Kavanaugh: Your Confirmation Is My Motivation

10/6/18

I feel how I felt right after Trump was elected.

Betrayed.

Optimistic.

Strong.

Determined.

Confused.

Not about what I feel. I know what I feel, what I want to do. I’m confused about how I should feel. Should I feel sadness? Pain? Fear?

I don’t feel any of those emotions. I feel sympathy for assault and rape victims, yes, but I don’t feel sad or tormented or afraid. I feel determined. A sort of “happy” anger that is to be my fuel.

Is it because I’m young that I don’t feel trapped, or am triggered? Yep.

Is it because I’ve never been raped or assaulted that there’s nothing to trigger me beyond sympathy? Absolutely.

Should I be sorry about that? Nope.

There was no in-between for me. No break between a let-down and action. This, I suppose, is the advantage of being a slightly unfeeling, inexperienced youth. I’m already ready.

If you needed a break, or still do, no fault on your part. Instead, think of it as a simple difference between us. Nothing better or worse. You need a moment before you’re ready, and that’s okay, and when you’re ready, it’s going to be big, the thing you do. I’m just…faster. (Maybe this means I need to slow down.) Whatever. I’m already ready.

Kavanaugh is not a good person. He is, in fact, a terrible person. When Trump was elected, we all got ready to take him down. It revitalized us. That is the only good thing Trump has done. Existed as himself, so we could form a resistance. We’re still ready on the inside, but he appears to be invincible, and so some of us have unconsciously numbed ourselves…slowed…but not given up. This is the second coming of Trump. They are essentially the same man. Any man who allows toxic masculinity in himself and his presence is like this.

! I’m not mad at anyone in particular, I too have forgotten the whiplash and crisis Trump’s election gave me, I am mad at our psyches! Why is it that after a few months of subtle control and propaganda we begin to forget what we can do? Where were you when you found out Trump was getting elected? What was your first thought? Where did that passion go? Oh, forgive me - it went to this moment.

We will destroy toxic masculinity. Not with violence, I beg of you. But not with silence either. You cannot change policy by putting black tape over your mouth - do you think that a man like Kavanaugh or Lindsey Graham will change their minds after seeing what they’ve seen their entire lives - a silenced woman? Rather, we must be calm, inscrutable, furious, loud, loud, loud! Not in volume. If you are quiet, antisocial - paint, draw, write, do whatever you can to express yourself against toxicity.

We need to get more young women inspired by politics. Especially disabled women, women of color, and nonbinary/trans female people. The reason that there are so many white men in politics is because that’s where the power is. That means our biggest fight is to get rid of Citizen’s United and gerrymandering - those two factors separate politics from the power of the people. We need to educate about past and current women politicians in schools.

Glass ceilings need to be shattered, over and over and over again.

This is a call to never give up.