Why we need to know HowToMeToo

[Music]

in my early 20s

i spent a summer in my hometown working

at a family restaurant

out of a commuter train station on my

very first day

my manager hands me my uniform it’s a

t-shirt

that reads check out my rack

i looked around and realized that only

busty women were being asked to wear it

i didn’t know quite what to do but i did

know that i felt

humiliated i handed the t-shirt back and

said

no thank you next i reported it

i happened to be interning at the

national organization for women that

summer

and i convinced them to add the

restaurant to its boycott list

it was my first act of defiance against

sexual harassment

and it taught me an enduring lesson

i have agency i can make a difference

but as i got older i realized that

taking a stand was far more complicated

than

handing back a t-shirt and that’s

certainly true today

in the wake of me too even as

scores of men powerful men

have been brought down we still don’t

hold

people accountable who aren’t

celebrities or titans of industry

those that abuse restaurant workers and

fruit pickers

and everyday middle managers who prey on

their shift workers

my story is about one of those men

one of the everyday run-of-the-mill

abusers

who the new york times is never going to

investigate

i’m here to tell you

how we can serve justice on them

during the brett kavanaugh hearings i

watched dr christine blasey ford

and her remarkable testimony to the

senate

she had nothing to gain and everything

to lose

but she was not going to give

up she was not going to let kavanaugh

forget the horrors

that she endured that one summer night

when she was 15.

it took extraordinary courage

and i was in awe it didn’t

stop his nomination but

it did expose him for who he is

at one point in her testimony

she described kavanaugh covering his

hand over her mouth

to stop her from screaming and then

he or another friend turned up the music

so others

in the house couldn’t hear her

it triggered a memory for my own teenage

years

because the man who raped me

didn’t do that he didn’t have to

i was unconscious either from booze or

drugs in my drink no need to

clap a hand over my mouth or turn up any

music

he had free reign over my body dr ford’s

testimony

brought back a flood of memories from

nearly three

decades ago and

i remembered other things too how

excited i was

as a suburban high school senior

to go to my very first college party to

be the center of attention

there i met pete he was a few years

older than me

and he stayed close and plied me with

drinks

soon he was pawing me on the couch

and that’s the last thing i remember

i woke up hours later bloody

disheveled aching

and confused i gathered myself

best i could and i walked outside

only to see my bra hanging from a tree

i went straight home and told no one who

was i gonna tell

my parents i was too scared of my

father’s anger and

of my own shame so i

found a crawl space in my head and i

shoved it up there as far as it would go

i was so deep in denial that

when pete asked me out shortly after

i accepted i went on a date

with my rapist and i kept it

buried for years i told a few people i’d

known but

never the full story

but even before the kavanaugh’s hearings

i

wondered about pete and what i

discovered is that

he looked to have a pretty

picture-perfect life

loving wife adorable boys

and he worked as a community college

professor

surrounded by young women

dr ford’s testimony shocked me into the

realization

that i needed to take action

and in many ways this was really

familiar territory for me

i have spent my career fighting for

causes i believe in

i have exposed bad actors in the gun

industry and i have forced the

resignation

of corrupt politicians i am not

one who doesn’t demand answers or who is

easily pleased so

i wrote a letter to the college

where my rapist works i spoke to the

title ix

coordinator and i told her my story and

expressed my concern

for the women on campus she

promised me that she would she would

tell my story to the president of the

college

and he in turn promised that he would

tell it

to his board of directors they both

assured me

there would be a full investigation

but months went by

and i heard nothing

i later learned that the so-called

investigation

consisted of a single email

survey to the current students

on campus and

when it was completed the president of

the college

said there was not a whiff of

impropriety and the many

years that my rapist had been at his

school

and that he was no in no position

to pass judgment on behavior

from so long ago

i was furious i sat there staring at my

computer screen

with hot tears running down my face

but i didn’t give up i wrote to

every member of that board of directors

i wrote to the state oversight committee

on higher education

urging them to review the investigation

and launch a separate inquiry

into the actions of the president

i had a feeling and it was only a

feeling at this point

that this was more than the usual

institutional desire

to make an awkward situation go away

eventually through public records

requests

i found out that the president of the

college had been looping professor pete

into all of our conversations and that

separately

he had told his board of directors

that there was another side to the story

and

that pete was likely innocent

so much for not passing judgment

also with the help of a researcher

i learned that in a different position

at another institution that

the president of the college had

actively

recruited a star basketball player

who had been credibly accused of rape

and had been thrown out of

two separate universities

no one else would take him

and the president’s public defense of

those actions

well everybody deserves a second chance

and that’s where i am today i would love

to say that the college took

those allegations seriously

and that it protected its students but

this is painstaking frustrating work

and there are no quick fixes

and even if there were and even if

pete were in prison right now and even

if

no other women were assaulted

i would still be looking

after that damaged terrified confused

17 year old girl me

and i’ll likely be looking after her

for the rest of my life

at the same time taking action

has value and those actions

can be big or small yes

you can organize protests yes you can

press charges

but if those things seem too daunting

you

can call me or someone like me

or a local legal non-profit or a

government agency

or someone who has the capacity and the

ability

to support you and create change

the point is to do something

we all need to learn how to me too

as survivors we need to reject the

culture

of impunity and build a network

a network with the skills and resources

and experience to seek redress for all

that we have

endured

it is not enough for us to hope

and pray that a national organization

will find

our cause worthy when we

understand how to meet we take back our

agency

and seeking justice is how we win back

our voice it’s powerful

and it’s attainable for all of us

thank you

[Music]

you