Minnesota men have a real opportunity this fall.
There is a heavy finger tapping on our eyelids. It's telling us to wake up. With expletives.
We have a choice. A challenge of consequence to match any other we've faced.
It's not pointing at us and saying, "you're a rapist." It's not saying, "you're garbage, because you're a man."
It is saying that, for millennia, the women around you have been raped. For millennia, the men around you - often out of your sight but within it as well - have treated women like trash in the street.
Recognize the moment that you're in, Minnesota men.
The landscape of being a man in 2018 is complicated, no doubt. Men you love have behaved badly. You can see them in your mind and, despite their transgressions, you want good things for them.
It's likely, just based on the numbers, that you have behaved badly. You can see that in your mind, too.
But this is the moment. A moment to see that even if your hands are clean, holding up the world as it is, you're holding up a world that gives men 25% more for the same day's work. That world punishes professional women for getting pregnant. That world appoints men to our highest seats of power, who have visited nightmares upon our neighbor women.
I have a mother. A wife. A sister. Grandmothers, god rest them.
But I won't tell you a bit about them. That they're family, in this moment, shouldn't matter.
Because, it's your family next to me. It's the stranger's family. The women around you now, those people tapping on your eyelids, are reason enough to change this.
We can start by electing these women, come November.
There is a heavy finger tapping on our eyelids. It's telling us to wake up. With expletives.
We have a choice. A challenge of consequence to match any other we've faced.
It's not pointing at us and saying, "you're a rapist." It's not saying, "you're garbage, because you're a man."
It is saying that, for millennia, the women around you have been raped. For millennia, the men around you - often out of your sight but within it as well - have treated women like trash in the street.
Recognize the moment that you're in, Minnesota men.
The landscape of being a man in 2018 is complicated, no doubt. Men you love have behaved badly. You can see them in your mind and, despite their transgressions, you want good things for them.
It's likely, just based on the numbers, that you have behaved badly. You can see that in your mind, too.
But this is the moment. A moment to see that even if your hands are clean, holding up the world as it is, you're holding up a world that gives men 25% more for the same day's work. That world punishes professional women for getting pregnant. That world appoints men to our highest seats of power, who have visited nightmares upon our neighbor women.
I have a mother. A wife. A sister. Grandmothers, god rest them.
But I won't tell you a bit about them. That they're family, in this moment, shouldn't matter.
Because, it's your family next to me. It's the stranger's family. The women around you now, those people tapping on your eyelids, are reason enough to change this.
We can start by electing these women, come November.
"...a heavy finger tapping on our eyelids." perfect. Thanks for writing this
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