Thigh-High Politics is an Op-Ed column by Teen Vogue writer Lauren Duca that breaks down the news, provides resources for the resistance, and just generally refuses to accept toxic nonsense.

On Monday, November 20, Vox published an exclusive report detailing a history of alleged sexual harassment by New York Times White House correspondent Glenn Thrush, who has since been suspended by the paper, pending an investigation. The piece — written by Laura McGann, who shared her own allegations against Thrush — emphasizes the impact of such behavior coming from an influential industry figure and the way it affected her professional ambitions and those of other female journalists.

I would encourage you to read the piece in its entirety, but one passage in particular stands out.

“Gradually, things in the office started to change for me,” McGann writes, reflecting on the period following an allegedly uncomfortable experience with Thrush. “Certain men in the newsroom, I thought, started to look at me differently. Some of their comments seemed a bit too familiar or were outright offensive. I had a nagging sense that I just wasn’t as respected as I used to be.”

“I started to think maybe I shouldn’t be in journalism if I couldn’t hang in a tough newsroom,” she continues. “I found myself on edge, nervous and anxious all the time. I started to believe I had brought this all on myself.”

As a result of Thrush’s alleged actions, McGann became concerned that she might not be able to fully pursue her career path. I shudder to think of all the women who instead became convinced this was true.

Here lies an unspoken tragedy of the #MeToo movement: the way the sheer force of harassment affects its victims, whether or not they come forward about their experiences. Left invisible are the countless number of people who have been shamed out of their industries after they were harassed or assaulted. There is much hand-wringing about the loss of talent represented by the downfall of such cultural juggernauts as Harvey Weinstein, Mark Halperin, Kevin Spacey, and Louis C.K. But we will never be able to quantify the number of victims who might have gone on to greatness if only their potential hadn’t been kneecapped by fear.

It is significant that many of the people who have been accused of predatory behavior are storytellers. Across TV and film, government, and the news, their perspectives have guided and directed our collective understanding of the world. (Of course, this raises the question: Is there an industry left that isn’t hard for women and other minorities? The problem isn’t job-specific — it's embedded in society itself.) But in looking at the #MeToo movement as a loss of perspectives, we should be most concerned with the legion of people — more often than not women — who have been silenced in more ways than the obvious. This is true for each of the people who have come forward and the countless more who have not.

In our national dialogue on sexual harassment and assault at the workplace, there is a current of paranoia. On the right, pundits have begun trotting out the so-called Pence rule — as in, Vice President Mike Pence doesn't eat alone with women, aside from his wife, and doesn't attend functions without her where alcohol may be served. To be clear, if you are a man who believes simply being in an unsupervised setting with a female colleague presents a danger, than you aren't fixing the problem; you're part of it. Advocating for the Pence rule is an extremist view, but even those who take a less paranoid tack seem excessively concerned about what is considered acceptable in a professional setting.