Grace Mattern

Thanks to Samantha Bee for so perfectly labeling the part of America that doesn’t want to lose all the privilege their whiteness gives them, that doesn’t want black and brown people to do as well as them, that doesn’t want women to have any authority over their own lives, and particularly, their own wombs.

There’s a lot of ground to be covered here, but I’ll concentrate on the white boys’ intent to gain more control back over women and their bodies. I’m working to learn more about how white privilege and racism and classism and gender stereotypes all intersect to oppress people, but men’s control of women is something I know a lot about

Ever since our ancestors figured out, early in the history of the human race, that men inseminate women, that the miracle of creation is not women’s alone, men have been hell bent on controlling women so they can be sure any babies produced by the women they’re controlling are theirs.

So stupid. Controlling a woman and telling her what to do might be a way to make sure any babies are yours, but it requires vigilance and abuse and denigration and it’s certainly not the best way. Respecting women, celebrating women’s strength, holding abusers accountable when they harm women — that attracts women, that keeps a woman at your side, that motivates a woman to keep you at her side to help raise those babies.

So what about all the women who support white fuckboys and their views? I won’t describe someone else’s life and experience, but I do know from working to end violence against women for almost 40 years that feeling trapped by current circumstances, violence, intimidation or expectations from their childhood entangles many women with partners who are disrespectful and controlling.

A week ago Friday when I first saw the news about Comey reintroducing Hillary’s emails into the election (and let’s remember, everyone, the George W. Bush White House “lost” 22 million emails), I understood again how hard it is to win as a woman if the white boys really don’t want you to. But actually, it isn’t white boys that are the problem. It’s white fuckboys, the ones who can’t stand the idea that a black President will be followed by a woman President, the ones who really think being white is better and should give them more control. How did they lose so much control?

Well they’re poised to lose even more which is why they’re so desperate. Looking at demographics, soon there won’t be enough of those white boys in this country to hold on to any control they have left unless everyone else agrees they should have it.

But already we’re at a tipping point, before white people in the United States are outnumbered by minorities. There are enough straight white women and men who are fine with sharing citizenship and power over their own lives with black and brown people, gender fluid people, LGBTQI people and women. Not only do they think it’s perfectly fine to have a Black President followed by a President who is a woman, they think it’s about time.

So white men who are losing their control over women, over the number of black and brown people in the country, over the ability to deny freedom and autonomy and power to all those “others,” are grabbing as much final control as they can, like taking ground in a war. If they can pull us all back to a place where women don’t have access to reproductive choice, where hatred and violent acts against black and brown people, Muslims and Jews, is okay, where groping and denigrating women is fine, where voting is difficult for black and brown people, where income disparity keeps increasing, then it will take that much longer to get back to where we are today.

Except we don’t have to go back at all. We can, and hopefully will, go forward. Vote for justice, decency, community, tolerance and diversity on Tuesday.

Vote for Hillary, then keep voting Democratic all the way down the ticket.

Give those white fuckboys the defeat they deserve.

People across the United States are celebrating last night’s World Series victory of the Cubs and choosing a new President. How are these events related? Both offer an opportunity to push back against the culture that condones abuse of women.

The Cubs acquired Aroldis Chapman in a trade with the Yankees this summer, knowingly taking on a man who abused his girlfriend. Although he denies having hurt her, he doesn’t deny having shot a gun into a wall multiple times during a fight with her last year and didn’t dispute his 30 game suspension. Did it bother the Cubs that Chapman is an abuser? Or was it more important to win a World Series?

Cubs president Theo Epstein claims he talked with Chapman prior to the trade and that Chapman was “heartfelt” in his answers. What does Chapman say about that conversation? He doesn’t recall the details and was “sleepy” while they talked.

Now the Cubs have a World Series win and an abuser to thank in part for that.

Here’s the connection with the election. I’ve had to accept over the past several months that I share this country with many people who are not only comfortable with Donald Trump’s racist, misogynist, and xenophobic views but welcome the opportunity to share their own such views.

