• About
  • Contact Me
  • Legal Stuff

From Hip to Housewife

...in two kids flat.

Follow Me:

Facebook Twitter RSS Pinterest Instagram
  • Family
  • Travel
  • Rants
  • Parenting
  • NY Theatre
  • Reviews
  • Tech

#Me too? #Well Duh.

Oct 20 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

canva-justice-right-case-law-court-lady-justice-scalesmallWhen, in the shadow of the Harvey Weinstein furor, the #MeToo hashtag started taking over my social media feeds last year, my first thought was #WellDuh. I’ve got a million #MeToo stories. The high school basketball star who tried to stick my hand down his pants, the college boys who thought I owed them, the editor who threatened me and called me a c-nt when I refused a date, the flashers and gropers, and catcallers. #MeToo? Of course. I don’t think I know a single woman who isn’t a “Me Too.” Even women who say they’ve never been subjected to any harassment or discrimination probably have been.We’ve just become so inured to it that we don’t even think of it as abuse. Boys will be boys. Men will be asses.

In the aftermath of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s credible allegations of sexual assault against Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh, there’s a new hashtag: #whyIdidn’treport. And I’m thinking #wellDuh all over again. We don’t report because we don’t think we’ll be believed. We don’t report because we worry about our jobs, or seeming like a trouble maker. We want, like Dr. Ford, to be helpful, even in the face of the most devastating events of our lives. We want to erase it. We want it not to be true.

We don’t report for a lot of reasons. About a dozen years ago, I went to a new hairdresser. It wasn’t just raining that day, it was torrential. So it was just the two of us in his small salon. He talked about his wife, how she was pregnant and on bedrest. He was exhausted, he said. And sex deprived. We chuckled. And then it happened, on the pretense of checking my foils to see if my color was done, he leaned in, stuck his tongue down my throat and his hands down the front of my robe, grabbing my breasts under my bra.

Did I scream? No. Did I yell? No. I pulled back and said “Please don’t do that. Please don’t do that.” quietly, quickly and repeatedly. I was horrified. I was terrified. I was alone with a stranger wearing nothing but a robe on my body and foils on my head. I was shocked, paralyzed. Was it the chuckle that made him think that was OK? Was it something I did? Something I said? He tried twice more to grope me during that visit, and as soon as my color was done, I left, wet head and all, mumbling something about how the rain would ruin my hair anyway.

I was almost as shocked by what he did as I was by my (non)reaction to it. I had always thought of myself as a woman who would fight back. I was tough, I thought. But when he grabbed me I froze. I felt guilty and ashamed. I didn’t do a damn thing. This wasn’t a guy with any power over me. This wasn’t a guy with the ability to destroy my career or my reputation. He was a hairdresser. But I said nothing. Worse, I said “please.” Please don’t assault me? Jeez.

In the years since, I’ve discovered that he does it to everyone. I’ve heard about 70 year old women he’s groped, and 20 year old girls. Once, when I asked a friend who did her hair, she said his name. Something in my face must have given me away. “What’s the matter?” she asked with a smirk. “Did he grab your tits or something?” Everybody knew. Everybody who’d been to him, it seemed, had been groped. No big deal, evidently. None of us said anything. No one went to the police. He is still in business, so it seems no one ever has.

Oh, not that I hid it away and didn’t talk about. I talked about it all the time. Right after it happened, I went home and told my husband, presenting it less as an assault and more as a “you’re not gonna believe this” story. As if I were telling him that the hairdresser cut my hair while wearing a clown suit. “Isn’t that crazy?” Ha Ha Ha. I can’t count the number of times I’ve trotted out the story at cocktail parties and girls’ nights out. I’ve honed the tale to perfection: I set the scene (rain, pregnant wife); I build up the suspense (he leans in); I drop the bombshell of the attack as if it were a punchline. I’ve shared the ribald tale with every hairdresser I’ve ever had. It always gets a big response from them. “NO!” they say, titillated and shocked. “Yes!” I reply, with a smug knowledge that I’ve shocked and titillated them. Instead of reporting it, I turned my story of sexual assault into an amusing little tidbit.

What the hell have I been doing? Why didn’t I report?

This week, watching Professor Christine Blasey Ford talk about her own long-ago attack, I finally fully understood #whyIdidn’treport. I minimized my experience to protect myself. By turning my attack into a pithy anecdote, I diluted its horror. I wasn’t a victim, I was a funny raconteuse! In my telling, there was no harm, no foul. Only it was harmful, and demeaning, and most definitely foul. In minimizing my experience, I also minimized the truth of what happened: I was attacked by a strange man, and it was terrifying. Twelve years later, I can still remember the sour taste of his disgusting tongue.

I understand how Harvey Weinstein, and Donald Trump, and Roger Ailes, and Les Moonves, and Bill Cosby, and Bill Clinton, and Bill O’Reilly, and so many more less famous, but no less foul men get or got away with harassing — and in some cases raping — women for so long. If it was hard for me to call out my hairdresser, I can’t imagine how hard it must be to call out the most powerful man in your industry…or in the world.

I understand why Dr. Blasey Ford did not want to think of herself as a victim,to spend her remaining years in High School as “that girl who was almost raped.” She didn’t want to pit herself against an older, popular boy who was captain of the basketball team, played football, was first in his class. (So he tells us. Numerous times.) She didn’t want to fight that.

During her testimony, she told the Senate Judiciary committee that she told herself that she wasn’t raped, so it didn’t matter. Think about that. She was attacked, held down, feared for her life, and yet it it barely seemed worth a mention until 35 years later, when the lives of millions of women might be within her abuser’s control.

