'We can do hard things:' Attorney Lisa Bloom on victims sharing their truth
Bloom to flight attendant victims of sexual assault: There can be empowerment in speaking out
Part 1 of 2 in a series.
Anyone else who wants to learn more about speaking anonymously in the docuseries about “the dark side” of working as a flight attendant as one of the “forgotten heroes” of aviation can reach me at MeTooAirlines@proton.me. If you ever thought about sharing your story about your assault, don’t miss this chance to hear more about what it would be like.
The usual trigger warning: Discussion of sexual assault
Reminder: Lisa Bloom has offered to talk to any of you at no charge about legal concerns you have or actions you might want to take relating to assault, harrassment, bullying, etc. suffered at your airline.
The difficult parts and the risks of talking publicly—even anonymously—about your sexual assault have been well covered here. Taking care of your mental health, whatever that looks like, is paramount, and how you do that is your choice.
Today we are going to discuss the benefits of talking about what happened to you, because the positive effects—and they do exist!—are often lost in the broader discussion, attorney Lisa Bloom told The Landing in a Zoom interview this week.
Bloom,* who has represented victims of men ranging from pedophile Jeffrey Epstein to Donald Trump to Fox talk-show host Bill O’Reilly, was appalled to learn the extent of the widespread sexual assaults on flight attendants by their own colleagues.
I asked her about how her clients have dealt with the trolls and rape apologists that inevitably crawl out of the woodwork to harass and threaten victims (and journalists) when they do reveal their attacker.
“I get those all the time too,” Bloom, who has won big cases and also spoken out about her own sexual harassment in the workplace, says. “On a practical level you have to block those calls [and messages], and if it’s a serious threat, report it to the police. That is very scary. Usually it’s not so much death threats but trolls.
“When you’re trying to make change, people get riled up and get upset. I choose to ignore it. Don’t feed the trolls. It’s scary and it’s very unpleasant.
“I tell [my clients] they get a lot of love, too. Usually 90 percent is positive, ‘you go girl, you’re brave.’ For some reason we don’t take that in as much as the negative.”
“But take in the positive too,” she adds, “and realize when you have the courage to stand up and do something important most people are going to admire you and some will come at you. I represented Wendy Walsh who went up against Bill O’Reilly. She was terrified at the beginning, but we did it.
“We took him down it was a great victory. She was one of Time magazine’s Persons of the Year in 2018 because of her courage.”
That Said…
This doesn’t mean it’s best for every victim to choose to go public or file a lawsuit, and it’s not the job of sexual assault and harassment victims to change the industry or the world, Bloom says.
“Here’s now I look at it. If they reach out to me we can [file] an anonymous claim—a Jane Doe.”
Even in doing that, “They are already doing a very important service to the world. I tell my clients, ‘I signed up to do this kind of work. You didn’t. You chose to become a flight attendant. You didn’t choose to be a civil rights or women’s rights activist. The moment chose you.’
“Victims of sexual assault can have their choice taken away from them,” Bloom adds. “It’s important that they have control and they have the right to choose.”
Though she and her mother, fellow women’s-rights attorney Gloria Allred, are known for being in the public eye, Bloom points out that over 90% of her cases are conducted quietly and/or privately.
(Pro tip: Publicity is not a bad word. It shines a light on dark secrets and provides cover when those who seek to hide and continue offending try to shut their victims down. In the light, you might find these predators in the cockpit scatter like cockroaches along with the executives who enabled them to keep offending).
Regardless of how you choose to handle your own assault, Bloom says that when a victim works with her, it’s all about what her client is comfortable with.
“It’s a spectrum,” she says. “Some are out doing media with me. That’s less than 1 percent. Then there is the other extreme who want everything to be confidential and they want to stay a Jane Doe. Then there's the middle, who choose to do media interviews as Jane Doe or they say, ‘Lisa, you can speak for me.’
“I have a significant social media following. If there are flight attendants getting harassed, I can get their story out.”
She’s also found that victims who were most terrified at first—and make no mistake, the powerful companies and industries some of them work in are every bit as intimidating and retaliatory as airlines can be—sometimes found a well of inner resources they didn’t know they had.
“During the course of the case, many times this changes. People who come to me are terrified. ‘I’m talking to a lawyer about the pilot who raped me.’ Then they talk to me and my team and they feel more empowered and stronger after we take a few steps,” Bloom says.
“You can speak out. We want others to know a sense of empowerment. Maybe I could do a deposition. Then a statement under oath. They realize they can do hard things. People don’t tell women that enough,” she adds. “We can do hard things.”
“My name is Jane Doe 1”
One high-profile case Bloom just settled involved Guess mogul Paul Marciano who faced allegations from multiple women.
“I’ve represented a lot of them,” Bloom says, and points to “a client who was terrified and then got stronger and stronger” as the case went on.
The client wanted to step forward. She said, “‘My name is Amanda Rodriguez and I’m not going to hide,’” Bloom recalls. “It’s a journey. It’s a continuum and it’s entirely up to them. The power needs to be in their hands throughout.”
Here is some of the Daily Beast’s reporting on that day:
“My name is ‘Jane Doe 1’ and I am Amanda Rodriguez,” she said at the end of prepared, on-camera remarks about her claims that Marciano, a titan in the fashion industry, sexually assaulted her in early 2020. “I have lived in fear about coming forward with my identity in public.
The press conference, organized by Rodriguez’s lawyer Lisa Bloom, featured speeches from others who’ve accused the embattled Guess executive of sexual misconduct. Eileen Toal, who last year told The Daily Beast that Marciano forced her to perform oral sex on him back in 1983; former Guess model Gwen Van Meir, who accused the mogul of unwanted touching and kissing during an overseas photo shoot; an ex-model identified in court as “Jane Doe 3,” who sued Marciano last year alleging he lured her to a hotel room and sexually assaulted her; and Chris Applebaum, a music video director and photographer who said he has personally witnessed Marciano sexually harassing models.”
The above screenshot of another Daily Beast headline from an earlier story hit me hard; it just about sums up every airline assault story I’ve written about in the past year.
A final note
Regarding the case of American Airlines and the sexual assaults, harassment and rapes victims have reported happening while working there, I want to say again:
There may be one or two anonymous trolls out trying to masquerade as a wide-spread campaign to scare people off. Make your choice for you and your life.
These people (the trolls outside your workplace) can’t hurt you. They win if you let that fear-mongering be your reason for staying silent. The most persistent online trolls are often sitting at home with a box of chardonnay sending out vile threats and melodramatic warnings and pretending to be five different people.
As I’ve written before, of course there are true risks, especially if you still work for the airline; these are risks I and those who have never experienced your company or industry can fully understand. I will never minimize that.
But real consequences or not to be found in anonymous screeds online. I can tell you this from experience. My name, my face, my byline, my career—all of it is out there.
I know there are still victims who want to be heard.
Otherwise, The Landing wouldn’t exist at all.
Part 2, on NDAs and obstruction, coming soon.
*yep, Lisa Bloom, like all of us, has has made errors; she calls hers The Collosal Mistake. Do we know someone else here on Substack who got it wrong? (Hi, it’s me!). She has fought tirelessly for victims. No negative messages please. She speaks routinely about victims’ rights to CNN and BBC and network TV, yet she gave her time to The Landing, and I thank her for that.
Has anyone else been approached to settle?