As I mentioned in my last post, I'm trying to publish my 2020 book list, but it's getting too long, so I have to break out a few of the reviews into separate posts, to which I will link. So here is one.
*****
“There’s nothing original about my story, and that’s the point.” This is the opening line of the third or fourth chapter of Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl, a rape memoir. There’s nothing original about the story because women get raped all the time, as I know from personal experience; but the author’s approach to telling her story is quite original.
At 19, Jeannie Vanasco was raped by a close high school friend. Almost 20 years after the attack, she contacted her rapist and told him that she was going to write a book about the rape. Surprisingly, he agreed to talk with her; and in a series of recorded conversations, he admitted to the rape, apologized, and tried to explain himself. She transcribed her recordings of their calls and then examined her own part in the conversations, while also looking back at the broader context of the event and the years that followed - - another sexual assault, her father's death, her hospitalization for bipolar episodes.
*****
One of the most compelling questions to come out of the #metoo movement and the 2020 racial justice reckoning is this: Can a good person commit a terrible act and then remain a good person, or resume being a good person, after a period of contrition? I think that the answer is yes. Another question: Does one terrible act make a person permanently bad and beyond redemption? I think that the answer is no. These are very big questions, which Vanasco tries to answer in this book. The call transcripts make the attacker (whom she calls Mark) if not necessarily sympathetic, then at least not an evil, irredeemable person. He accepts responsibility for his actions and seems sincere in his sorrow and regret. He's also a little manipulative, which Vanasco recognizes but doesn't really address otherwise.
The book also explores the idea of gender performance, which is a term that I had never seen before or heard before. It's a useful expression. Vanasco's friends and therapist describe her sympathy for her former friend and her tendency to excuse or absolve him from full responsibility as gender performance. So I suppose that a woman's natural tendency to consider the feelings of others is a tendency that we are meant to root out and destroy. But who decides these things? What is the underlying assumption? That women should emulate men in every way, even in our thoughts and feelings? This seems the very opposite of feminism to me.
When the police arrested the man who raped me, he confessed almost immediately: and he pled guilty at his arraignment, so there was never a trial. I testified at his sentencing hearing. I watched as the bailiff led him away in shackles to serve a long prison sentence. As far as I know, he’s still in prison. When he becomes eligible for parole, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is supposed to contact me and seek my input regarding the parole decision. And if I think this man is contrite and unlikely to re-offend, then I will be inclined to support parole for him. I don’t know that this inclination could be described as forgiveness. Any forgiveness that I extend to the man who raped me would be conditional; the condition being that he never contact me in any way, ever again. But even if I don’t completely forgive him, I’d be willing to give him a chance to be a decent person again. Just because I don’t ever want to see someone again, doesn’t mean that they’re beyond all hope of redemption.
*****
Last year, probably about a month before the pandemic hit, I attended a meeting where a very smart woman presented on a pretty complex technical topic. Population in the room was about 70 percent male and 30 percent female. I knew exactly what was going to happen; and voila! It happened!
Five or six of the men peppered the presenter with technical questions of varying degrees of complexity. She handled herself beautifully, and answered all of their questions very capably (at least in my layperson’s view--it could all have been bullshit and I wouldn’t have known the difference). And the thing is that none of the men were even remotely disrespectful to the woman. In fact, every single question seemed sincere (if long and windy) and every single questioner seemed to respect this woman’s professional expertise. It’s just that she was really smart, and the men were terrified that a smart woman might leave the room without knowing that they were smart, too.
Anyway, this is neither here nor there. It’s just the kind of thing you think about when you’re reading a rape memoir and the author constantly second-guesses her own emotions, and subjects herself to “gender performance” critiques from everyone and their brother. Women aren't the only people who "perform their gender." And it’s OK to forgive, or to at least give a person another chance, even if they don't deserve it. Especially if they don't deserve it
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