I Believe Her

Much has happened this week and it’s difficult to find the words to articulate the sinking feeling I get when thinking about the Brett Kavanaugh nomination. “Entitled men have a remarkable ability to be oblivious to the damage they inflict,” New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote in his column this week.

I recently re-read 1984, which contains many parallels to the current frenzy of fake news. One section, about the 1984 world’s use of doublethink, says, “To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of reality which one denies–all this is indispensably necessary [for doublethink to work].”

Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter to the GOP whether or not he sexually assaulted Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. We’re living in a post-truth era.

I arrived at college with mace. I didn’t drink for the first month from a paralyzing fear of being taken advantage of. I still don’t take shortcuts or put in earbuds when I walk home at night, and cross the street when a male student follows a few feet behind. When I go on dates, I share my location with friends and have to just trust this stranger I’ve agreed to hang out with. These routines, almost daily, that I and most women have to keep up to stay “safe”, are exhausting.

One of the many messages young women are receiving right now is that women’s experiences shouldn’t be believed, but that also men shouldn’t be held accountable for “poor decisions” made when they were young. I am still in college, and my time in high school wasn’t that long ago. The person I am now and the boys I surround myself with are at this same 1982 stage in our lives. I certainly do not believe that the men in my life are incapable of making rational, and respectful decisions. To say that they are incapable is an insult to them, to me, and to my bodily autonomy.

I believe Dr. Blasey Ford. I empathize and have had too many friends who’ve taken these precautions, and still ended up in her situation, not to take her seriously. Believing women doesn’t mean that women never lie, that false accusations aren’t possible, or that “all men” are violent. Believing women means that we recognize an imbalance of experiences and are committed to uncovering the truth.

And let us be reminded: this is not a criminal trial, but a job interview. Regardless of whether Kavanaugh actually assaulted Dr. Blasey Ford, he has lied under oath for plenty of other reasons–about his knowledge of certain documents during the Bush administration, about his drinking habits, about the legal drinking age when he was in high school, etc. Do we want a Supreme Court Justice who can’t be honest and own up to varying behaviors in his past, and not just including the sexual assault? I definitely do not.

I feel lucky that the boys and men in my life, be them my dad, my relatives, my past boyfriends, my friends, or those I’ve known fleetingly, have been and are gentle, kind, and loving. They recognize that their masculinity is not dependent upon dominance or power or aggression, but on respect and empathy.    

But I also recognize that my trust is not absolute. Anyone can have a dark side, and the women who’ve come out to publicly support Kavanaugh’s character may have no idea what he is or was capable of.      

I’ve also been thinking about my nine-year-old brother lately, too, and whether we’ve told him “no” enough as the youngest boy in the family, or if he’s kind to the girls at school. In elementary school I was a passionate pre-feminist when the boys told me I couldn’t do something as well as they could. I wonder if my brother is one of those boys. None of this is to say that any of that behavior is an indication of what he’ll be like as a teenager or an adult. Rather, I worry if he’ll be an ally to those who weren’t born into the same circumstances as him, always one step ahead.

Ultimately, if I were in a similar position to Dr. Blasey Ford, I’m not sure I’d have the strength to put my life and my family in danger, to be diminished to my trauma, or have my life be damagingly ripped apart. I commend her. I believe her.

So get over the politics. Recognize a man who’s never been told “no” when you see him. And believe women not because you have a mother or a wife or a daughter, but because you are also human.