You would have to have taken a hiatus from Social Media to not be aware of #MeToo in all its complexities. For a while I sat back and read but eventually I succumbed. On October 15, I posted this on my FaceBook timeline:
THIS I will copy and paste. Yes ME TOO
If all the women (men too, it’s awful no matter who is affected) who have been sexually harassed or assaulted or raped wrote “Me too” as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem.
Please copy/paste, if you choose to participate.
It was a popular post, as far as inciting discussion. I was amazed…perhaps saddened…by the women who stated they didn’t let such things affect their lives. How they are so strong, so secure in their lives, they let me know when or if something bothers them.
That’s wonderful, seriously. But the #MeToo effort is not just for strong women. It’s to bring attention to the small girls who thought they’d locked their doors only to find out it doesn’t take much of a key for someone to intrude. It’s for the night waitresses who have to tolerate the cook’s comments or actions if they want their food out on time, and prepared correctly. It’s for the factory line workers who deal with overbearing supervisors. It’s every person, especially females, forced to cede control of their lives.
But it’s so much more. Melinda Gates reminded us of the global impact of girls growing up, being constantly put down, in this writing: Me Too Me Too
Heidi Stevens Baltimore Sun, relates what she hears from her male colleagues. The title is: Why do women get all attractive if they don’t want to be harassed? Yeah, that got me kinda hot. Especially when she explains this is the ‘core question’ she heard from one of her colleagues. She says more. So much more.
It seems like celebrities are falling right and left. Some of them are no real surprise but others? Particularly when we hear details? I’ve had friends earnestly explain to me this overflowing of testosterone is a side effect of being a strong leader.
Nope, I can’t buy that either. Nor do I think this is a modern phenomenon. Abuse of power is as old as choice of leader through intimidation. Might is Right, and so on. For one thing, just because it’s always been done that way doesn’t make it any more right than it was then. Slavery, child abuse, spousal battery. As a species, we are supposed to be maturing out of that way of life.
Maybe I just read too much Science Fiction as a kid, to believe in such fantasies. Maybe this just needs to run its course. Amber Tamblyn explains why she’s not ready yet to offer redemption. I agree with her. Not because I want to see all men suffer for the acts of (I hope) just a small percentage. But because I want all of us to step back, take a breath and THINK about what’s been happening to us. Because it has to stop.
We need to see the dawn of a new era, when we can stop acting like we are the only ones with rights. Peace and love.
Mona Karel Author 