Who wears the trousers

Who wears the trousers

Since my forties, I've discovered that to be exposed to abuse from men who try to take advantage of their positions, you are never too old.

15/01/2018

Translation by Sejal Shah

Cover of the book 'Everyday Sexism' by Laura Bates, published in Spanish by Capitán Swing.

Cover of the book ‘Everyday Sexism’ by Laura Bates, published in Spanish by Capitán Swing.

What a surprise. A powerful rich white heterosexual man has taken advantage of his power to sexually abuse women, most of whom were young and convinced they had to placate this man to get on in their professions.

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For real?! I can’t believe it!”

What I can’t believe is that this should even come as a surprise.

Because since my forties, I’ve discovered that to be exposed to abuse from men who try to take advantage of their positions, you are never too old. And thanks to a feminist consciousness, I can detect the abuses of men around me and read them for what they are: manifestations of power.

I mean, that Hollywood producer was not looking for sex. Neither was that director who has been accused by over 30 women, nor the one who married his stepdaughter after abusing his own daughter, nor the one who raped minors in the seventies, nor the one who touched Leticia Dolera’s (Spanish actress and director) breast. They were looking for power.

Sex can be an consensual exchange of pleasure between two people–or however many feel like participating–, an exercise in domination, a commercial exchange, or an act of violence. And powerful rich white heterosexual men are capable of getting it in any one of those forms (There’s a chance they struggle more when it comes to consent). But what they care about most is demonstrating that they have power. And they do have it. That’s why they do what do.

When a “gentleman” (and understand I use that term with a certain air of scorn of a feminist faced with a heteropatriarchal system) has a woman before him, he has the opportunity to exercise power. And they love doing that.

For that reason, I don’t understand how it can be surprising to discover that the guy who has the most power in the most powerful industry, which constructs the narratives we then swallow whilst eating popcorn, has taken advantage of every available opportunity to demonstrate who wears the trousers. And who takes them off whenever he feels like it.

Because for us women who are sufficiently aware to detect the abuses of men around us and read them for what they are –manifestations of power– it doesn’t surprise us in the least.

In my case, the press ombudsman of a progressive Latin American newspaper lured me to a bar I didn’t want to go to, got me a whisky I didn’t want to drink, and touched parts of my body I didn’t want him to touch. And that’s the story I would tell if it seemed to me that sharing an isolated story would be sufficient to stand together with the campaigns that tell us women to recount what happened “that time” to “us too”. But for me, as with all women, heterosexual men, however powerful, have taken me to places I didn’t want to go, told me things I didn’t want to hear, and touched parts of my body I didn’t want them to touch so many times that I’ve lost count.

I’ve had my shoulders massaged by a high-profile politician of the left at a public celebration, I’ve had disgusting things said to to me by a nationalist Christian democrat talk-show panellist, I’ve had a journalist who I worked with on a political project tell me of the wanks he’s had thinking of me, I’ve had the dean of one of the good universities use filthy language to describe my body, I’ve had an NGO senior grope me, unmoved by my face of disgust, I’ve had a respectable ex-public servant accuse me of causing him senile erections, I’ve had a Turkish belly-dance costume seller put his hands on me against my wishes… and I could go on like that as far back as my memory permits, going over a record of demonstrations of power dressed up as sexual interactions, that men who I’ve come across have dared to do, simply because they can. And which I haven’t dared to avoid, because I have always received, as have all “good girls”, a process of training which has prepared me for one sole objective: to please men. And which has convinced me that there’s nothing we can do about it because they wear the trousers, and they can do whatever they like.

And none of that protesting, complaining, or standing up for yourself. You’ve got to go along with them. Like that, they’ll open doors for you, they’ll hire you, they’ll pay attention to you, and they’ll let you play with the grown-ups. And it’s not so difficult… a smile, a giggle, an obliging face, a lowered gaze, doing it like you don’t mind, or even, doing it like you like it. And it’s all business as usual. Good for everyone.

Because for those who protest, complain, stand up for themselves, for those who don’t smile, don’t giggle, don’t put on an obliging face or keep a lowered gaze –for those– there’s ridicule, insults, scrutiny, “but who does she think she is?”, “what did she expect?”, “she’s asking for trouble”, “you wish, ugly bitch”, “fat cow”, “dyke”, “old bag”, “jealous bitch”, “whore”, “slut”, “tease”, “frigid”, “skinny bitch”, “spoilsport”, “cock tease”… For them, on discovering that we live in a world that treats us more or less OK, only if we accept that we are “less”, there are disappointments, fights and lost tempers.

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