Robert Hadden, Epstein, Weinstein, Tyndall, Nassar: Is There Anyone Worse Than Old White Men? Yes.

To start with the ending. Every dominant male group in every other nation in the world where white males, in a democrcy, are not the dominant group, are worse than old white men in the US. Ofcourse young white males in the US are worse - better to be fondled by Hadden or Tyndall than to be killed by the Idaho killer.

I have made this important observation of humans in earlier blogs. Evil often occurs because: if people feel they can get away with something, they will do it. In general this applies to every misconduct. This basically reflects the lack of feeling that they will be, or should be, held accountable. Individuals in positions of authority, money, status tend to have the impression that the rules do not apply to them. This has always existed in all times with humans (probably all animals and maybe all plants).

The only control that exists in the modern 'civilized nation' era is transparency and accountability. Democracy intrinsically lends itself to that concept, whereas dictatorships intrinsically lack it. Despite this integrity factor that democracies contain, probably no more than 1 % of circumstances of abuse experience this transparency and accountability. This is because in democracies, despite being a government democracy, most businesses and organizations (eg: universities) actually are some form of dictatorship /autocracy. If the individuals on top are corrupt (maybe 70% have some level of corruption) then unless leaked out, misconduct is still the order of the day, the lingua franca, of organizations.

So the prospect of transparency and accountability is basically the only tool we have available to control misconduct. As more reports come out, and more perpetrators held accountability, other potential perpetrators are forced to think twice before engaging in their base instincts. This is a form of copy-catting of good behavior. So it may not be that fundamentally old white men are more ethical than other dominant male groups in other nations, but the 350 years of democracy, the prospect of transparency and accountability, render old white men as less toxic than men in other ethnic/ racial groups.

I have enough trouble with individuals in the US that I am holding to account for failure in patient safety, that I hesitate in naming the other groups that are worse than old white men, since I do not need additional potential assassins..So understanding what I am writing below requires knowledge of world history and current events. But, girls and women are allowed to go to school, to work and be in public in the USA, and forced virginity testing ( in truth just physical molestation of women because you can get away with it) by police, teachers, and doctors is not allowed. There is not the general acceptance of abuse and rape of women. There is at least a reasonable prospect of justice in the judicial system in the USA, provided it does not conflict with the judges' intrinsic bias. These abuses occur in other countries where old white men are not the dominant male group. For a number of reasons, the other Anglo Saxon immigrant nations, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, are much better than the US on virtually all measures of safety and accountability.

It is encouraging that more of these old white males are held to account for their conduct, so other old white males with the same instincts, because of their sense of entitlement and noblesse prerogative, do not engage in abuse. What is still missing is the holding to account of the supervisors above the perpetrator. Those senior to Hadden, Tyndall, etc also need to held to account.

There are still many more old white men in the medical and other fields, and their accomplices, that need to be held to account for even worse conduct than Robert Hadden and the others listed above. I plan to do my part for continued effort towards more general transparency and accountability..

Richard Semelka, MD