cartoon cow writing at a desk

Kavamas (Kavanaugh+Thomas) vs. Hillford (Hill+Ford) (9.22.18)

Here we go again. I will NEVER forget Anita Hill and the hearings for the nominee Clarence Thomas as a potential Supreme Court Justice. I was in graduate school at the time. The televised hearing occurred in October 1991. Twenty-seven years ago Anita Hill said that Clarence Thomas sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor at the Department of Education and the EEOC. During 3 days of testimony, Anita shared one of Clarence’s disgusting, inappropriate, unprofessional comments to her which was, “Who has put pubic hair on my Coke?” Those disturbing words burned into my soul and have stayed wedged into my conscious memory ever since.

My childhood sexual abuse came out 7 years prior to this Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas public hearing in 1991, yet this public story tapped into another level of pain in me that ached to be healed. The Hill/Thomas hearings distracted me from my classes, my work, and my existence. I was hurting so badly that I told my new friend Carrie my backstory, because this public story was eating at me on every level of my being. I felt consumed by the sexual assault energy like it was front and center in my life and nothing else could be attended to. The sad news is Clarence Thomas was approved, because once again in history, a woman’s voice is not important. A woman’s mental health and safety is irrelevant. A woman should accept and expect to be sexually harassed in the workplace, because women don’t matter. Men are superior and they are supposed to run the world. The U.S. Senate voting to approve Clarence Thomas as a Supreme Court Judge swept sexual harassment and women’s rights back under the rug for almost 3 decades. For me, as a survivor of sexual assault, this ruling discounted my own story, my own experience, and made me feel more powerless at that time.

Twenty-seven years later, we have an opportunity to get this shit right, but we have some unique twists in our story. First of all, the Republican party decided that Donald Trump was the BEST person to represent their party to run for President of the United States even as women came forward sharing their stories about him sexually assaulting them along with proof on an Access Hollywood tape. Now this man who sexually assaults women and can’t control himself is the POTUS and he has nominated Brett Kavanaugh to be the next Supreme Court Justice to sit on the bench and judge the most serious cases in our country for 30+ years. Enter the protagonist Christine Blasey Ford who’s name will now become synonymous with Anita Hill’s. Christine has accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her when she was 15 and he was 17 at a house party. This time the stakes are higher, because physical contact was involved. Thus far we have heard through the grapevine (the news media) that Kavanaugh pushed Ford into a bedroom, turned rock music up blasting in the room, groped Christine’s body, tried to take her clothes off, and covered her mouth with his hand to keep her screams from being heard. And she thought that Kavanaugh might kill her. Sounds like a classic story of unwanted sexual advances from a male pushed onto a female, but in this case on aggressive steroids.

Ford and Kavanaugh both deserve to share their side of the story with the public. I will be listening and observing this hearing on Thursday, September 25th. I will also be sending positive energy to Christine Blasey Ford to speak her truth with strength, power, and conviction. For those who do not understand sexual assault trauma – it takes YEARS and COURAGE to speak truth to this shameful, disgusting, dysfunction in our society. And to those who are working through the LAYERS of sexual assault memories and trauma – seize this opportunity to speak up and speak out; tell your story to a trusted friend or relative; heal yourself; and, express your complete voice. YOU are worth it. Goddess willing, the truth will come out, justice will prevail, and the highest good for our people (females and males) and our country will benefit from this Match of the Century.

P.S. I wouldn’t have to be a feminist if women were created equal.