[Yeah, go ahead and tell me 2017 sucked. Much of it did, but it was also an exciting year for activism and major progress at the state level on reproductive rights. Please join in me in a retrospective look at all the shit that got done this year thanks to scrappy activists, in spite of everything. —MB]
This week, we’re in a brave new world where sexual harassment and assault allegations are suddenly met with business consequences, from Harvey Weinstein to Kevin Spacey to Louis C.K. to Matthew Weiner. It’s amazing. And yet, unpack it the tiniest bit, and you realize that the real consequences begin when primarily white, super famous women with huge social capital and financial capital are the victims.
But I guess we have to start somewhere when it comes to finally—FINALLY—taking sexual assault and harassment seriously. After last year’s election, I became convinced more than ever that it just might never happen.
Because when you write about issues frequently sidelined as “women’s”—from the way women’s health care is siloed from all other health care, to the national rape kit backlog, to the daily chore of being a woman in public, and thus perceived as sexually available when really you’re just EXISTING—it’s easy to start feeling like an exhausted Cassandra, all raspy-voiced from shouting into an uncompassionate void.