It’s time for the rabbit hole to go one level deeper. If you haven’t read about the allegations, form an opinion about famous comedian/actor Aziz Ansari here. Human sexual interaction is complex. I rather wish we could bisect it for convenience. You can do this, of course, but no matter how neatly you cut it, you’re still desecrating an elaborate whole in ignorance of its true depth.

In response to the controversial Babe piece, there came an op-ed in the New York Times by Bari Weiss to vindicate Mr. Ansari, who, concluding dinner, may have been prepared to draw new boundaries for the treat yo’self method.

Take a step back. #MeToo has been a critical step forward in outing men who have abused power and outright sexually abused women. We proceed to the question of legitimacy now, and on one side of the argument, there is a kind of omnivorous receipt of abuse claims. To exemplify, here is James Franco on his own received allegations of sexual misconduct:

“In life I pride myself on taking responsibility for what I’ve done. The claims I heard are not accurate, but I completely support people coming out because they didn’t have a voice for so long. I don’t want to shut them down in any way. I think it’s a good thing and I support it.”

Are we really pretending that the most important aspect of this is not whether it actually happened? The claims are not accurate, but he supports them? He supports inaccuracy? This occurs to me as the cop-out of a scared man. Scared for his career, he is defending himself with one arm, and using the other to pat his accusers on the back. Careful that’s not a prurient pat, James. Nice and platonic, if you please.

I don’t know whether he did what his accusers say he did. And I don’t know what went down between Aziz Ansari and his date. But if Babe’s account is accurate, we have a lot to delve into.

Here is the meat of what I’d like to address: the Weiss article is an example of irresponsible journalism riding the coattails of a just opposition to the unfortunate morphing of #MeToo, a trend which initially wounded rotten men like Harvey Weinstein, but has since evolved some odd tentacles - appendages that tickled James Franco into practically employing Orwellian doublespeak.

Criticism of #MeToo’s excess can be found here. As for the NYT piece, I have to wonder if Weiss actually read the initial account of Ansari’s sexual encounter.

Yes, yes, the wine business was over the top. And fair enough, mumbling and “nonverbal cues” mixed with undressing and oral sex could be a case of mixed signals. This may be a gray area, and I wasn’t there to judge just how obvious those cues were, although my intuition says (read: screams) that if she has to stop and ask for a change of pace, or to walk away multiple times, she isn't into it. But Babe also indicates that Ansari restrained her physically to some extent. Yikes. Nothing gray about that.

Importantly, can we also take a moment to examine the fact that, after telling him "no," and a seemingly benign relocation to the couch (for an actual Netflix and chill), Ansari then resumed blatant sexual advances? Here is something Bari Weiss doesn’t tell you. That article only describes matters as far as:

They got dressed, sat on the couch and watched ‘Seinfeld.’ She said to him: “You guys are all the same.” He called her an Uber. She cried on the way home. Fin.

Compare this to the original Babe account:

“After he bent me over is when I stood up and said no, I don’t think I’m ready to do this, I really don’t think I’m going to do this. And he said, ‘How about we just chill, but this time with our clothes on?’”

Sounds admirable of Ansari, but then:

They got dressed, sat side by side on the couch they’d already “chilled” on...

While the TV played in the background, he kissed her again, stuck his fingers down her throat again, and moved to undo her pants. She turned away.”

So we have, “verbal dissent ended the night” and “verbal dissent did not end the night.” I’ll reiterate that I wasn’t there, but if Babe tells it true, that’s some pretty egregious "misreading" from Ansari. And why Weiss chose to eject this key, key item from the NYT op-ed is the next question.

My take is that the encounter sounds like a mixed bag of calamitous awkwardness, though I cast a deeply suspicious eye toward Ansari. That's putting it mildly, to be honest. While Grace's (the date’s pseudonym) occasional willingness may have confused him, I can’t say I’d have been oblivious myself to the cues described. Reference the title; you don't need telepathy here, guys. Ansari sounds like an unempathetic horndog who easily went over the limits.

I will say that sexual abuse allegations are a matter of grave consideration. An extreme stance that drugs itself on the purported accuracy of all claims is right up there with a complete defense of Ansari’s romantic "stylings."

I don’t know who’s telling the truth in most circumstances. The best we can do is continue to respect women, pay attention to body language during encounters, and take sexual abuse allegations with the seriousness they deserve. Substantiation of claims is left to investigative journalism and the justice system.

I wish I had a better answer.