**trigger warning, sexual assault and lots of cuss words**

An excerpt from today’s journal…

June 7, 2016
I have this practice going where I sit down and write for at least 30 minutes. Set a timer and just go. But I got up here to my office a little over an hour ago and so far I have browsed and nearly purchased a LOT of baby clothes, given advice that I have no business giving, and posted a hundred things about the Brock Turner Rape Case which is such bullshit and fills me with so much rage and anger that I can’t even begin to find the right words for it. Which is likely why I just keep re-posting what everyone else says, never really finding anything that expresses my heart so fully. But there’s so much to this story–how could anyone capture everything in one article or meme or video or tweet or sound bite? It’s just impossible. It makes my skin crawl but it makes me feel so strong and so emboldened.

He took that girl behind a dumpster, took her clothes off, and jammed his fingers into her in the dirt until someone saw what was happening. He ran away, they caught him. If you were having a consensual, fun, roll in the dumpster (and haven’t we all been there?)—why would your first instinct be to run away? Maybe because it was neither fun nor consensual? But that’s just my guess.
Welcome to Donald Trump’s America where you can just take whatever the hell you want just because you feel a whim and then bitch about it when the slightest breeze of disagreement brushes across your dimply, white, chicken skin.

I have to keep talking about this. I mean, I realize that I just wrote a blog post about how the internet is too quick to judge and jump on a bandwagon to drag someone through the dirt—and I do maintain that. When it comes to death threats for the mother of a toddler because she let go of his hand for a second, I maintain that outrage is not very helpful. When it comes to opening up a conversation about what is and is not consent, I promise you that it is helpful. We’re going to make this hell mean something.

I’ve always been the kind of person who says, “Maybe there’s nothing that I’m really passionate about”. But it’s not true. I’m not passionate about anything too obvious. Rock climbing! Or saving the animals! Or anything like that.
But I am passionate about consent. I’m passionate about educating the public in ways that will make us better, more compassionate, more honorable humans.

As sick and sad and horrifying as this situation is, I won’t let that woman have to go through that in vain.

I wonder, if he’d received a more appropriate sentence if she would have felt more vindicated. I wonder if she would have written such a strong and powerful letter. I wonder if it would have gone viral. I wonder if we’d be talking about it now.

Don’t get me wrong—injustice has been done here! Humanity failed this woman and the justice system failed this woman. But if we can use this situation for the glory, good God almighty, let’s seize that opportunity.

Let’s talk about what rape is. Let’s talk about what consent is. Let’s talk about what victim blaming looks like. Let’s talk about privilege. What is this privilege that I keep hearing so much about? We will talk about the flagrant, white male privilege that is running sloppy and shameless through this entire fucking story.

I don’t have enough space or time to cover all of these things in one day. But over time, we’re going to get there. We’re going to talk about this. In this space and in others. We have to do it.

XOXO, Lib