#109: Why we silence women who tell the truth (with Tiffany Bluhm)
“We’d love to believe that a woman did something to deserve it because then we can victim blame, we can isolate the event, we don’t have to address the entire complicit system. We have to build a culture where women are allowed to tell truths that could affect systems.”
This week on The Puddcast, author, speaker and podcaster Tiffany Bluhm joins us to discuss why we silence women. She unpacked the imbalance of power exposed during sexual misconduct allegations, why men are excused for their behaviour and women are blamed for it. We explored the reasons women don’t always speak up and what often happens when they do. Tiffany explained why we don’t believe those women who do speak up. All this and more, drawn from her new book, Prey Tell: Why We Silence Women Who Tell the Truth and How Everyone Can Speak Up.
Order Prey Tell: Why We Silence Women Who Tell the Truth and How Everyone Can Speak Up
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Once you’ve listened to this, make sure to check out the raw and uncut B-Side interview where my friends and I unpack the conversation in even more detail. Available exclusively on Patreon.
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Transcription
Jonathan Puddle 00:01
Hey friends, welcome back to The Puddcast with me, Jonathan Puddle. Today, I've got Episode 109 for you. My guest is Tiffany Bluhm, we talk about her new book Prey Tell: Why We Silence Women Who Tell The Truth And How Everyone Can Speak Up. I have read this book, it is a very, very important work. In this episode, you're gonna find us talking about why men get excused for their behavior, why women get blamed for it. And then why women don't speak up about the things that happened to them. And what usually happens when they do speak up, why we don't believe women, why we silence them, why we don't listen. So it's a sobering conversation but there is a lot of really important information here. And I would recommend it for everybody. I would also recommend you grab Tiffany's book, which you will find linked in the show notes. If you would like to read the text transcription of this podcast, you can find that at JonathanPuddle.com/podcast, show notes as well, you'll find that linked there. And you can see the text version of this in case you are hearing impaired or, or English isn't your first language or whatever situation might propel you to text. Let's get into the show. Tiffany, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to get to chat to you today.
Tiffany Bluhm 01:22
Oh, thanks so much for having me.
Jonathan Puddle 01:23
My pleasure. I have been sitting furiously reading through this book as quickly as I can. But I'm not a speed reader. And so I always am in this quandary, I have to read deeply or I can't read true to myself. So I'm about halfway through. And I'm loving it. It's painful. It's true. It's good. Thank you for doing this. Bravo.
Tiffany Bluhm 01:47
Thank you, thank you. It is definitely not a stocking stuffer, so I can understand why it would take a little bit more time to dive into that. When you're reading about all the cultural icons of the 90s and early 2000s that so many of us know and being able to see it through a lens that we might not always look through. And it's one that I think wherever we stand, whether we follow Jesus or not, this is an issue. The imbalance of power where women are treated as second and subjugated and silenced and slandered reduced to nothing is a conversation we have to have. And it's a conversation for both men and women. So thank you so much for reading it.
Jonathan Puddle 02:20
My pleasure. And honestly, I was gonna save this till the end, but I'm gonna say it now because it's relevant to what you just said, for men and women. It's very rare that I read a book that I would say every single human needs to go and read. And I would say that's relevant for this book. I mean, in this cultural moment, everything else going on. I was trying to think of a category of people who wouldn't benefit from reading and I couldn't come up with any.
Tiffany Bluhm 02:44
Oh, I completely agree. Completely agree. It's been it's been it's been beautiful to hear. To hear people say, "Hey, I read this and plowed through it, told my mom what happened to me, and now we're pursuing litigation against my former high school principal," or, "Hey, I bought this for my worship leader" or mothers buying it for their college-aged sons. And then those sons being like, wow, I needed this. Like, this shapes... changes everything for me. So I'm excited. I'm excited.
Jonathan Puddle 03:12
That's so good. I want to hear you talk about the content more. But I wonder first, you just tell us a little bit about yourself. And what brought you to bring this to us?
Tiffany Bluhm 03:22
Yeah. So for those of you who can't see me, which is all of you, besides Mr. Puddcast, which is most clever. I mean, that's how I've been saying. Are you calling it poodcast, puddcast?
Jonathan Puddle 03:33
Oh it's the Puddcast.
Tiffany Bluhm 03:34
It's genius. Let's be real. I mean, it's just too good. I don't know... when you thought of that I bet the most cheeky smile creeped across your face.
Jonathan Puddle 03:42
That is exactly what happened. And I figured it would be one of the world's biggest missed opportunities if I didn't do.
