#MeToobin trends on Twitter as CNN legal analyst enters the pantless pantheon, after ‘jerking off’ on Zoom call

CNN analyst and New Yorker writer Jeffrey Toobin is being slated online for masturbating during a Zoom call with colleagues. As #MeToobin trends on Twitter, Toobin enters the pantless pantheon of public figures caught in the act.

Jeffrey Toobin has been suspended from his job at the New Yorker magazine and been given leave from CNN, after exposing his genitals on a Zoom call with co-workers. According to Vice News, which broke the story on Monday, “Toobin was masturbating” during the teleconference, with his fellow journos saying they saw him “jerking off.”

“I thought I had muted the Zoom video,” the liberal pundit said in his defense, calling his work-call whack-off an “embarrassingly stupid mistake.” During the call, the tone could hardly be described as sexual. Participants were running a simulation of next month’s presidential election, with Toobin playing the role of the courts.

A day later, Toobin was still being roasted on Twitter. Under the hashtag #MeToobin, some commentators slammed his “creepy” behavior as textbook sexual harassment, while others joked at the naked New Yorker’s expense.

Even former NFL star and convicted felon O.J. Simpson joined in. “Damn Jeffrey Toobin,” he said in a video posted to Twitter. “At least Pee Wee Herman was in an X-rated movie theater,” referring to comedian Paul Reubens’ widely-publicized arrest for masturbating in an adult cinema in 1991.

Toobin is not a stranger to Simpson, and his account of the troubled running back’s murder trial, ‘The Run of his Life’ was adapted for television as the FX series ‘American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson’ in 2016.

Nearly a year into the coronavirus pandemic, the ways we work and interact with each other have changed. Zoom calls have replaced boardroom meetings, classrooms have gone virtual, and lockdowns have made dating an online game. What hasn’t changed, apparently, are the perverted pastimes of some of our public figures.

Just last month, an Argentinian MP resigned after he was caught sucking on a young woman’s breast during a virtual session of parliament. Several weeks beforehand, a government official in the Philippines was caught having sex with his secretary during a conference call. When he realized he had been seen, the official ducked out of the frame, put his trousers back on, and attempted to play off the incident. His colleagues were having none of it, and the official was soon booted from his job.

In Spain in April, journalist Alfonso Merlos landed himself in hot water when a bare-naked woman strolled into view as Merlos appeared live on a political YouTube show. Merlos’ jilted girlfriend called the incident “shameful,” and the Spanish media pounced on the titillating tale.

Unlike these unmuted miscreants, Toobin wasn’t caught with a partner, but alone in front of his computer screen. As the controversy swirled, some commentators wondered whether the disgraced journalist was pleasuring himself to something on another tab, or worse again, to his colleagues’ video feeds.

Politicians have landed themselves in trouble for less than Toobin too. Earlier this month, a British council official apologized after calling the mayor of Allerdale district a “daft cow,” evidently forgetting to press the mute button first. The councillor panicked when he realized his mistake, before asking the mayor to accept his apology.

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