When my daughter was considering the Air Force and the AFAcademy I told her I wanted her to make an informed decision and I asked three women who graduated from the Academy with my husband if they would speak candidly with my daughter about their experiences. Each agreed and generously told her about their life experiences, the opportunities and challenges they had faced. I asked each whether they would want their daughter to follow in their footsteps- each woman hesitated and then spoke about her experiences with sexual harassment, assault and rape. They were honest with my daughter and every woman was “on the fence” about recommending that path to their own daughters. My husband who was a member of their class was shocked- he knew about none of what had transpired for his classmates. My daughter made an informed decision about her future thanks to women who were honest with her about their experiences. 🙏
Love this. Thank you. I think of this as like White Privilege. When I first heard that term I was taken aback, because although I am white I certainly was never privileged. After spending more time with people of color, I finally "got it". There is a certain "pass" you get when you are white, and another pass you get when you are male. You can't understand it until you hear the stories of others who don't have the pass. Then it hits you.
Great info Jess. So many white people and particularly white men, think privilege means they have plenty of money and job opportunities and connections. What it refers to is the fact that you don’t have to feel like you are being watched in a store because of your skin color. You can likely walk by yourself without giving much thought to it. It’s about the things you DON’T have to think about in everyday life situations.
I used to be an avid camper & backpacker. It is an unparalleled experience to smell the trees & water. To witness a night sky when no other street lights or house lights are near you. It’s a reconnection with every living thing on earth…trees, flowers, bugs, distant sounds of various animal life etc. It lets you know that WE are PART of everything. We are not superior to these other living things on earth. More people need to learn that lost lesson.
Men are always surprised to find out about the fear that women constantly carry. Women everywhere understand the fear, because of their experiences in the world. Sadly, it will not go away, even with abortion rights reinstated. While it’s a critical piece of the picture, there is so much more that has to change.
We have indisputable evidence that two Supreme Court justices are serial sexual abusers. The Republican presidential candidate is a convicted abuser and publicly brags about it, including his fantasy to do his own daughter. The Republican VP candidate openly advocates for sending women’s rights back to a time before we could vote. They all believe that women exist for men’s pleasure and to make babies.
There are more women in the United States than men. We have the advantage in numbers, and we need to leverage that to gain the advantage in power. A blue tsunami this election cycle can do it. Women, and the men who truly love them, will make it happen. There will still be generations of work to do, but we have to press fast-forward in changing the power dynamic in this country.
I want to believe in the blue wave but I don't feel it. Of course we're divided and scared to talk about these issues due to fear of further division, so my radar could be off. I just don't sense the anger and fear that I personally feel from other people I interact with in day-to-day life.
Josh, the enthusiasm were seeing around the Harris/Walz campaign is electrifying, exceeding even that surrounding the Obama campaign. Kamala has been endorsed by a multitude of high profile celebrities, military leaders and Republicans, including many who have worked for Trump. 8 million Americans have turned 18 since 2020. There’s a groundswell of support from women of all ages, and many men, too. I don’t believe the polls accurately reflect the race. None among the 8 million who have registered to vote for the first time are captured in polls of “likely voters“. In the digital age, people screen their calls and don’t answer when they don’t recognize the number. This is another large swath of the population who aren’t being captured in polls. Many Republicans who voted for Trump before, are not voting for him again, even if they won’t say so publicly. I tend to tamp down my enthusiasm for fear of disappointment. But I think we got this!
Yes indeed. I'm in SD and I see the support. I wrote a lengthy comment a few days back on Jess's post about folks so into maga that are just lost to us. I met my district rep and him team. All young..in their thirties. I feel it too. The election is coming fast but I feel okay for the first time in a long time. They knew Jess as she spoke up here back in May in Sioux Falls. It's great! Let's go blue!
