In the fraught national discussion we’re having about what Donald Trump said about kissing and assaulting women, there seem to be two camps: The Words Matter people, and the Just Words people.
I am a Words Matter person, and I believe saying things out loud matters a great deal.
Coaches, trainers, and therapists will tell you, saying something out loud gives the words power. It changes your brain, and taking ownership of the words changes your relationship with the idea. We are complex animals— awash in hormones, emotions, ideals, and desires. The words that flit and somersault through our brains are the product of all those competing internal drives; some exalted, many base. But the words we say out loud are choices— choices that we make about who we are and how we connect.
To claim that it’s ‘political correctness’ to not spew every angry, petty, shortsighted, belittling idea that skitters across our lobes is false. It’s deciding that you own who you are in the world.
When I was growing up, everyone I knew was fairly racist. Many of those people not only experienced the prejudices; they used, and therefore owned, the words that gave that sin so much power. In some families it was impolite to use the words, even though the sentiments were there. But if you don’t say them out loud, the ideas wither. And when your children don’t hear the words out loud they don’t live like truths, they exist like other ideas, to be examined and possibly discarded. It works both ways. Other words that also were considered impolite, like racist, gain power when they’re said out loud. And when we say those words out loud, we own that place in the world.
People counter with “everybody thinks that stuff.” Sure. But people who say it out loud have made a choice to own it. To be that person. To fly that flag. We should take them at their words.
I have a husband and a son and a brother and nephews. I don’t presume to know what it’s like to ride around on that strange horse, but I know their character because they speak it and show it. Donald Trump didn’t say what he said because he’s a man. He said it because he has chosen to be an individual who lives as a predator in the world. And he doesn’t deserve the cover of gender, or the opportunity to soften his fall with our brothers and sons and husbands.