Sexual Harassment: So Many Ways To View The Issue -- Comedy Tells US The Situation Is Important

Today the headlines.

Tonight the punch lines.

Just ask Elizabeth Taylor, Pee-Wee Herman, Teddy Kennedy, Donald Trump, Claus Von Bulow . . .

And lately, inevitably, Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. He could testify - it's a short hop from the front page of the newspaper to Johnny Carson's opening monologue.

Charges of sexual harassment by a former Thomas associate, law professor Anita Hill, have grabbed top billing in newspapers, the evening news, radio call-in programs.

The accusations. The denials.

"Maybe if they just went on with Chuck Woolery on `Love Connection' . . . and fought it out," Johnny Carson deadpanned the other night, when all three of nighttime TV's supremes jumped on Thomas' case.

The accusations. The denials. The rimshots.

"I dunno," said Arsenio Hall. "I guess it depends on how you interpret the words: `I'd like you to examine my briefs.' " And last night: "We don't want eight guys in robes and one in a raincoat."

"Late Night with David Letterman" weighed in with its Top 10 Clarence Thomas Pickup Lines.

No. 10: How about a little affirmative action?

"The larger point is, we've gotten a message through the culture that this is a big issue," noted Joseph Turow, a professor at the Annenberg School for Communications and an specialist in the way information moves in the media. Jokes by Letterman and Arsenio and Carson "reinforce that this is on the front burner of society."

Pickup Line No. 8: The other judges don't understand me.

Mull this: On a good evening - say when the guests include Loni Anderson and that guy from the Columbus Zoo - "The Tonight Show" attracts up to 35 million viewers. Letterman draws a comparatively puny 4.5 million viewers a night, but that's still more than the combined circulation of The New York Times and USA Today.

Sure, it's filled with lots of pretty colors and short sentences, like TV, but The Nation's Newspaper didn't give its readers Pickup Line No. 6: How about a peek at exhibits A and B?

"Maybe because I'm a woman I don't think a lot of those are particularly funny," said Katharine Heintz-Knowles, an assistant professor of communications at the University of Washington. "Because sexual harassment is not funny."

Fun facts: Of Carson's staff of eight writers, exactly none is a woman. "Late Night" has one woman writer.

Pickup Line No. 5: It is my opinion, based on existing statutes and established precedents, that you could be a model.

After a short laugh followed by a longer groan, Seattle public-opinion consultant Alex Edelstein noted: "Things sacrosanct during the day, when the sun dips below the horizon you can joke about them."

Thomas is by no means the first to be goofed upon by TV's court jesters. Remember the separated-at-birth cracks about Robert Bork and actor Victor Buono, who played King Tut on the old "Batman" series?

Pickup Line No. 2: That's not a gavel.

Now comes a soothsayer and sage from the East. No, not Carnac the Magnificent - rather, a Syracuse University professor who teaches courses in the history of TV "from Howdy Doody to the Simpsons."

"At least we're not seeing silly light bulb jokes, or why did the chicken cross the road," said Robert Thompson, co-author of a book to be published next spring on the creators of American television.

"While these shows don't deal with the subtleties of the confirmation process and Thomas' strengths and weaknesses, the next day at recess and around the water cooler if people are talking about that Top Ten List they're talking about an important political issue."

And . . . (drum roll) . . . The No. 1 Clarence Thomas Pickup Line: I find you guilty - of being a fabulous babe!

Several television and radio networks carried today's Thomas confirmation hearings. Presumably, the Jeffersonian ideal of an enlightened electorate will be advanced further on "Saturday Night Live."

"A lot of people have learned about the politics of George Bush . . . from Dana Carvey imitating him on that show," Thompson noted, "than from actually listening to the president speak."