I want to believe all of this... I guess maybe I'm a Missourian at heart. I want the polls to "show me," and like you said they won't because they're as fundamentally flawed as the media who report them. We know the media wants a close race because they profit more from one. Nevermind that deliberately manipulating the public's perception of the race is unethical. Nevermind that they could be endangering our democracy. Nevermind that the Trump campaign's attack ads from which Big Media profits so greatly include hate speech (I saw one recently that was very transphobic). I have anxiety and despite doing everything I can to avoid them, I have seen some ads that deeply upset me. We are just collateral damage in a capitalist system that puts profits and politics way before people. I digress... I'm just glad it's almost over.
Josh, the thing to do is focus on the positive and put your heart into the outcome you desire. They want us frustrated and apathetic. I’m by no means a Pollyanna, but I’ll fight with every last fiber of my being, before I’ll ever give up.
Josh, be encouraged. There are many seriously pissed-off people in Ohio about this, and not a few of them are Republicans. They are as ready to be done with Republican candidates as we are. They do not put up yard signs or stick anything on their car because they don't want to mess with "crazy people." I am NOT saying "don't worry about it," because we need to absolutely wipe them out at the polls, the worse the better.
Even in places like Minnesota, where abortion laws are very generous, Catholic hospitals will always present a problem for women who have suffered miscarriages and need help. Women who are done having children often can't even get their tubes tied immediately after having their last child if they give birth at a Catholic hospital. People need to be aware of these things when choosing insurance coverage or which hospital at which to give birth.
Unfortunately, in some areas the are only Catholic hospitals. My daughter-in-law had both my granddaughters in a Catholic hospital because in a large metropolitan area, that was the closest hospital for many miles.
My son works for a “Catholic” hospital. He gets his insurance coverage through his work and they would cover a vasectomy, but the hospital he works for would not perform the procedure.
I grew up in Kansas pre ERA and RvW. I know what it is to be feel at risk every day—as a citizen, a student, an employee, wife, mother.
I was sexually harassed on every job I ever held. Even by in-laws! I’ve been discriminated against in the workplace—for being of child-bearing age, being a feminist, at the end of my career, for being a “dinosaur.”
I’ve always lived in fear—for my dignity, my sovereignty, my livelihood, my safety.
As a white haired senior, I still do.
During the start of the pandemic I was verbally “assaulted” on two different occasions by young adult men while taking a walk in my “gentrified” midtown KCMO neighborhood—once for simply for wearing a mask, once for crossing over to the sidewalk to get out of the street.
I’m 76 years old.
This shit won’t end in my lifetime.
Sorry for my long rant. Your essay opened my eyes to my truth—I know fear.
Remember when we could expect hugs and flowers and peace signs walking down the streets of Westport back in the day? Starkly different times within a lifetime....
The daily fears women experience are often so deeply learned and ingrained from early age that we sometimes don't realize how many of our actions are habitual....avoiding dark areas or lonely areas of the parking garage without conscious thought...areas to avoid after dark...parking near the lights, within view of the building and its windows, hotel room choices, avoiding certain trails, certain men, waiting for the next elevator, avoiding the stairs, the list goes on and on. Men don't realize. They mostly just don't.
Your words are so bravely written. Can you imagine how different life would be if men had to experience the slings and arrows of life the way women do? To be able to openly express to men about your sexual assault is truly stunning because so many women would hide from it. And to always be concerned about your safety when you are camping or alone is the reality for most women.
Thank you for your bravery and persistence. And best wishes for the Missouri abortion ban to be overturned in November. The Dark Ages need to Begone forever.
“So many women would hide from [openly expressing to men about your sexual assault]” is a very true statement. And why do so many women hide from it? Because when I dared to “speculate” as to what would cause men like Ted Cruz and Bret Kavanaugh to force a woman raped in incest to bear her rapist’s (a family member’s) child, you can read in the link, this is the disgust that was heaped on me. I was merely speculating that the only reason I could think of that Cruz, Kavanaugh, and so many other “Right to Lifers” deny women raped by their own family members to bear their rapist’s child - without any exception to their rigid abortion ban - is because they are incestuous rapists themselves, looking to exonerate their behavior preemptively. You’d have thought I was Sinead O’Connor, tearing up a photo of the Pope on SNL, the horror and revulsion this man feels able to openly express to me for daring to speculate as to why men force women raped in incest to bear their family member’s child.
