Publishers Must Push Back Against the Baying Twitter Mob

These are the ‘morality clauses’ arising in standard publishing contracts in the wake of #MeToo. Primarily a Hollywood weapon of the 1930s and 1940s, morality clauses were used particularly to frighten actresses from disgraceful hanky-panky. So savor the irony: this legal loophole was designed to oppress women, especially in regard to sex. In consequence of a movement meant to thwart the oppression of women, especially in regard to sex, the clauses are sneaking back.

What makes these stipulations so alarming is their vagueness. Who exactly is ‘the public’? Who, or what, speaks for ‘the public’?

I think we know. ‘The public’ is Twitter.