9/28/2018 2 Comments Why do we wait so long? Here's whyAbout a year ago, the #metoo movement flooded all of our media channels, especially the social ones. Women from all walks of life, race, creed, sexual orientation, etc. came out of the woodworks to share their stories or merely a post a hashtag so their other “sisters” would know they weren’t alone in this world. Stories ranged from being made to feel uncomfortable to full blown violent crimes.
Me being me, I made a joke to a friend about the movement (because that’s what I do, I’m inappropriate)... I said “I’m debating on jumping on the #metoo bandwagon but I think I’m guilty of my own inappropriate advances so is that really fair? (I mean, Jesus Christ, my whole blog is about inappropriate behavior). Instead of sharing my #metoo moment, I said “remember how I grabbed that dude’s junk on the cruise we took?” She reminded me that I’d actually asked him for permission so it wasn’t really assault and that he liked it, right? About a week later, I went for a girls’ weekend with my favorite bitches and #metoo came up over cocktails. One of them said “I’m not saying I don’t believe them but why would they wait so long to say something, I mean come on, some of these stories are like over 20 years old” Fast forward to today….. For those living under a rock, today was the confirmation hearing (or hopefully the hearing that confirmed he wouldn’t be confirmed) for Brett Kavanagh for the Supreme Court. A large majority of the entire US population doesn’t feel he’s a good fit (Yes, I’m putting it nicely.) Aside from a number of shady business dealings (that no one seems to be mentioning) he’s also accused of sexually assaulting multiple women but one in particular has decided to speak up, Dr. Christine Ford. Her testimony of the assault on her by Kavanagh some 30 years ago was part of the hearing. All sorts of debates have been on my Facebook feed and with each one I found myself getting more and more irritated and angry. My Cowboy (you’ll learn about him another time and his awesomeness will definitely not get its due credit in this blog), patiently waited for me to finish my scrolling. He listened to me rant about the various things in my “feed” regarding the day’s events. I finally put my phone down after my final “engagement” with a someone who said “I have so many more reasons that I respect Trump but I’m too tired to list them and I need to go take care of my low blood sugar” (which she can probably only afford to do because of the Affordable Health Care Act, but I won’t get into that). After a deep shy over the state of the world, I turned to my relatively conservative Cowboy and said “so what do you think of all of this Kavanagh/Dr. Ford thing?” in my ever so slightly feminist but very liberal voice. He gently said “I’m not saying I don’t believe her but I’m just trying to understand why someone wouldn’t say something sooner, why do people wait so long to say something.” I flashed back to that moment a year ago when my friend said the same thing and of course in my own special way, I told him exactly why women don’t say anything. We feel ashamed - we feel guilty - we believe it was our fault - we’re afraid no one will believe us and sometimes in the moment, we don’t actually even know it’s wrong. This blog is for those of you that are judging Dr. Ford or just flat out being ignorant about the whole topic of women being sexually assaulted and not reporting it. I’m hoping that by actually hearing a story from a non-celebrity, real person, that's not trying to “take down’s a man’s career”, but from a woman you actually know, that maybe you’ll listen to understand and potentially improve upon your empathy skills. Because after some of the posts I see from friends, there's a lot of folks that need to work on their empathy skills . Here’s my story…. which up until last year, I'd never told anyone. At age 16, I was a receptionist at a car dealership after school. While working there, a guy (somewhere in his later 40's) started flirting with me. I didn’t even realize that’s what it was because I was only 16 at the time and I was relatively oblivious and naive to the obvious sometimes (hard to believe, right?). This went on for several weeks. I found myself kind of drawn to him and then he’d start hanging around the desk more and more often. He then started asking more personal questions about me and my boyfriend and what type of “experience” I had and if my boyfriend and I had “done it” yet - totally inappropriate questions. I don’t remember all of the details, (because it was 25/26 years ago and let’s face it, sometimes you don’t want to remember when you feel like an idiot asshole) but I’d agreed to stop off somewhere and talk to him on our way to our respective homes. It was probably close to 9:30p/10pm at night. I followed him to a park and ride lot and then got into his car. I don’t even really remember what was said but at one point, he somewhat forcefully kissed me and put my hand on his pretty hard cock and started to put his hand up my skirt. When he whipped out his Johnson, I had that come to Jesus “WHAT THE FUCK am I doing here” moment. I knew this was a bad idea and I needed to go home. He was irritated, said something to the effect of “what did I think we were there for” (The truth is, at the time, I had no fucking clue why I agreed to go to the parking lot with that guy but in hindsight, I’m fairly certain I was there due to some deep rooted issue about needing unconditional love, low self-esteem bullshit or something stupid like that but that’s another fucking story) But at 16, my excuse to leave was that I didn’t want to cheat on my boyfriend. He blew it off like it was no big deal and then I got the hell out of his car and drove home. It wasn’t until I relayed that story to my bitches that fall weekend last year, during our #metoo talk, that I realized how truly fucked up the situation was. No, I wasn’t raped and I even went there willingly, but a 40 something year old guy (old enough to be my dad at the time) kissed me, groped me and put my hand on his fucking dick in a parked car in the middle of the night. I was 16. He was in his 40s. It was fucked up. Now back to today. I get that Dr. Ford and Kavanaugh were the same age and they have some different circumstances but the moral of the story is the same. We wait 25/30 years to come forward because we’re embarrassed, we’re ashamed, we think we deserved it, we’re afraid no one would believe us, we feel guilty and we're afraid people will judge us. Society has taught women to feel like they are “less.” We may not have been raised by our families this way (or maybe some unfortunately have) but women are not treated equally so why would we risk “outing” ourselves with a sexual assault or misconduct against us if we’re only going to be judged for it or not even believed? To the women who have had the courage to speak up right away, I admire you and thank you for hopefully saving the girl that would have come after you if you had not come forward. To the women who spoke up and weren’t believed or it was brushed under the carpet, I mourn for you and know that you are loved and it's not your fault. To all the ignorant folks out there that are pretty quick to dismiss the word of the women who have had the courage to speak up and who justify the constant misogynistic actions of this administration, you know women who have been abused and assaulted. You know them, you probably even love them. They are your friends, family, and acquaintances. You know them. Does that change your mind on posting your ridiculous, ignorant, uneducated comments? You know them. They were just too embarrassed to tell you or WORSE, they did tell you and you didn’t believe them. Statistically, your daughter, wife, sister, mother, or friend is probably going to be a victim. Will you believe them when they tell you? Will you judge them if they wait years to come forward? Did your daughter deserve it because she got drunk at a high school party? Did your sister ask for it because she wore a provocative top? Was your wife in the wrong place at the wrong time? What will you say to them when they have the courage to tell you? I certainly hope you don’t treat them the way other women who have found the courage to come forward are being treated. Maybe, just maybe, try to think about that before you open your mouth and comment, sound good? Until next time my friends
2 Comments
10/20/2022 12:52:13 pm
Decade service specific east put anyone democratic. Other worry politics. Behavior say consumer only most serious.
Reply
10/31/2022 05:07:41 am
Discover reality recent various situation. Discuss claim marriage field thousand war.
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
September 2017
Categories |