On Women's Lib

“You are just gorgeous! Look at you... Have you ever thought about a modeling career?”

The back of my neck prickled.

She was a blonde, pretty woman not much older than us. I had moved to the US just a couple of months earlier. It was 1989 and my friend and I were 16. My first time at a giant American mall, looking at records, and crystals. Getting some Taco Bell and an Orange Julius from the food court. 

“Ummm, no…” my friend said.

“Well, I think you two have what it takes…” she dug in her purse to give us a card but I grabbed my friend’s hand, and pulled her away in a sprint. We ran away laughing at the thrill of having escaped something dangerous. It was instinctual. We knew that this was a dangerous situation for two teen girls, and that the danger had to do with sexual exploitation. 

How did we know?

Every young woman knows, certainly by age 16. Most if not all of us experience dangerous situations like these, one way or another from early childhood.  My own experience with inappropriate sexual advances started at age 7. It was my guitar teacher, and my own mom shamed me for suddenly not wanting to get lessons for the thing I most loved in the world, rather than to think to ask if he had touched me. Then it was my dad’s friend, the creeps on the bus, the boys from the high school across the street, and so on. By age 16, my hypervigilance around men was acute– always assessing risk: Who is dangerous in this situation? Where is the exit? What are my chances of leaving this place if a predator zeroes in on me? Who can help? I know that most women can relate to this. And that is because this is the way of the world.

We have allowed, as a society, for this to be status quo. For millenia. But in this country specifically since its very founding and well before. Fourteen  generations ago we were burning and drowning witches in Salem, Massachusetts. It wasn’t until 1900 that married women in every state were allowed to keep their wages and own property in their own name, and not until 1920 that white women got the right to vote. And, as we know it wasn’t until 1973 that women gained bodily autonomy regarding their reproductive decisions, and we already lost that with the Dobbs decision in 2022. Rape was considered illegal since colonial times, but only if committed by a stranger, and only because it was an affront to the father or husband. In 1880, the age of consent was 10 to 12 in most states, except for Delaware, in which it was 7. The hatred and disregard for the humanity or value of women is the same that fueled hatred and disregard for the humanity of Black Americans, and Indigenous people since white, male feet touched the soil of this continent. 

I don’t think any woman following the Epstein story is surprised. We are shocked, we are disgusted, we are triggered, we are heartbroken and irate. But, as a class of citizens we are not confused about why we are here, living through the unveiling of this atrocious sex-trafficking ring run by the most powerful men in the world. We are now learning that Cesar Chavez was a sexual predator too. It is not just the most powerful men in the world, but the men who hold power in their own spheres of influence, down to the family structure. Am I ever surprised when the ones I love or admire are exposed, also? No. It breaks my heart, and it happens often. Because this is a festering gangrene that will kill our whole society if we don’t tourniquet and amputate it. 

Are we ready to draw a line in the sand? There is no way I can consent to continuing to go along with a society where watching out for sexual assault is part of every little girl´s lifestyle. We absolutely can build a society where our grandchildren won’t believe that as girls we used to have to worry about this.

Dolly Parton says that we cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust our sails. The winds are undoubtedly blowing and it is dark and scary, and full of dementors. Are we ready to adjust our collective sails to get through this and usher in a new era in the aftermath?

It will take many generations to create a new society, but as women we are half of the population and we can do this, starting now. Remember what happened in Iceland in 1975 when 90% of women went on strike and did no work, house work, or childrearing? We hold incalculable power.

Getting serious now means serious investment now, in this moment of unraveling, and let me tell you, men will not be the ones funding this work. I call on all the women who were married or related in any way to any of these predators being exposed in the files, who have benefited financially from those relationships to step up to your task at this moment. Society building takes investment! Even if you already have incredibly generous Foundations established to fund a lot of this work (thank you!), I invite you to consider the impact your investment can have if you triple it for the next ten years. This is our time, let us go all in.