very deep emotional hurt? (Never mind the fact that he didn’t interview any of the victims in the course of his “investigation.”) Is this man in any way qualified to even understand what sexual harassment is, let alone investigate it?