@Jess Piper is very lucky to be surrounded by supportive men. Not all women are, and I grieve for all the women who have no support, and are forced to be humiliated by these men who think it wrong to speculate as to why some men have removed our right to control our own bodies.
I taught specials education in Oklahoma for 30 years that gave me an appreciation of the female point of view. Early in
my career i had a young woman in my class who was very troubled who believed that I had sexually harassed her and reported it. I was brother subject of a police investigation that concluded that het allegations, even if true, didn’t rise to the level of assault. I later learned that she had been assaulted but hadn’t received any counseling. But after the investigation ended one of the counselors told me that every woman in the building would have vouched for me but added that “we wouldn’t have for some of the other guys.” Many years later, while waiting with some female colleagues for a parent to show up for a meeting, they began talking about me in the third person describing me like I was one of the good ones and the counselor added that it was almost like talking to another human being to speak with me. Both incidents left me wondering how other men generally relate to women because I always saw them as equal friends and colleagues. My wife tells me women like me because I’m don’t condescend to women the way many men do. I’m sorry to say that men tend to reflexively consider women in a proprietary manner. I was lucky enough to have a mom, a grandmother, and a great aunt who wouldn’t put up with that kind of behavior.
You reminded me of something. In college, I was in a psych class that was focused on "groups" and we were always in small groups assigned to discuss things. This time we were supposed to face each group member and tell something we liked and something we disliked about them. This one guy looked at me and said he liked that I "seemed more like a regular person than like a woman". Please don't judge me when I remember feeling flattered. But it did seem like a very weird thing to say. It was 1975, I think. I've come a long way since then.
Exactly. My husband never thought sexism was a thing. His father was deployed, his mother ran the farm and raised him and taught him to shoot. It wasn't until we were together that he started to see what sexism was. What I had to deal with much of the time. He is a good man, and now he is also "woke."
I’m always amazed by your writing. You have the ability to make the reader think,feel,and see. Thank you for talking about our fears and the real life consequences of a total abortion ban. Thank you for having conversations with our good men.
Well done. The despicable commercial the anti-3 folks are running right now is disgusting. It even confused my wife. She said, "That's it. I'm voting NO on 3." I finally convinced her, after reading from BallotPedia that voting YES was the right thing to do. Sheesh.
I had an experience that helped me understand what it feels like to not recognize the position or the privilege one has in life. I was surfing in Myrtle Beach...or trying to anyway. Myrtle Beach is not a surfing mecca for a good reason--waves are few and far between. But it was a nice sunny day, and I clung to the side of my longboard looking towards the ocean for a hint that a wave might be approaching. Nope. I basked in the sun and waited a good 20 minutes before deciding another day might be the best option.
And when I finally turned and looked to the shore I was a mile out to sea. I was in a rip current; 3 knots x 20 minutes = 1 mile. I knew not to panic; a longboard is basically a flat canoe. So I just paddled back in. But the interesting thing is what I felt the whole time I was being swept along out to sea.
Not a thing.
Because I was IN the current, a part of it, I didn't feel a thing. It was only when I turned to see the people on the shore looking like little ants that I realized I was not where I wanted to be.
Privilege is like that. People in it don't realize they have it. They can't, unless we tell them.
