Fré Halvorson-Taylor On #MeToo
I debated posting a “#MeToo” on social media. Such posts flooded my Facebook, and I was a combination of horrified, unsurprised, and comforted. Yet, at first, I didn’t take my experience with sexual harassment seriously enough to share it with my nine hundred Facebook friends: I didn’t want people to think I was overreacting. Really, I thought I was overreacting.
I was harassed for the first time walking in Charlottesville, alone, when I was eleven. It was the first time I gave someone the finger. It was also the first time I felt like I wasn’t allowed to be walking on the streets I thought I owned an equal share of.
In the six years since, I’ve had to grapple with almost daily harassment: ranging from “harmless” comments to situations where I’ve feared for my physical well-being. I’ve gone and still go through the phases of shame, denial, and self-hate. As the #MeToo situation showed, I generally stay in the practice of internalizing whatever happened. There is something constantly telling me I shouldn’t take myself that seriously–people have it far worse than I do.
But this is actually where those who have harassed me win: in my absence of words and my silent suffering. And so, from now on, I won’t ever shut up.