Thank you GOP Senators for Selling America's Daughters to the Highest Bidder

Thank you Senators for selling America’s daughters to the highest bidder.  After all how could we consider ruining the lives of our white, rich and elite.  I remember the first time I heard those words, “you will ruin his life.”  At the age of 16, I didn’t comprehend the cost of my silence.  But I was taught then just as we continue to teach young girls everywhere, you will never be as valuable as him.  

I could count the cost of my silence in terms of dollars and cents, because certainly therapy was never cheap.  There were years I spent on a couch trying to unravel the events that changed my life.  There was so much weekly therapy needed to help me find the forgiveness I needed for the adults that failed me every step of the way, and certainly the counseling I needed to find alternative coping mechanisms besides bottles, pills or lovers who reminded me of my lack of value.  How much money could I have possibly spent over the last 30 years?  Certainly, the near hundreds of thousands of dollars I spent could not be as valuable as his life.  And I was one of the lucky, privileged ones.  I could access therapy.  But clearly those dollars were worth less than him. 

Perhaps I could count the cost of my silence in years lost because there were many.  I lost years being unable to forge healthy relationships.  I didn’t trust anyone.  How could I when I was taught at 16 that I couldn’t trust anyone to find value in me?  And this was reinforced again in college when I was told the police weren’t needed or by my job that told me his value as my superior was much greater than mine.  I lost years trying to drown out the memory of what happened to me.  I lost years never sharing my story. I lost years of friendships because the energy it took to remain guarded exhausted me.   But how could I consider taking away even a minute of his life.  How could I have ever considered how inconvenient it would have been for him to hear he raped me?  He stood to lose so much more than my mere silence.  After all I could have blemished his career and certainly, as a white, elite man, his value was so much greater than mine. 

Or maybe I should count the cost of my silence in terms of self-esteem and self-confidence because certainly I struggle with both even still.   I denied myself opportunities because I didn’t see myself as good enough.  Imposter syndrome kept me from going to the prestigious schools I got into, from taking the job that I was afraid I wouldn’t be good enough to maintain or from dating people that would treat me well because who would want to be with someone that is not as valuable as him.

I could try enumerating my silence in terms of my physical health.  Stuffing so much inside caused me so much intense physical pain.  I have ulcers, back pain, cluster headaches, and hip pain.  I have TMJ from grinding my teeth.  For a long time, I didn’t care what I ate or how much or little I exercised because why bother when there was no value in fueling a body that was less than.

Or what about my mental health?  Certainly that was worth far less than his life.  Beyond the cost of therapy, there were also the cost for medications that kept me from hurting myself.  How does one quantify the cost of stigma from living with and hiding a mental illness?  Certainly that can’t be more than his lily white life. 

And last but not least, my sense of safety.  Can we even calculate that?  The times I have spent waiting for the “right” parking space so I am near a light or close to a door.  Or the times I spent in my home because I wouldn’t feel safe going to that club or that party.   But what value can we even place on safety when his life could possibly be ruined. 

Thank goodness we have the GOP to remind us that the value of the white, elite man will forever be worth more than me and certainly more than women of color and even more still if she is not thin, uneducated, trans, or gay. It won’t matter if we tell 30 years later or the day we were assaulted, because the greatest crime is ruining his life and that we can not afford.  So America’s daughters are here for the abuse by the white, rich and elite.  They will work tirelessly to protect the men who will raise men to hurt their daughters.  They will forego any sense of morality and justice.  Because America is a white man’s country and the GOP is here to remind us that they will sell their own daughters to the highest bidder because even their lives aren’t worth squat.