But I also think there are many people supporting Trump because they are anti-choice and their religious convictions are driving them to accept the hateful aspects of Trump because he may be able to deliver a Supreme Court that will over turn Roe v. Wade. Still others will vote for Trump because they view themselves as Republicans no matter what and will swallow what they don’t like about Trump to vote with their party.

What both supporting the Cubs and Trump leads to, however, is condoning a culture of violence and abuse of women. Any time we support anyone who has been abusive to women, whether it’s firing a gun to frighten your girlfriend (and most likely strangling her, as she originally told police) or groping women and bragging about it, we tell ourselves, our children, everyone, that it’s okay. Nope, #NOTokay.

As Adrienne wrote on Facebook today, about the Cubs victory last night, “You don’t knowingly employ someone who not only broke a law but abused someone. You know what it does to young boys and girls when a team puts him on the big stage? It sends a message that it’s OK. It sends a message that if you’re talented enough you can do anything you want with no repercussions. That’s not fucking ok. That perpetuates a culture of abuse of women.” In Trump’s case, it would be that you’re rich enough that you can do anything you want. 

The Cub’s shouldn’t have acquired Chapman and Americans shouldn’t hire Trump to be President. It doesn’t matter what piece of good you think you can pull out of the mistake of elevating an abuser to an exalted status — that he can pitch the shit out of other teams, that he could make abortion illegal again, that he can help win the World Series, that he can implement a fiscally and socially conservative agenda — it’s still a mistake.

Abuse of women is #NOTOkay now and forever. Remember that when you make choices.

Mike and I worked together at a natural foods bakery. The year was 1976 and baking breads and cookies with whole wheat flour and honey as the sweetener felt revolutionary. My job was to scrub out the loaf pans, Mike made cookies. We both lived in Montague Center, a small town north of Amherst, Massachusetts where we both attended UMass. We often talked at work and sometimes saw each other around town — out for a walk, at a party, sitting on the porch of the large farmhouse where I lived with a changing cast of housemates.

Eric was waiting tables at that point in our lives so he was rarely home for dinner, but there were almost always a few other housemates around. One night I invited Mike for dinner. I don’t remember who else was there, but I know Eric wasn’t.

After we finished eating I started clearing the table and stood at the sink rinsing dishes. Mike came up behind me in the kitchen, reached his arms around me and cupped a breast in each hand. WTF? (Though that wasn’t a thing then like it is now.)

I turned around, asked Mike what the hell he was doing, and never invited him over again. I avoided him at work. Soon I moved away and didn’t have to worry about running in to him in the neighborhood.

What’s your story? As women, we all have them and now many women who’ve never told their stories of groping and grabbing and flashing are telling those stories thanks to Donald Trump. In the aftermath of his braggadocious video about assaulting women and subsequent dismissal of the women who’ve been assaulted by him, there has been an outpouring of stories.

Who would have thought we’d have Donald Trump to thank for anything? But his arrogance and denial have prompted a national conversation on sexual assault unlike anything I’ve seen in more than three decades working in the movement to end violence against women. There was a lot of media attention to sexual assault on campus  last year (which I wrote about here), but this has gone far beyond that. This time women who were assaulted long ago or yesterday, women who did or didn’t go to college, women who never told anyone about being molested, are talking. They’re telling their stories about being fondled and violated and subject to unwanted sexual touch.

#NOTokay is a Twitter feed started by writer Kelly Oxford asking women to share their first sexual assault that got more than 30 million replies in five days. 30 million! The New York Times called the result “a kind of collective, nationwide purge of painful, often long-buried memories.” There have been almost 93,000 Facebook posts tagged with #notokay.

As I’ve written before, over the last 30 years I’ve asked women I meet if they’ve ever experienced unwanted sexual touch. Only one woman has said no. One. My conclusion? Unwanted sexual touch is a universal female experience, but until recently no one ever talked about it. Now women are talking. If you’re a woman, I hope you’re safe enough to be able to tell your story. If you’re a man, listen.

Finally, perhaps, we’re having the national conversation about sexual assault I’ve been waiting so many years to hear.