Feels like old times

There is still a lot of communication going on related to the topic of last week. That's fine; I was committed to at least another week of writing about it anyway.

One of the comments was that it reminded him of #MeToo. 

I also had that reaction.

The misogyny that goes into creating this kind of a situation is a big part of that, but there was something else, and the height of #MeToo was where I first noticed that.

First of all, I need to be very clear that -- much like COVID -- #MeToo is not just one limited incident when everyone was talking about it. Tarana Burke had started using the hashtag in 2006 on MySpace, more than a decade before Alyssa Milano posted it on Twitter. Then, despite sexual harassment and assault and abuse continuing to be a problem, there was backlash against it "going too far" and the country has twice elected a serial predator (now a convicted rapist!) to the presidency.

There are ongoing problems.

Regardless, at the height I was posting about #MeToo a lot. That was some blogging but also sharing articles and updates about my own experiences on both Facebook and Twitter.

One of my Twitter mutuals blocked me. Because of some things that had happened with her daughter it was all very painful and she needed to shut it out. I did not feel good about disturbing her or losing contact with her, but it also felt important to keep posting. 

Part of that was all of the other women chiming in.

I knew many stories beyond my own. There was a level at which I was posting for them, even without mentioning their names or details. It was for me, but it was also for the others I already knew about. 

Then I kept learning about more. The circle of people I was thinking about expanded.

That was repeated during a few phases. Some reached out privately and some blared it out, but they had things to say and there was relief in saying them.

This is a much smaller scope, but yeah, there have been more people affected than I knew. 

There are always more.

Personally, the only real surprise was when the obituary confirmed he had been with his partner for 23 years. There was a part of me not sure if had had been with her all of that time, but that would put their getting together in 2002. That means definitely together in 2008 through 2010 from when I really remember it, and still together at least as late as 2017, a time period when it was still happening, that I did not know about last week. So, yeah.

The obituary calls her "beloved" three times. That's one reason I am still not using his name a lot. I don't know if she knew. Maybe it was overcompensating. There were so many people who had no idea that he had a partner.

When I wrote that first Facebook post and said I was feeling hard-hearted, what that meant is that I was seeing this outpouring of grief and essentially rolling my eyes, which did not feel right. People were legitimately sad and I should respect that, but there was also this irritation that was growing and becoming angrier.

As the responses started coming in, it was clear that I was not the only one feeling that. Giving people a place to vent could be a relief for them. There is that need to speak, but also that desire not to be giving pain to other people who are already hurting. 

Another classmate wrote a very nice Facebook post as a tribute to her friend on the same day I did my first blog post. Replying to that with what a jerk he was would not be kind to them, but keeping silent has its own problems. It's not always easy to find the right balance.

I have some more thoughts on that, but the next post will be spending some time on the misogyny. 

None of this happens without the misogyny.