The ‘Me Too’ movement has quieted to a dull hum in the background. The topic is beginning to mature into something people can talk about without shame or blame.
I’m going to tell you about the world as it was when the boss chased his secretary around the desk before bending her over. I am going to mention the directors’ couch and rent receipts. You have all heard of these situations.
I kept hearing the same question during the hey day of the ‘Me Too’ movement. It went like this…
If it was so disgusting, humiliating, shameful, why didn’t she come out and say so back then, instead of waiting twenty or thirty years?
American Men
In the olden days, a woman who stood up to her boss knew she would go nowhere within the company. She knew word would get out and she’d probably end up unemployed and blacklisted in her work community.
Besides, being the target of sexual comments and activities was a sort of rite of passage for a woman. It verified her attractiveness to be harassed. It gave her a sort of power to know she had something men would walk on coals to possess if only for twenty minutes.
Men expected a woman to ‘put out’ if she had any desire to get ahead.
In a culture such as this, a woman had very little choice. Unless she decided to do that other thing expected of her – get married, stay home and make babies. And many did.
The director’s couch was much like the boss’s desk. And in the entertainment world she was expected to willingly and eagerly live up to the bargain. She was expected to sleep her way to the top. And if taking dictation on the bosses desk or having children did not appeal to her, she had few choices. Why would she say anything to anyone about something everybody already knew?
The ‘rent receipt’ we all know about this.. the unwed mother, the wife of a player, someone trapped in a limited job market because of her education level and those four babies running around the apartment, well, she can’t very well be homeless. In this America, being homeless pretty much assured the fate of those four kids would be divvied up among several foster homes.
Twenty minutes, after all, made her self supportive for at least thirty days. And she couldn’t count on her family to help.
I think you are catching on to why these women didn’t tell. So let me share a totally unique experience. It took place most of my Junior year of High School.
I have a significant disability and in the 70s a school had every right to say they wouldn’t take me. I was expected to do what I had to do.
I rode a bus.
I couldn’t make the high steps from the curb to the top and down again. If I didn’t accept help I wouldn’t go to school.
Every morning, a boy would come down the steps and pick me up holding onto my less than ample breasts. A little fondling as he set me down, I guess the first boob contact was an appetizer.
I could hear the boys, behind me, giggling and congratulating each other. They have probably drawn straws to be the one who came to get me.
On arriving at school the process reversed. Groped twice. Nope, I didn’t say a word.
The trip home was the same. A good groping at the school yard followed by fondling as I arrived home.
Four times a day for five days in a row I would be sexually assaulted.
One day, my dad came home from a bar. He called me aside and this is his wisdom.
He told me that when someone does something for me, I owe them. Don’t you tell on those guys because they are doing you a favor, doing me a favor, he added.
My own father knew, I assume he overheard something at the bar. It broke me just a little. Instead of taking them on then coming home to tell me those boys would never assault me again, he made sure I didn’t make trouble.
This is why I never told.
Things have changed and today we can say something, if we dare. Some women can bring lawsuits. People are punished, vigorously.
I am not at all sure that the bosses, directors and landlords of the 60s and 70s should be held to today’s standards. It isn’t for me to decide. I have no intention of ‘outing’ a bunch of high school sex offenders. I don’t even remember their names.
I hope this post helps you understand the mind of a woman who let these things happen and waited decades for the world to be ready to hear her story, to believe her story.
This is my story and now that I’ve told it.. well… I guess I can dwell on some other aspect of my bizarre upbringing.
Thanks for staying with me, to the end. Comment if you wish, but don’t feel sorry for me or be inspired by me. After all, I didn’t tell for a very long time.
Life is a Story – Tell it Big