A companion piece to Harrington's work in Issue 2: Site-specific Protest Dance: Women in the Middle East

 

Questions

How old are you?

How much do you weigh?

Do you drink alcohol?

How much?

How often?

Do you black out?

Are you a party animal?

How did you find out about that party?

Who did you go with?

Do you have a boyfriend?

Are you sexually active?

Do you cheat on him?

How do you pleasure him?

Why didn't you invite him to the party?

Was your phone on?

On page 143 you said it was off.

What did you wear?

A cardigan?

What color?

Red

Was it buttoned?

You don't remember?

That is ok, because he can fill in the rest. 

 

Trump's Words

I would look her right in that fat, ugly face of hers.

She had blood coming out of her eyes; she had blood coming out of her everywhere.

It is hard to be a 10 when you are flat chested.

That must have been a pretty picture, you on your knees.

As long as you have a young beautiful piece of ass.

I tell my friends to be rougher with their wives.

When the body is that good you don't get to the face.

They let you do anything to them, grab them by the pussy.

 

My words

Yes I wore a red cardigan.

Yes it was unbuttoned.

Yes I drank.

Yes I wanted to meet somebody. 

No I did not want to be raped.

What about me?

What about me?

I matter

 

My solo, What about me? examines beliefs and language that support rape culture using the 2015 Stanford rape case and Trump’s descriptions of women as source material to highlight how language and societal attitudes can lead to the physical violation of women. On a January night in 2015 a woman was taken behind a dumpster by a man who attempted to rape her while she was unconscious. The woman drank too much at a party and passed out, leading the man to believe that this was his opportunity to violate her, until two men witnessed that the woman was not moving and stopped him. He ran off. The woman wrote a public letter explaining how she felt after the assault, asserting that she did not deserve to be dragged behind a dumpster and raped just because she had drank too much. The young man blamed his actions on the drinking culture at the school, and the young man's father did not see any reason why his son’s '20 minutes of action’ should have any effect on his son's life and more importantly his career. The judge in the case, who gave the lightest sentence possible - 6 months at a county jail with probation as opposed to 14 years - also felt that this young man's reputation and career were more important than this young woman; a long sentence would have a 'severe impact' on him.  After all, she was just a woman who was stupid enough to drink too much at a party, she deserved what she got - she wore the wrong clothing, flirted, drank, and did not go to the party with her boyfriend. In the 21st century, this attitude is still prevalent. A man is not responsible for his actions. The woman as the temptress, the body that is deemed inherently sexual and shameful is a narrative that has not been eradicated.

In this piece, I play many roles - the lawyer, the victim, Trump, and the young man, morphing from one to the other. In the end, I play me, a woman asking what about me? Answering I matter.