I wrote a piece a few days ago about the problem, as I see it, with Donald Trump’s “grab them by the pussy” comment. In it, I shared a personal incident from my past where I was grabbed by the pussy, without my consent. I find the incident shameful. Not because it happened. That wasn’t my fault. But I feel ashamed that I didn’t say anything. I feel disappointed in myself.
That’s my problem. I don’t blame that on anyone else. Those are my own feelings and I can work through them.
I’m lucky that way. A lot of women can’t. A lot of women had far worse things happen to them and it’s incredibly difficult to work through all of the really tough emotions that emerge because of that.
But really, that’s what my piece was about. It was about a specific phrase, used by a specific person, that I felt connected well with something from my own past. I shared it in the hopes of raising awareness about how that particular phrase, and others like it, are harmful. They’re dangerous. And they perpetuate rape culture.
If your response to that is any of the following* . . .
* “How many millions of women bought 50 Shades of Gray? And now they’re upset about some dirty talk?”
* “But Bill Clinton! And Hillary is a rape apologist! And he’s a rapist! And Bill! Bill!! BILL!!”
* “Trump was obviously speaking in hyperbole.”
* “No one has accused Trump of rape or sexual assault. His only crime is that he offends the senses and he is not a nice guy.”
* “Miley Cyrus, Beyonce, Rhianna, Kim Kardashian, they can trash Trump for what he said 11 years ago but their vulgar stage behavior in front of children is ok?”
* “Tell me again how supporting a rape apologist makes you think you can be an advocate for women.”
. . . then you are a glaring part of the problem. And you sound like a creep.
So if I write about one instance, a glaring example of how people perpetuate rape culture and the fallout it can produce, I have to write about every. single. one?
If I write about something Trump says, then it means I want you to vote for Hillary?
If I write that I think Trump is a sick piece of shit, that means I am voting for Hillary?
If I write about anything to do with Trump, you can assume you know everything about me including who I am voting for and what I feel about all of the other candidates? (You do know there are four in total, right?)
Let’s forget politics. Please.
If I write about one rape apologist, I have to write about all of them?
If I write about one piece of shit accused rapist, I have to write about all of them?
Got it.
Thanks for reminding me. I’ve been so busy writing ever since because of all the people like you taking the time out to remind me that I am now tasked with writing about EVERY instance of rape, assault, battery, harassment, abuse, rape apologist, etc. So busy, in fact, that there is literally no hope of my ever accomplishing anything else in my lifetime.
And I’ll still never finish.
Or, I don’t know, here’s a thought.
Maybe just read my piece and accept it for what it is. Me, sharing a very scary, intimate, shameful incident from my life in an effort to illustrate to those who don’t get it (I’m looking right at *you* now) how his language, and what he said, is dangerous. It was an attempt to explain to those who wondered “what’s the big deal” about what he said, *exactly what the very big fucking deal is.*
If you don’t understand why what he said is NOT what men typically talk about behind closed doors, that piece was for you.
If you think that bragging about sexual assault and battery is the same thing as *dirty talk*, that piece was for you.
If you’ve turned a blind eye to all the times Trump has been accused of harassment, assault, and rape because you don’t want to admit you don’t really give a shit and support him anyway, that piece was for you.
If you seriously think that a woman performing for an audience that paid for the right to see her perform, of her own free will, in skimpy clothes, is the same thing as a man saying that he has the right to grab a woman by her pussy without her consent, that piece was for you.
If you think that by pointing out what he said as wrong and drawing a correlation between what he said and how women often find themselves victims of the very type of battery he described, that I somehow have turned a blind eye to all the other rapists and abusers in the world, that piece was for you.
Nowhere in that piece did I tell anyone who to vote for instead of him. Nowhere did I mention who I’m voting for. Nowhere did I defend Hillary or Bill Clinton.
But hey, thanks for reminding me why I wrote it and for whom.
Just so there’s no further misunderstanding . . .
It was for you. Because you are a big part of the problem.
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*A small sampling of actual responses I received here and elsewhere to my writing.
allison writes 