I love the way you break things down Jess. 💕
When my daughter was considering the Air Force and the AFAcademy I told her I wanted her to make an informed decision and I asked three women who graduated from the Academy with my husband if they would speak candidly with my daughter about their experiences. Each agreed and generously told her about their life experiences, the opportunities and challenges they had faced. I asked each whether they would want their daughter to follow in their footsteps- each woman hesitated and then spoke about her experiences with sexual harassment, assault and rape. They were honest with my daughter and every woman was “on the fence” about recommending that path to their own daughters. My husband who was a member of their class was shocked- he knew about none of what had transpired for his classmates. My daughter made an informed decision about her future thanks to women who were honest with her about their experiences. 🙏
Love this. Thank you. I think of this as like White Privilege. When I first heard that term I was taken aback, because although I am white I certainly was never privileged. After spending more time with people of color, I finally "got it". There is a certain "pass" you get when you are white, and another pass you get when you are male. You can't understand it until you hear the stories of others who don't have the pass. Then it hits you.
Yes!
Great info Jess. So many white people and particularly white men, think privilege means they have plenty of money and job opportunities and connections. What it refers to is the fact that you don’t have to feel like you are being watched in a store because of your skin color. You can likely walk by yourself without giving much thought to it. It’s about the things you DON’T have to think about in everyday life situations.
I used to be an avid camper & backpacker. It is an unparalleled experience to smell the trees & water. To witness a night sky when no other street lights or house lights are near you. It’s a reconnection with every living thing on earth…trees, flowers, bugs, distant sounds of various animal life etc. It lets you know that WE are PART of everything. We are not superior to these other living things on earth. More people need to learn that lost lesson.
This was beautiful!
Thank you for sharing.
Thank you for explaining privilege that way. So many white people get defensive about it.
This testimony breaks my heart. Thank you for the courage - sheer courage - it takes to so what you do.
Men are always surprised to find out about the fear that women constantly carry. Women everywhere understand the fear, because of their experiences in the world. Sadly, it will not go away, even with abortion rights reinstated. While it’s a critical piece of the picture, there is so much more that has to change.
We have indisputable evidence that two Supreme Court justices are serial sexual abusers. The Republican presidential candidate is a convicted abuser and publicly brags about it, including his fantasy to do his own daughter. The Republican VP candidate openly advocates for sending women’s rights back to a time before we could vote. They all believe that women exist for men’s pleasure and to make babies.
There are more women in the United States than men. We have the advantage in numbers, and we need to leverage that to gain the advantage in power. A blue tsunami this election cycle can do it. Women, and the men who truly love them, will make it happen. There will still be generations of work to do, but we have to press fast-forward in changing the power dynamic in this country.
I want to believe in the blue wave but I don't feel it. Of course we're divided and scared to talk about these issues due to fear of further division, so my radar could be off. I just don't sense the anger and fear that I personally feel from other people I interact with in day-to-day life.
Josh, the enthusiasm were seeing around the Harris/Walz campaign is electrifying, exceeding even that surrounding the Obama campaign. Kamala has been endorsed by a multitude of high profile celebrities, military leaders and Republicans, including many who have worked for Trump. 8 million Americans have turned 18 since 2020. There’s a groundswell of support from women of all ages, and many men, too. I don’t believe the polls accurately reflect the race. None among the 8 million who have registered to vote for the first time are captured in polls of “likely voters“. In the digital age, people screen their calls and don’t answer when they don’t recognize the number. This is another large swath of the population who aren’t being captured in polls. Many Republicans who voted for Trump before, are not voting for him again, even if they won’t say so publicly. I tend to tamp down my enthusiasm for fear of disappointment. But I think we got this!
Yes indeed. I'm in SD and I see the support. I wrote a lengthy comment a few days back on Jess's post about folks so into maga that are just lost to us. I met my district rep and him team. All young..in their thirties. I feel it too. The election is coming fast but I feel okay for the first time in a long time. They knew Jess as she spoke up here back in May in Sioux Falls. It's great! Let's go blue!
I want to believe all of this... I guess maybe I'm a Missourian at heart. I want the polls to "show me," and like you said they won't because they're as fundamentally flawed as the media who report them. We know the media wants a close race because they profit more from one. Nevermind that deliberately manipulating the public's perception of the race is unethical. Nevermind that they could be endangering our democracy. Nevermind that the Trump campaign's attack ads from which Big Media profits so greatly include hate speech (I saw one recently that was very transphobic). I have anxiety and despite doing everything I can to avoid them, I have seen some ads that deeply upset me. We are just collateral damage in a capitalist system that puts profits and politics way before people. I digress... I'm just glad it's almost over.
