Speaking Truth to Power - Anita Hill [89]
Senator Biden: “Do you recall what it was?”
“Yes, I do. The name that was referred to was Long Dong Silver,” I recalled.
But these details of what had happened would not satisfy the committee. Senator Biden wanted more. “Can you tell us how you felt at the time?”
I collected myself in order to respond. “I felt embarrassed. I had given him an explanation that I thought it was not good for me, as an employee working directly for him, to go out with him. I thought that he did not take seriously my decision to say ‘no,’ and that he did not respect my having said ‘no’ to him.” I did not know any better words to explain to someone with power how it felt to be utterly powerless. Like my grandfather Henery Elliott, confronted by his white neighbor, my race (and for me my gender) gave me no right to say no to those whose gender and/or race gave them the right to decide for you. I was no better off than my grandmother Ida Elliott, who in the retelling of the story appears never to have been consulted in the matter.
“I—the conversations about sex, I was much more embarrassed and humiliated by. The two combined really made me feel sort of helpless in a job situation because I really wanted to do the work that I was doing, I enjoyed that work. But I felt that was being put in jeopardy by the other things that were going on in the office. I was really, really very troubled by it and distressed over it.” I strained to define feelings that were so basic that defining words seemed unnecessary. Nevertheless, they were feelings so foreign to the committee members that full explanations were imperative if they were to understand.
“Can you tell the committee what was the most embarrassing of all the incidents that you have alleged?”
In the back of my mind I knew that by reciting the details of my experiences I was simply responding to those who claimed that I had overreacted to Thomas’ remarks. Perhaps even Biden himself believed that the behavior which I complained about was inoffensive. Knowing why I was being asked to repeat details of the experience did not make it any easier. Yet I tried to keep the purpose in mind as I struggled to recite more of the behavior.
“I think the one that was the most embarrassing was this discussion of pornography involving women with large breasts and engaged in a variety of sex with different people or animals. That was the thing that embarrassed me the most and made me feel the most humiliated.”
“If you can, in his words—not your—in his words, can you tell us what, on that occasion, he said to you?” the senator asked, seeking even more particulars.
Within the first hour of my appearance before the committee I was asked to repeat details of experiences which I had already forced myself to describe first to Metzenbaum and staff attorney Jim Brudney, then to the committee in my written statement of September 23, then to the FBI, and finally in my opening statement. Inherent in these demands for repetition was a fundamental hostility to the claim, as though each time what I had said before had been insufficient. “Tell us … once again … what was the most embarrassing … in order for us to determine.” The hearing had only begun and I found myself wondering, “How many times … how much detail … how vulgar did the language have to be and … how uncomfortable do I have to feel in order for [them] to comprehend what happened to me?” By the end of the day, I would conclude that no amount of detail would satisfy the committee, though at no point during the day’s questioning would I consider withdrawing.
“My time is up,” Biden announced just before noon. “By the way, I might state for the record, once again we have agreed that we will go back and forth: half-hour conversation on each side.…” I had not been a part of this agreement that in essence the Democrats and Republicans would take turns with me.
“Let me yield to my friend from Pennsylvania, Senator Specter,” Biden said, concluding his “turn,” as Senator Specter prepared for his thirty-minute