Depends on the act, and the accused, I guess. I'm sure similar things happened in the 1980s - I was a kid who didn't pay much attention to that kind of thing back then.

But there were plenty of scandals of a lesser nature that would ruin people, with even a hint of impropriety. Again - it depended on the act, the person(s) involved, and perhaps the way our society's wind was blowing (as always).

I can guarantee you, though, that some of things we currently witness on a daily basis would have absolutely destroyed people, careers, brands, you name it - even just 10 years ago, yet today it's just "oh, that's nice - let's see what happens tomorrow" - yesterday's scandal already forgotten.

Again - it does depend on the act and the person; you can think about many recent people who have "been in the news" for similar accusations, if not all-but-proved acts, and wonder "Why this guy, and not this other one?"

For some reason, we skewer only a selected few, and in many cases, not the ones who really need and deserve it, either.

I don't know - maybe? Admittedly, I was just getting out of diapers at the tail end of the 80s. Perhaps this kind of thing revolves around the onset of new communication mediums and the general adoption and ease of use.

Newspapers, easy to read, hard to publish - "trusted" source. Printing press and/or other technologies aid printing and trust drops. Radio, TV, internet follow.