Josh, the thing to do is focus on the positive and put your heart into the outcome you desire. They want us frustrated and apathetic. I’m by no means a Pollyanna, but I’ll fight with every last fiber of my being, before I’ll ever give up.
Josh, be encouraged. There are many seriously pissed-off people in Ohio about this, and not a few of them are Republicans. They are as ready to be done with Republican candidates as we are. They do not put up yard signs or stick anything on their car because they don't want to mess with "crazy people." I am NOT saying "don't worry about it," because we need to absolutely wipe them out at the polls, the worse the better.
Thanks for calling on all of us to be better. As a father of 2 grown daughters I am very aware of the need for access to care.
My older daughter had a miscarriage. She had difficulty getting appropriate care at a Catholic hospital in Minnesota.
Even in places like Minnesota, where abortion laws are very generous, Catholic hospitals will always present a problem for women who have suffered miscarriages and need help. Women who are done having children often can't even get their tubes tied immediately after having their last child if they give birth at a Catholic hospital. People need to be aware of these things when choosing insurance coverage or which hospital at which to give birth.
Unfortunately, in some areas the are only Catholic hospitals. My daughter-in-law had both my granddaughters in a Catholic hospital because in a large metropolitan area, that was the closest hospital for many miles.
My son works for a “Catholic” hospital. He gets his insurance coverage through his work and they would cover a vasectomy, but the hospital he works for would not perform the procedure.
You have spoken the truth of women's lives. Thank you
I grew up in Kansas pre ERA and RvW. I know what it is to be feel at risk every day—as a citizen, a student, an employee, wife, mother.
I was sexually harassed on every job I ever held. Even by in-laws! I’ve been discriminated against in the workplace—for being of child-bearing age, being a feminist, at the end of my career, for being a “dinosaur.”
I’ve always lived in fear—for my dignity, my sovereignty, my livelihood, my safety.
As a white haired senior, I still do.
During the start of the pandemic I was verbally “assaulted” on two different occasions by young adult men while taking a walk in my “gentrified” midtown KCMO neighborhood—once for simply for wearing a mask, once for crossing over to the sidewalk to get out of the street.
I’m 76 years old.
This shit won’t end in my lifetime.
Sorry for my long rant. Your essay opened my eyes to my truth—I know fear.
Stay the course, Jess.
Thank you for standing up for us all.
Onward. Upward. Peace.
Remember when we could expect hugs and flowers and peace signs walking down the streets of Westport back in the day? Starkly different times within a lifetime....
Yes, I do. We were so hope-filled then.
The daily fears women experience are often so deeply learned and ingrained from early age that we sometimes don't realize how many of our actions are habitual....avoiding dark areas or lonely areas of the parking garage without conscious thought...areas to avoid after dark...parking near the lights, within view of the building and its windows, hotel room choices, avoiding certain trails, certain men, waiting for the next elevator, avoiding the stairs, the list goes on and on. Men don't realize. They mostly just don't.
carrying our keys between our fingers for safety when unavoidable,.........
Your words are so bravely written. Can you imagine how different life would be if men had to experience the slings and arrows of life the way women do? To be able to openly express to men about your sexual assault is truly stunning because so many women would hide from it. And to always be concerned about your safety when you are camping or alone is the reality for most women.
Thank you for your bravery and persistence. And best wishes for the Missouri abortion ban to be overturned in November. The Dark Ages need to Begone forever.
