Angry Young Woman

Okay. So. As we all know I’m quite behind the throbbing pulse of popular culture. Not saying I’m cooler than you (I am) just that I am severely out of touch with like, a lot of it. 

And this is mostly by choice–I am very very tired of The Age of the Pretty Girl. I’m very tired of feeling the need to look a certain way all the time–that if I don’t, what I say will hold no weight. 

You may be saying, “Oh my god that isn’t true at all.” And that’s very sweet of you. However.

Allow me to direct your attention to my most clicked essay in all 4 years of writing this thing, by about 200%. It’s called “Confession” and it’s about struggling to connect with the faith of my childhood. Cool, right? Nah. The title photo is a picture of my ass in bike shorts. Dunno why i did that, really. Was feeling myself that day, maybe. Or was giving God a little, “Up yours.” 

My most clicked essay is the one where I show ass. And I get it, it’s a great ass. Like, killer. 

This fact is just information–and at the end of the day it doesn’t matter. I’m going to keep writing and having a great ass and the pulse will continue throbbing somewhere that I’m mostly unaware of. 

Sometimes though, things are popular because they are good. And this is dope, right? We can all share in appreciating the same thing. It’s exciting and encouraging and I genuinely enjoy this phenomenon. 

Shared hatred can have a similar effect–just perhaps a more violent one. Sometimes shared hate incites change, and other times it forces those unwilling to listen to double down in anger. Mostly though, I think it does both quite messily.

The point of all this, dear reader, is first to tell you about something popular that I liked. Then, to tell you why I liked it–why I think our shared appreciation of this good, popular thing is both powerful and affirming.

Promising Young Woman. 

I’m not going to spoil anything for you, because if you haven’t seen it, I genuinely want you to watch it. I also want you to keep reading this, so worry not. There will be no spoiled plots here.

However.

I am now going to speak about sexual assault. So feel free to stop here. I won’t be mad. I adore you. 

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Promising Young Woman is a dark comedy, and yeah. I did laugh. I laughed in recognition and disbelief at the anger-and-vulnerability-balancing-act that people who live with trauma must perform. 

I laughed at the absolutely fucking infantile way that people tend to react when faced with the reality of their own actions. I laughed because I’ve seen it. So, so many people have seen it.

I have not been able to stop thinking about this film–genuinely. I think this is because it’s not about revenge, really. It’s about asking people to recognize what they’ve done–to just fucking say that they were wrong.

I understand the desire to seek this particular kind of closure.

Here’s why.

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I was barely 21 the last time I blacked out. It was August and I weighed less than I had in elementary school. By a lot. 

I was so excited to be able to live my life, for however brief a time, finally away from doctors and strange, performative group therapy. 

This time would in fact, be very brief.

Regardless, I went out with a friend; I got drunk very quickly; most of the night is lost. 

However:

I remember throwing up in an unfamiliar toilet. I remember laying down on an unfamiliar bed. I remember being unable to lift my head, or even speak, for some time.

I remember two men, both strangers, one of whom had begun kissing me. Me–who had lost the ability to turn away.

I heard from some distance the second man. “What are you doing?”  He was asking his friend. His friend–the boy kissing what were supposed to be my lips–replied, “What? I’m not doing anything.”

“What? I’m not doing anything.”

I was utterly absent. I could hear these boys speaking but could not stand to leave. 

I figured I was dead. I figured that I was dead and that this horrible face–this wretched man’s face–would be the last thing I would ever see. 

My friend, my beautiful, lovely friend, found me. She got me home. Somehow somehow somehow, in a way that I don’t remember, and In time enough. She got me home.  

I woke up shaking some hours later. Afraid. Very much so.

I blamed myself, of course. I blamed myself, not thinking for a moment how the wretched face I couldn’t quite remember belonged to the person deserving of the blame. 

I am realizing only now, years later, that I have been angry for a very long time. 

I am angry that at my most vulnerable, I was taken advantage of. I am angry that this story is one that so fucking many people relate to, that this isn’t uncommon or surprising. That this won’t shock whoever’s reading. Not even a little. Not at all. 

I am angry that I am considered incredibly fortunate because it could have been much worse. I am angry that some will have stopped reading by this point because I am telling a story they’ve already heard. 

That they have even grown tired of. 

Stop reading. Stop reading if you want, but remember this: we have all lost the ability to turn away. 

How old were you when you learned to cover the top of your drink with your hand to avoid being drugged? How old were you when you started carrying mace?

13? 14? Younger?

The morning after it happened, I told a friend of mine why I was afraid to leave the house that day. He was livid, and he was wrong. Why was I telling him this; why would I have gotten so drunk? These are the questions he asked, not, “Allison are you okay?”

I was to blame, he was saying. It was my fault. 

I wish I could have said this then, but I’ll say it now–more for me than for him. 

I had been afraid all my life. I had been afraid and cautious and unbelievably guarded from the moment I understood my body. 

There is something deeply, frighteningly wrong here–with the fact that a single moment of vulnerability in a life marked by extreme caution was immediately met with this. This wretched face. The response, “What? I’m not doing anything.”

“What? I’m not doing anything.”

It wasn’t my fault. Dear reader, it isn’t your fault. Their immorality is not the fault of your vulnerability. Their immorality is never your fault.

This is their fault. 

And whoever they are, I want them to know that. I want them to recognize that.

I love you, dear reader.

For resources and advice:

Call 800.656.HOPE (4673) to be connected with a trained staff member from a sexual assault service provider in your area.