When Truths Add Up to a Lie

Like most people, I sat riveted yesterday, glued to the Kavanaugh committee hearing. The range of emotions I felt included pride, shame, disbelief, and a certain sense of knowing.

I believe Dr. Blasey Ford at the visceral level. There is not a part of me that does not believe her. She’s a survivor and a patriot and an example of grace under pressure. If you’re going to try to convince me she’s lying, just stop reading now because I will not be convinced.

I also believe that Kavanaugh believes he is telling the truth. I watched his impassioned opening remarks, full of defiant anger, and almost wanted to believe him. “Could she be wrong? What if it was someone else? What if she’s the one who’s confused? Mistaken identity?” If I am being honest, I was surprised at how much his words hit me. And it left me momentarily confused and shocked at myself.

But here’s the thing…

Let’s for a moment remove this entire discussion from the political arena and forget who disclosed what and at what time and for what motivation. Stripping all of that out of the way, what do we have?

One woman, forced to share a story that she had carried like a weight around her neck for so many years. And now saddled with the burden of proof, even though she’s not on trial or allowed a real investigation. A volleying back and forth of five minute questions – which often turned into political grandstanding – is not designed to get at the truth. It’s designed to go through motions.

One man who may or may not have sexually harassed young women in his very successful high school and college years. And who is poised to be one of the most powerful people in our country.

He describes himself as a committed student and athlete, family man, Catholic and avid calendar creator.

But, he was also a heavy drinker. A problem drinker.

He said he only “fell asleep” versus blacked out (which sort of feels like an “I didn’t inhale” deflection). When pressed on answering the question of whether he had ever blacked out, he quipped back at a female US Senator, “have you?” Is this the “I’m rubber and you’re glue” defense? He did not fully or calmly answer one question about his drinking behaviors or how they may have affected his memory or recollection of past events. He was ruffled. He did not want drinking called into question. He just wanted to talk about his grades and his work ethic. But being first in your class doesn’t preclude you from assaulting someone.

Then there are the yearbook entries. The multiple, infantile references to drinking clubs, drinking awards, drinking teams. It speaks to a troubling mindset. There is also the sworn testimony of people who did not recall the party but acknowledged Kavanaugh was a “heavy, frequently incoherent, belligerent drinker”. Let’s not forget the friend from Yale (Lynne Brookes, a Republican) who said after the testimony aired live, “There is no doubt in my mind that while at Yale, he was a big partier, often drank to excess, and there had to be a number of nights where he does not remember.” He was borderline uncooperative when asked to answer specific questions and didn’t answer them. There are the witnesses who he said corroborated his story but, in fact only said “they don’t recall the party”, which does not mean it didn’t happen.

We all have parties from our past we don’t recall or remember that did, in fact, happen. But we don’t remember them because we weren’t assaulted. If we were assaulted, we would no doubt recall the party with vivid detail, like it was yesterday, or even moments ago.

Earlier I said I watched the hearings with a sense of knowing. And that knowing is this: I have been at those parties. Both in high school and in college; where people come together last minute, shots and drinking games ensue and before people know it or even intended it, many are drunk, even a few throwing up in bushes, others hooking up in empty rooms and most trying to figure out how to get in their own house past curfew without their parents being the wiser.

I don’t know anyone who was sexually assaulted at these parties.
But I also know it doesn’t mean women weren’t assaulted at these parties.
I just wasn’t witness to it.
There are too many stories; too many women; that force me, and us, through the lens of history and knowing better, to accept that this happened where I was.
And probably to people I know.

Should he be vilified for drinking a lot as a teen? No. But…why didn’t Kavanaugh say, like many accomplished adults today say, “Yes, I did party quite a bit while I was a student, but I left all of that behind me once I grew up.” The question really is, why couldn’t he say this, even if it’s true? He doesn’t say this because if there is one black out; one night of not remembering; one night full of things he wishes he’d never said or did, then there is the possibility that she is telling the truth and he may just not recall it. This is very possible. And I think it’s probable.

In this story, his black outs are the cracks where her light gets in and shines on the truth.

And it’s also probable that he did not go back in his calendar and enter in, “wasted at impromptu party last night; don’t remember what happened.” I’m not doubting his family’s commitment for keeping detailed calendars; he has them to prove it. But I am doubting that they contain every embarrassing, private, or more importantly, potentially illegal, detail of his life. His calendars are a pre-social-media-era highlight reel…a chronicle of friends, sports, academics, time spent traveling with his family and all things bright and shiny. Not dirty and despicable.

All of that is more probable than Dr. Blasey Ford making the entire story up for political revenge. Keep in mind she is receiving death threats. Keep in mind she has had to move her family more than once. Keep in mind she has been sharing the details of this night for years with her closest confidants. There is no amount of payoff in the world that would motivate me to risk the safety of my children or my family’s well being.

So we have someone telling the truth and someone believing what he is telling us is the truth. He needs to believe what he’s telling us because what is the alternative? That he got black out wasted on numerous occasions and on at least one of those, groped, choked and tried to forcibly undress and assault someone while friends laughed? No one wants to believe that about themselves. But it doesn’t make it a lie. It just makes it a truth that needs a reckoning. There will never be rest without the reckoning assault victims deserve.

And, so, every woman knows how this will go. Kavanaugh will be confirmed and he will sit, for the rest of his life, on the highest court in the land. And we will say, exasperated and confused, “Did you not hear her? Did you not feel her pain and her purpose? Do you see why people who are assaulted and raped do not share their stories?”

What this teaches us, like a punch in the gut and a boot on the throat, is that women don’t really matter. That boys will be boys. And girls are collateral damage to their coming of age. And if a woman’s truth ruins a powerful man’s career, then he is somehow the “real” victim. And yet we soldier on, writing our words, sharing our struggles, raising our children, fighting for the underdog and tending to the future, focused on the belief that tomorrow will be different.

What I am left with, is the feeling that we, as a nation, are rotting from the inside out. That our leaders are more divided and corrupt than ever; that women’s rights are in peril; that my daughters, and son, are growing up in a world more precarious than ever; that our view of what is acceptable is changing, and not for the better. We are less humane. Rot.

And do you know what happens when things rot?

Women don’t let the stench fester. We don’t want the mess. We take out the trash.