Stay true
Vote Blue 💙🔵
“So many women would hide from [openly expressing to men about your sexual assault]” is a very true statement. And why do so many women hide from it? Because when I dared to “speculate” as to what would cause men like Ted Cruz and Bret Kavanaugh to force a woman raped in incest to bear her rapist’s (a family member’s) child, you can read in the link, this is the disgust that was heaped on me. I was merely speculating that the only reason I could think of that Cruz, Kavanaugh, and so many other “Right to Lifers” deny women raped by their own family members to bear their rapist’s child - without any exception to their rigid abortion ban - is because they are incestuous rapists themselves, looking to exonerate their behavior preemptively. You’d have thought I was Sinead O’Connor, tearing up a photo of the Pope on SNL, the horror and revulsion this man feels able to openly express to me for daring to speculate as to why men force women raped in incest to bear their family member’s child.
https://substack.com/@johnmendelssohn/note/c-72072274?utm_source=activity_item
@Jess Piper is very lucky to be surrounded by supportive men. Not all women are, and I grieve for all the women who have no support, and are forced to be humiliated by these men who think it wrong to speculate as to why some men have removed our right to control our own bodies.
you've said what every woman knows deep down. Profound.
I taught specials education in Oklahoma for 30 years that gave me an appreciation of the female point of view. Early in
my career i had a young woman in my class who was very troubled who believed that I had sexually harassed her and reported it. I was brother subject of a police investigation that concluded that het allegations, even if true, didn’t rise to the level of assault. I later learned that she had been assaulted but hadn’t received any counseling. But after the investigation ended one of the counselors told me that every woman in the building would have vouched for me but added that “we wouldn’t have for some of the other guys.” Many years later, while waiting with some female colleagues for a parent to show up for a meeting, they began talking about me in the third person describing me like I was one of the good ones and the counselor added that it was almost like talking to another human being to speak with me. Both incidents left me wondering how other men generally relate to women because I always saw them as equal friends and colleagues. My wife tells me women like me because I’m don’t condescend to women the way many men do. I’m sorry to say that men tend to reflexively consider women in a proprietary manner. I was lucky enough to have a mom, a grandmother, and a great aunt who wouldn’t put up with that kind of behavior.
You sound like my husband, I'm grateful for him.
You reminded me of something. In college, I was in a psych class that was focused on "groups" and we were always in small groups assigned to discuss things. This time we were supposed to face each group member and tell something we liked and something we disliked about them. This one guy looked at me and said he liked that I "seemed more like a regular person than like a woman". Please don't judge me when I remember feeling flattered. But it did seem like a very weird thing to say. It was 1975, I think. I've come a long way since then.
Exactly. My husband never thought sexism was a thing. His father was deployed, his mother ran the farm and raised him and taught him to shoot. It wasn't until we were together that he started to see what sexism was. What I had to deal with much of the time. He is a good man, and now he is also "woke."
I’m always amazed by your writing. You have the ability to make the reader think,feel,and see. Thank you for talking about our fears and the real life consequences of a total abortion ban. Thank you for having conversations with our good men.
Well done. The despicable commercial the anti-3 folks are running right now is disgusting. It even confused my wife. She said, "That's it. I'm voting NO on 3." I finally convinced her, after reading from BallotPedia that voting YES was the right thing to do. Sheesh.
I haven't seen the commercial; what dirty trick did they use this time?
I had an experience that helped me understand what it feels like to not recognize the position or the privilege one has in life. I was surfing in Myrtle Beach...or trying to anyway. Myrtle Beach is not a surfing mecca for a good reason--waves are few and far between. But it was a nice sunny day, and I clung to the side of my longboard looking towards the ocean for a hint that a wave might be approaching. Nope. I basked in the sun and waited a good 20 minutes before deciding another day might be the best option.
And when I finally turned and looked to the shore I was a mile out to sea. I was in a rip current; 3 knots x 20 minutes = 1 mile. I knew not to panic; a longboard is basically a flat canoe. So I just paddled back in. But the interesting thing is what I felt the whole time I was being swept along out to sea.
Not a thing.
Because I was IN the current, a part of it, I didn't feel a thing. It was only when I turned to see the people on the shore looking like little ants that I realized I was not where I wanted to be.
Privilege is like that. People in it don't realize they have it. They can't, unless we tell them.
Well said.