Hi, men. I bet a bunch of you are really uncomfortable today. Maybe for you, the fact that things like this happen all the time might be news. Maybe, looking back, you might have been around for them and didn't know, or maybe you knew something was off and didn't do anything.
Maybe you're having trouble articulating those feelings. Maybe you're friends with, or involved with, women who are extremely angry and hurting and triggered. Maybe they have shared their experiences of sexual assault and the threat of it with you, maybe they haven't.
Maybe you're having to rethink things your friends said, years ago. Cast them in a different light. Jokes you heard. Jokes you told. Maybe for you they were jokes. Maybe it was so outside your realm of experience and the universe of your imaginings. Okay. I accept that.
Maybe you're wishing you could go back in time and ask her more questions when you saw the light in a friend's eyes go out and didn't know why. Tell the guys to shut up. Get her out of there. Be braver than your half-formed fears of being cast out, of becoming a target yourself.
You can't go back. Whatever you're castigating yourself for today, face it. Sit with it. And then give yourself compassion. None of us gets out of this toxic culture without some poison in our veins. You couldn't have been Batman.
But you can be better now. You can start today.
But you can be better now. You can start today.
You can stop arguing with women about their experiences in the world. Practice saying "I'm so sorry that happened to you, is there something I can do to help right now, do you need a distraction, do you need an ear, do you need some care?" In the mirror if you have to.
You can read a lot of feminist scholarship. You can force your way through the muffling layers you were wrapped in when you were too young to fight back.
I am not saying this is easy. I am saying it is necessary.
I am not saying this is easy. I am saying it is necessary.
And maybe you are also a survivor, trapped in a vortex of fear and shame, and days like this are so very, very difficult. I see you. I love you. My arms are open.
Days like this are so very, very difficult. We only get a better world if we make one.
That is all.
Days like this are so very, very difficult. We only get a better world if we make one.
That is all.