Do men get abused and harassed too? Of course they do. But it’s not the norm for them. It’s not embedded into the culture. (White) Men didn’t have to fight for the right to own property, to vote, to eat alone at a restaurant. Men aren’t still fighting for control over their own bodies. Men aren’t so used to abuse that it’s the norm. They aren’t so used to abuse that it doesn’t occur to them to think of it as abuse, or to turn it into cocktail party banter.

And while #WhyIDidn’tReport is a useful hashtag, to help men understand the reality of being a woman in a man’s world, it’s also a sad hashtag. Sad that it has to exist. Sad that after a year of #MeToo, after a lifetime of witnessing women get dismissed, and disbelieved, and dishonored — they still don’t get it. Even plenty of good, decent men, still don’t fully understand #WhyIdidntreport.

#MeToo says this is not normal. #MeToo says I’m acknowledging it for what it was. Abuse. Assault. Harassment. Rape. #MeToo says I’m not going to take it anymore, or excuse it, or laugh about it, or bandy it about for the amusement of others. #WhyIDidn’tReport says: you still haven’t heard me. Listen.

#MeToo #MeToo #MeToo.

How My Dog Convinced me to Get Botox

Sep 20 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

cute dog pic

or How my dog drove me to get Botox.   In past years having my period at work meant I regularly employed the old tampon up your sleeve on the way to the rest room routine. But of late I take a different tack. In my dotage, I march towards the restroom twirling my tampon […]

Continue reading

Activism Boot Camp: Are High Schoolers our Hope for the Future?

Aug 22 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

This is not a photo of kids waiting for a bus Oh, I know what it looks like. It looks like a photo of a bunch of teenagers waiting on line for a bus.  But in fact, it’s a photo of hope. It’s a photo of the future. It’s a photo that reassures me that […]

Continue reading

Museum Hack: A Whole New Way to Go to the Museum

Mar 6 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

What it was like to be a Bad Ass B*tch at the Metropolitan Museum with Museum Hack. Back in the 1970’s, my mother got me a spiral bound, probably mimeographed workbook of Metropolitan Museum Treasure Hunts.  I still vividly remember the bright turquoise cover with its hand drawn Met hippo, the black type, and black […]

Continue reading

jimmyCASE: My Favorite New iPhone Case

Jan 24 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

I was given a jimmyCASE to facilitate this review. Although I don’t post a whole lot on my blog anymore, I still regularly get pitches from PR companies wanting to send me stuff to review.  Go figure. Mostly, it’s stuff I would never want:  diaper bags (my kids are teenagers), car seats (did I mention […]

Continue reading

We’re Walking Here: A Behavioral Guide for Tourists to NYC

Oct 15 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

With high-tourist season about to begin, a New Yorker tells visitors how to navigate New York like a native.  Or close enough. NYC has a love/hate thing with tourists.  We need you. You stay in our hotels, you buy stuff, you fill the seats at Broadway Shows starring b-list celebrities.  You go to the Olive Garden. […]

Continue reading

Why Donald Trump’s Leaked Comments Won’t Change A Thing

Oct 8 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

Embed from Getty Images  I wouldn’t shake that hand!  Who knows where it’s been? The news world is all aflutter:  Donald Trump was heard on tape saying vile and disgusting things about women! Ratings galore!  Pundits never-ending! The left is all excited:  this is it! This will be the thing that FINALLY (finally!) convinces people […]

Continue reading

Bright Star: A Great Mother’s Day Gift of a Broadway Show

Apr 30 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

Mother’s Day is around the corner.  And what better gift than tickets to a warm, funny, moving Broadway show, starring an incredible newcomer:  Carmen Cusack.  Tickets to Bright Star, which opened on Broadway this season, would make the perfect Mother’s Gift this year. Bright Star, written and composed  by Steve Martin (yes, that Steve Martin), […]

Continue reading

#goEnjoy ENJOY: Personal Tech Service #Coupon #DiscountCode

Apr 29 Posted by nancyjrab Leave a Comment

I love me some new technology.  I love marveling at what these new-fangled contraptions can do.  How they work.  Their simplicity.  What I don’t enjoy is having to figure out how they do what they do, and set them up myself.  Enter ENJOY, the new home tech delivery service I tried out last week. ENJOY […]

Continue reading

How Not to be “That Person” in Your Co-Working Space

Apr 18 Posted by nancyjrab 2 Comments

WeWork. NeueHouse, Grind, The Yard.  If you’re a small business or start up owner, chances are you are either already in one of these hip or pseudo-hip shared office environments, or thinking of joining one.  Want free beer?  There’s a co-working space for that.  Want foosball tables?  Check.  Want camaraderie, parties, inspiration, motivation?  Check Check […]

Continue reading
Next Page

What are you looking for?

Subscribe by Email

You know you want to read me all the time! Leave your email and hit subscribe and I'll email you every time there's a new post!

Join 21,209 other subscribers

Check out my other baby!

Shop Books by Me and Friends

Click Here to buy The Bigger The Better the Tighter the Sweater, which includes my essay about my boobs. (yes, really) Click Here to buy The Knitters Gift, which features my essay on the psycho-sexual effects of being a knitter. (sort of, kind of)

Categories

Recent Posts

  • #Me too? #Well Duh.
  • How My Dog Convinced me to Get Botox
  • Activism Boot Camp: Are High Schoolers our Hope for the Future?
  • Museum Hack: A Whole New Way to Go to the Museum
  • jimmyCASE: My Favorite New iPhone Case

Copyright © 2021 · Beautiful Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in