Aziz Ansari actually talked about the sexual misconduct allegation against him like an adult

It wasn’t perfect, but his new standup act offered a pretty good example of what to say when you’re accused.

Earlier this week, Aziz Ansari directly addressed the sexual misconduct allegation against him for the first time since issuing a brief statement last year. And he did it in his standup act.

“There were times I felt really upset and humiliated and embarrassed, and ultimately I just felt terrible this person felt this way,” Ansari said at a “pop-up” show in New York on Monday night, according to Vulture’s Jesse David Fox. “But you know, after a year, how I feel about it is, I hope it was a step forward.”

Ansari was talking about the allegation, published on the website Babe.net, that he had pressured a woman to have sex with him while they were on a date. “I believe that I was taken advantage of by Aziz,” the woman told Babe reporter Katie Way. “It was by far the worst experience with a man I’ve ever had.”

After the allegation became public, Ansari’s comedy seemed to take a reactionary turn, as he complained about liberals on Twitter playing “Progressive Candy Crush.” But on Monday, he spoke thoughtfully about the accusation against him and what he’d learned from the experience. It wasn’t a full public apology, but it was far more than most powerful people have offered when accused of sexual misconduct as part of the #MeToo movement. And Ansari’s words provided a model — even if it was an imperfect one — for people who want to reckon with similar allegations against them.

Ansari’s appearance Monday was a departure from his other post-#MeToo material

In January 2018, Babe.net published a story about a woman identified by the pseudonym Grace, who said that Ansari had repeatedly missed or ignored her signals that she didn’t want to have sex with him during a date that ended at his apartment. At one point, she said she told Ansari, “I don’t want to feel forced because then I’ll hate you, and I’d rather not hate you.” According to Grace, he then invited her to “chill” on the couch — but then pointed to his penis and motioned for her to perform oral sex. She ultimately left and, she said, “cried the whole ride home.”

In a statement issued after the story was published, Ansari said that everything he and Grace had engaged in “by all indications was completely consensual.” When she told him afterward that she’d been uncomfortable, he wrote, “I was surprised and concerned. I took her words to heart and responded privately after taking the time to process what she had said.”

The allegation against Ansari has been one of the most controversial of the #MeToo movement, with some arguing that the comedian has been unfairly lumped in with men accused of multiple sexual assaults, and others saying Grace’s experience is worthy of discussion, even if it’s different from what women have said they went through at the hands of, for example, producer Harvey Weinstein.

Though Ansari struck a somewhat contrite tone in his 2018 statement, some of his standup after the allegations came to light seemed to point to deep-seated anger.

He complained in one appearance about Twitter users debating cultural appropriation, according to Eren Orbey of the New Yorker.

“Everyone weighs in on everything,” he said. “They don’t know anything. People don’t wanna just say, ‘I don’t know.’”

He also likened left-wing Twitter users to Trump supporters, and accused them of playing a competitive game of “Progressive Candy Crush.” Overall, Orbey wrote, “like other men who have reëmerged in recent months, he seems to have channelled his experience into a diffuse bitterness.”

His material on Monday, at least according to Fox, struck a very different note. He admitted that the allegation against him was “a terrifying thing to talk about.” However, he said, “It made me think about a lot, and I hope I’ve become a better person.”

Ansari said a friend told him that hearing the allegation made him rethink his own dating history, and said, “If that has made not just me but other guys think about this, and just be more thoughtful and aware and willing to go that extra mile, and make sure someone else is comfortable in that moment, that’s a good thing.”

And, he added, the experience made him grateful for his career. “There was a moment,” he said, “where I was scared that I’d never be able to do this again.”

It wasn’t perfect, but Ansari’s appearance on Monday started a conversation

The statement wasn’t an apology — and by saying he “felt terrible this person felt this way,” Ansari didn’t exactly accept blame. As many have pointed out, it’s odd to frame men’s efforts to avoid sexual coercion as going “that extra mile.” And Ansari’s comments focused largely on the experience’s effects on him, not its impact on Grace.

Still, Ansari showed he was willing to discuss the accusation against him, without complaining about internet outrage or critics on Twitter. He was willing to think about what he and other men could learn from it. And, crucially, the entire experience made him aware that his career in comedy is a valuable, coveted privilege, not a birthright.

At this point in the #MeToo movement, we’ve seen many powerful men and their supporters discuss comebacks with the expectation that the accused are owed forgiveness and a return to their former positions, often before they’ve made much of an effort to atone. So it was meaningful for Ansari to acknowledge that he was not, in fact, entitled to his career as a celebrity, and that he was thankful to his audience for continuing to make it possible.

I was one of those who saw the allegations against Ansari as an important part of the growing public conversation around sex, power, and consent, and I believe it’s possible to take Grace’s story seriously while acknowledging the ways it differs from women’s stories about Weinstein. Because of my writing on Ansari and others, I’m often asked — on Twitter, over email, and by friends — what would constitute a satisfying response by a man to allegations of sexual misconduct.

I often point to Community creator Dan Harmon’s apology to Megan Ganz, a writer he acknowledges he harassed when she worked on his show.

“I did it by not thinking about it,” Harmon said of the harassment, in an episode of his podcast Harmontown. “And I got away with it by not thinking about it.”

Now, I’ll point to Ansari’s latest material — not as a perfect apology (or even as an apology, exactly), but as an example of a man clearly facing what he’s been accused of and speaking about it frankly with his friends and fans.

As Fox notes, Ansari is soon embarking on an international tour, during which he’ll use material he’s been trying out in recent appearances. So his statement on Monday may be the beginning, not the end, of his reckoning in public. And for other people who have been accused as part of #MeToo, perhaps it can also be a beginning — the start of a larger conversation about what real growth and atonement, not just a return to business as usual, might look like.

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