This week, we will witness a spectacle unlike any before in history; comparisons to anything prior are dishonest on their face. Politics aside (which, sadly, has become an impossible ask for seemingly 99% of America), an undeniably qualified candidate for the Supreme Court of the United States named Brett Kavanaugh, will face accusations that 35 years ago at a place that cannot be remembered by the accuser, at a time, date, and place, that cannot be remembered by the accuser, he, as a drunken high school aged boy, held her, a drunken high school aged girl, down and covered her screams until she was able to run away to safety in a bathroom. A bathroom of a home she cannot in any way describe or remember. He, meanwhile, says he doesn’t even know who she is, has never done anything of the sort to anyone, and was never at such a party. His friend, who was in the room according to the accuser, says it never happened.
End of evidence.
Seriously, America, grow up.
This weekend’s most infantile attempt at explaining why we should believe everyone that claims to ever be a victim was this analogy by Senator Patty Murray: “If someone claims their car was stolen we believe them, why don’t we believe her?” Clever, but stupid. Yes, if someone says their car was stolen, the police operate on the presumption it is true and then investigate and try to find the car and the perpetrator. If, however, someone says their car was stolen by Jim Smith, Jim Smith is innocent until he is proven guilty (like say behind the wheel of the car). Now imagine someone says “40 years ago Jim Smith stole my car on a street in a city, and his friend saw it happen, even though his friend denies being there,” Sounds like an open and shut case, doesn’t it?
For the record, I want to believe that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford is genuine in her claims against Judge Brett Kavanaugh in this sense; if she’s truly just making this up and it has led us to this, then the final implosion of American society has truly begun.
Rather, I like to think that Ms. Ford is recounting a very real and awful event from her adolescence, it’s just that she has the very very very few details she can remember completely wrong. Different guy, for example. Trauma does horrible things to the human brain and makes it very hard to accurately remember things that have been done to us. I want her to find peace; but not at the expense of an innocent man. And no, not at the expense of a guilty man, either, if there is never any proof of his guilt.
Regardless; the idea that we have placed an American’s life work in the balance over totally unsubstantiated and completely vague claims is beyond horrifying. The only thing more horrifying is the willful ignorance of most of America, hiding behind the cloak of “it wouldn’t happen to me.” The most stunning revelation of last week is that so many of you believe that this is only happening to Brett Kavanaugh because he’s being nominated to the highest court in the land and is, thus, held to a higher standard.
HA! Are you literally not paying attention to the world around you?
People are getting fired for made up things called “third party harassment.” One of the definitions of which is as follows: you and a co-worker have a private conversation that is eavesdropped on by someone not invited to be part of the chat and that person is offended by something they willfully overheard and you lose your job.
Normal, everyday people are already getting fired over things that literally never happened. A truck driver training a woman of color is accused of listening to a radio show that said the “N” word (which never happened) and the driver loses his job without any sort of interest in or attempt to find the truth. No proof was needed at all, just her claim that it happened.
This is what everyone is missing; It isn’t a question of whether or not someone should be held accountable for heinous behavior that occurred 35 years ago while in high school. It’s a question of whether or not someone, anyone, should be held accountable for behavior that cannot, in any way, be substantiated or proven by what may be a total stranger, 35 years ago. And devastatingly, the majority of Americans (according to multiple polls this weekend) say that the answer is “yes, yes you should have to answer for something you may have never done but someone says you did a long time ago in some place at some time.” My God.
That’s it; that’s the point. Everything else is noise.
- Yes, actually, there is a reason why an FBI investigation into this matter is a total waste of time.
- Yes, Dr. Ford is a lifelong liberal activist and known anti-Trumpster, as is her attorney, Debra Katz.
- No, there is no parallel what-so-ever to the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas hearings of 27 years ago. None at all. Not even close….in fact, it’s intellectually insulting to even claim such a thing.
- No, if this event occurred, it is not settled law that it disqualifies a man from a lifelong appointment. If all of us can be destroyed by heinous things we did as drunken teenagers 35 years after the fact, then we’ve already destroyed each other. Many female victims of sexual assault, in fact, are the ones trying to break through and point out that what may have happened to Ms. Ford sounds awful, but it is most certainly not rape, and may not even be sexual assault.
Yet, none of those things are the very real point. The point is very simple. Too many people are arguing loudly and without apology, that decades old accusations with absolutely zero evidence of any kind are, in fact, all we need to end peoples’ careers, livelihoods, and perhaps more.
With all of the vile ickyness that has been puked upon this country in the last two years, this is by far the worst. Sadly, too many of you are playing the part of the baby bird and opening your mouth to swallow every drop of this upchuck.
