Two years ago, Harvey Weinstein was very sorry. He came of age in a different time, he said in a rambling statement after more than 80 women came forward to accuse him of sexual harassment and assault. He realized he needed to be a better person. He quoted Jay-Z: “I am not the man I thought I was and I better be that man for my children.” He could not be more remorseful to the people he hurt, he wrote, and he planned “to do right by all of them”.

That was then.

On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that Weinstein is nearing a settlement deal with the more than 30 women who say he harassed, assaulted or raped them. As part of the settlement, he won’t have to admit wrongdoing. He also won’t have to spend any of his own money – his production company’s insurance plans will shoulder the $25m payout. And Weinstein himself will benefit from the deal, securing about $12m to cover legal fees incurred by him, his brother and his company’s board.

There’s no shame for the women here taking the settlement – it might be the best deal they can get. But it does speak to just how cheap words can be. Weinstein attempted a major public rehabilitation campaign, of which apology and accountability was front and center. Now that it’s time to put something of value behind his words – the cold, hard cash he made while systematically exploiting and torpedoing the careers of many of the actors who are now suing him – he’s unwilling to show remorse. Even words now seem to be too costly: part of the deal is that he won’t even admit fault.

This shouldn’t be surprising, but it is yet another example of how impotent our system is at dealing with the kind of systematic sexual wrongdoing that brought about the #MeToo movement. The acts of harassment and assault that too many women face are often done in private, leaving insufficient evidence for a criminal case. Taking up the matter in civil court through a lawsuit, as Weinstein is facing, gives victims more latitude, but happens within an adversarial system full of bad incentives and inadequate remedies.

It would be a truly radical and transformational move for Weinstein to disregard his lawyers and decide it’s time to do the right thing: admit fault, apologize sincerely and individually, and use every last cent he has to make amends and pay back the women who accuse him of wrongdoing. That would be a move quite outside of our usual chess game of criminal punishment, legal liability and public relations, and one that any lawyer would surely advise against. But it would still be the right one.

Human beings naturally crave justice, and around the world, we have cobbled together countless systems to get it (and of widely varying success, morality and humanity). These are necessary, and the ideals underpinning the American criminal and civil systems are beacons the world over – even if, in practice, justice is far less blind than we claim it is. A functional justice system has to work for the masses. But that also means that it’s often going to be found lacking in individual cases.

It would be a truly radical and transformational move for Weinstein to disregard his lawyers and decide it’s time to do the right thing

Every survivor of sexual violence has to decide for themselves how to traverse the impossible landscape in front of them. We talk less, though, about what sexual assailants should do, short of facing down the long arm of the criminal law. This Weinstein deal provides an opportunity.

The overwhelming majority of men who physically assault women will never spend a day in jail. Most will not pay out money in a lawsuit. There are a few men – a drop in the bucket of men who have assaulted and harassed women – who have been publicly shamed for their actions. And yet we have spent more time worrying about whether #MeToo has gone too far and about how long those men have to sit on the sidelines before they can return to their previously vaunted careers than we have asking what accountability would look like.

I’m not sure what the answer to that is – and in any case, it’s a question for victims, not internet pontificators. But I do know this: any true form of justice and accountability must include the taking of responsibility, both rhetorically and practically. We need men like Weinstein to offer more than tepid “I’m trying to be a better man” statements; we need to see that work in action. Sometimes that might mean money. Sometimes it might mean service. Sometimes it might mean fading into irrelevance and obscurity. It means, at the very minimum, an honest accounting for what one has done.

That Weinstein cannot even offer that – that after all of this, after his name becoming nearly synonymous with the #MeToo movement, he still uses his legal team to angle for no admission of fault – tells us that he does not take responsibility publicly or privately. It tells us there has been no evolution and that he is not the “better man” he claimed to be molding himself into. That this is the result of perhaps the highest-profile #MeToo case, involving several household-name celebrities, dozens of accusations and a man who is now known the world over as an accused sexual predator, and still the best deal his victims can get is one in which none of them gets so much as a full apology, well – the only lesson here is that #MeToo hasn’t gone far enough.