Grainted

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#MeToo is making a comeback on my Twitter, thanks to KavaNope in the US, and a comedian named Utsav Chakraborty in India. All the chatter about Utsav points to a consistently misogynistic personality - one that doesn't come through in the videos he acts in, or in his public persona.

Since then, person after person has been coming out with their stories. Of young men, of older men. Of colleagues and bosses. And yeah, none of this is surprising but it's still surprising and exhausting.

Yesterday a friend said something about how I'm really into 'the whole #MeToo thing,' and today somebody else said it and they still don't seem to understand how much these things affect us and everything we do. How much they take for granted. How I sort of don't have a choice about "being into the whole #MeToo thing."

My college roommate and I encountered this dude who also briefly attended the same college, and there were some professors and stuff we all knew in common. And the conversation turned to our history professor, and this guy goes off on a story about how he'd trolled her when she was taking a class for them. Asking dumbass questions that make him seem misogynistic when he really isn't, he's just trying to waste somebody's time. (If the pay gap is real, why don't women just take men's jobs? If gender is a spectrum then how does the pay gap factor into that?) II wanted to ask him if he's ever heard of punching up Vs punching down but I didn't have the energy.

[I typed "enwene" instead of energy and I feel like that's more apt.]

And the thing is my roommate and I both have ample reason to dislike this professor - she's made us both cry on account of us being very bad at researching and attending class and passing exams. Except we don't, whereas this bro to whom she's done nothing has nothing good to say about her. Just an easy target, you know? Just more punching down.

And it's honestly because we know how much she's done for various female students who needed support from the faculty because they were harassed or assaulted or worse. We know how far she's prepared to go. And we can imagine how hard it must be to keep teaching at a place that, despite your best efforts, consistently turns out some A-grade misogynistic morons.

Pick your flavour of Horrible Man(TM), and I can tell you I studied with them. And everyday I wonder when I'll have the courage to talk about them, and everyday is still not the day. Not yet.


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