^ This right up here.
He wasn’t chained to his desk. He was being creepy as fuck. Probably not the first time.
Such a shame, JT. You were one of the good’uns.
Pretty sure the investigations are merely a formality, meant to satisfy the inevitable court fights about Toobin’s guaranteed sackings. He will get fired for this, no if’s and’s, or nuts.
Haven’t bothered to read the article, but I’m just wondering how this actually happened? I hope it’s a case of the Zoom meeting ended but a few people stuck around for questions and Toobin didn’t realize he was still on. Not that it makes a difference who those who were treated to the free porn show, but it’s at least explicable. But 30 minutes into an hour-long meeting, and he decided that this was the perfect time to, ahem, whip up some controversy?
The New York Times article says that he was on a second Zoom call that was “the video equivalent of phone sex.” So he wasn’t masturbating just because he suddenly got the urge, but because he was videoing with a partner of some kind. He didn’t realize that he was visible to the participants in the first call. (As has been mentioned, if he were merely masturbating he would have been doing it below the desk and it wouldn’t have been visible. He evidently deliberately showed the other person what he was doing.)
The main take home message: Don’t try to mix business and pleasure.
Toobin’, on a Zoomin’ interlude;
Wankin’. . . hope it doesn’t seem too rude 
Yeah, and why are you phone sexing in the middle of a work call? Again, its not because you’re “bored”, it’s a fucking assertion of power.
JT is having an epically bad day – losing his job, his marriage, and probably his home.
Agreed. And it’s not just him either. Everywhere it’s discussed I see men saying “It’s an easy mistake to make.” and telling stories about all the accidental nudity anecdotes they have heard since Zoom became the conference room.
I’m so not playing with this. If men are under the impression that it’s fine to masturbate while talking to colleagues as long as you don’t get caught? We’ve got along d*** way to go as a society.
Young rascal!
Accidental nudity is something else though. I’m somewhat careful but I can totally imagine this happening to me: my wife’s WFH office is a desk in our bedroom and I could totally walk into a videoconference frame from the bathroom if I wasn’t paying attention. She tends to have a lot of early morning (i.e. the time I take a shower) meetings too. That said, she doesn’t use video that often and I’m somewhat careful these days.
The masturbation thing is something else. I totally agree that it’s hugely disrespectful even if meant to be off camera.
I’m torn about the name of a new franchise outfit. I’m thinking something along the lines of:
“Toobin Lube” or
“Lube ‘n’ Toob”
It’s an oil change joint, naturally, but the employees are … uh … otherwise engaged when you get there.
Also … FWIW … I noticed that the replies on this thread have been coming in rather slowly. It’s almost as if y’all are typing with just one hand or something …
“Tubin’ & Lub’n” - we do basic maintenance on autos.
Well he needs to cover his webcam lense with electrical tape like I do.
This helpful Lifehacker article was unfortunately just a couple days late for Toobin to benefit from:
Taking the schlonger perspective, I think the penalty is too stiff. You can wax on and off, philosophically, without getting to the meat of the issue - It is unacceptable to engage in these shenanigans at work. And it is also surprising. Since this isn’t Fox News.
Still, did this need to be sprayed over every major newspaper? No. So who’s being the bigger man here? This problem could have been treated more gently by the New Yorker, handled delicately, but they chose to release the story - disseminating it all over the place. Such a rigid approach doesn’t make anybody look like they are in charge. By and large, it is hard to know what they were thinking.
Who would go on a video call with that degree of freeballing?
It seems like from the Vice article that the other coworkers left to go into breakout rooms and Toobin was in the main video call by himself for 10 mins. It was when the coworkers came back from the breakout rooms did they see what Toobin was doing on his… other call.
New York Yanker. It wasn’t a circle jerk (AFAIK).
I could make my point more compactly. But to cut to the bone, I’d really need to doodle a Venn diagram…
Sometimes people have sex at work. At least in an actual office one can close and lock the door.
I’ve it called ‘the boys’ before. Not much of a stretch to calling them ‘action figures’, as in “gonna git me a little action”.
I’m thinking that what he really gets off on is the danger of being exposed. /i /s.