Tiffany Bluhm 03:47
100% 100%. So I am a writer, a speaker, a podcaster. I live in the Seattle area. And I am passionate about the intersection of justice, women and faith. I've spent most of my adult life discipling, speaking, serving and writing to women. I served with the FBI Innocence Lost Task Force to address sex trafficking, just in the Seattle area; working to create john school to address men who pick up women with Crimestoppers (which is a national organization); creating programs that walk alongside women who are transitioning out of shelters and different things like that. So in one way or another, my heart has been for women. And so often we can feel like the strong women get it, and the weak women don't. But the reality is we live in a society, in a culture where all women are often seen as second and they're often seen as worthy of being the scapegoat when a man abuses his power. So when I found myself in a situation where I spoke truth to power, which was an unpopular truth, I discovered that I was disposable, and the man who abused his power at a woman's expense was seen as indispensable. So as I grappled with the professional, societal, spiritual, financial ramifications of speaking up, it really opened my eyes to how this is not an issue that happens in a vacuum. I can't name one woman in my life or in my world, or in media, or anywhere in especially in the church who hasn't experienced some sort of silencing, not only in silencing just of sexual misconduct, which I do talk a lot about in Prey Tell (P R E Y). But really, the idea of the imbalance of power, where a woman's loyalty or reputation, body time or space is exploited. And so as we discover how these things happen, and how it's advantageous for the men in our world, to keep that ball moving down the court and to continually use them as a scapegoat and treat women as second and blame women, for their choices, we realize that that is not the way of Jesus, and the way of Jesus is whole and good. And there is reciprocity and mutuality, in its DNA. So that is why I wrote it. And it really has just been out of my own personal experience of walking through a hard system and feeling like I would lose everything. And honestly, I did. I mean, honestly, I was the breadwinner for my home. I I can't imagine where I would be professionally, if that hadn't derailed my career. And research shows that this issue, this abuse of power at a woman's expense is the leading factor to determine a woman's success, professional career and financial standing in life. So it's a pretty dangerous issue that we're talking about, one that affects every woman. And it's not only on women to solve.
Jonathan Puddle 06:41
Yeah, seriously. And every woman... I love, I love the way you wrote, I think in the introduction: "50% of the human population."
Tiffany Bluhm 06:50
Yeah.
Jonathan Puddle 06:51
And I underline that, because something about that again, just like it just punched me. And I was just like, right 50% of those made in God's image...
Tiffany Bluhm 07:01
Yeah.
Jonathan Puddle 07:01
...experience this.
Tiffany Bluhm 07:03
That's right.
Jonathan Puddle 07:04
One of the imbalances that you talked about early on is this thing about how like the onus is kind of more on women to avoid sexual abuse, you know, by not dressing provocatively and doing all these things, then it is on men to actually control themselves.
Tiffany Bluhm 07:24
Yeah, yeah. Isn't it interesting. The Greco-Roman influence of the first century, really shaped the church rather than the church shaping the culture. And so the early church fathers, they adopted this belief that women were deformed men and women were inherently evil and untrustworthy and dishonest at heart. And if you were to bed them or lay with them, you were allowing that evil into your life, you were giving yourself to lustful desires. At her request, it was the woman right, it was the woman who did this to you. So that that caught wind in the early church, even though the whole life of Jesus, we see quite the opposite. We see women emboldened, unleashed and empowered to walk in ministry and their aptitude and gifts and skills and abilities were celebrated and elevated to leadership positions. But we take and weaponize these household codes of Paul and several stories in the Old Testament to say, this is how it should be, rather than looking at Genesis 1. And then again, the life of Jesus. And the vision he's cast is where we can walk and where how we can live and how we can occupy spaces. So you think of that Greco-Roman influence, and then you fast forward to the time of the printing press, where this idea and Martin Luther really camped on that, a woman's place was in the home. And the reformation, the printing press, really, really interesting timing. But where women were at the apex of the Christian life was to be a mother and to be a wife. And so it limited their leadership and limited their voice, and it limited their power. And then you take this into that modern day and how we've architected purity culture, after the rise of the sexual revolution in the 70s, and the 80s. And it swung the pendulum so far that instead of visioneering, what God created as holistic and being able to have the hard conversations, and seeing men and women as equal, we once again demonized a woman's body, we took that patriarchal structures and scriptures and really applied them to a modern day where the internet was prevalent, where boys were given this free pass and told, especially in church culture, that it's you know, if you can keep it together, if you can keep it in your pants, and if you can hold it together, then you'll be blessed with a smokin' hot wife. And many of the girls were told, you know, modest is hottest, and it is on you—we're talking about 13 and 14 year old girls, aren't we,young girls—placed with this burden of shame and guilt that if a man were to stumble, if a man were to even just have a double take and look at them, that it was their fault that they did something to deserve it. So really, we combined the narrative of rape culture with purity culture, same side of the coin, and we instructed our young daughters, our young young daughters I am I am... Listen, I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, I was given a reason why abstinence was a good idea. I was given reasons why porn would erode my frontal cortex, what to look for in a potential mate, I don't want to discount the goodness that I gleaned from that season of life. But I also want to point out and critique how it had caused incredible harm. Research shows that many who grew up in the purity movement have the same post traumatic stress symptoms as those who were sexually abused. I mean, that is terrifying. A girl who's never been touched, but feels that if anything bad happens, it's on her that only dirty things happened to dirty girls, that they did something to deserve it. Again, as you said, earlier, we placed the onus to escape abuse of power on women and girls more than we invite boys and men to behave justly. So that really formed and shaped my understanding. And honestly, what I did was, I took that thinking into adult life and into the workforce. So when men would say things to me and comment on my appearance, or my dress, I thought it on myself, man, I should, nor in this dress today. I did something to deserve this. So seeing how that really deformed my understanding of self, my understanding of men in the workplace, my understanding of God, and it really can... has done so much damage. And I could, I mean, my DMs and my email is just blown up with similar stories, much more egregious than mine, of women who had been malformed in what they believe that their role was and how they operate around men and that they should remain small, that they should deny who they are, and especially for women of color. They're also fighting stereotypes that they're hypersexual, that they're permissive, that they're subservient. And when you add that into thinking that they deserve it, not only that they deserve it, but that they want it, you really got stereotypes that you're going to see play out in the court of law, where men are continually excused. We see it starting in junior high. We see it start, obviously, an institution educational institutional settings where schools don't want to own what's happened on their campuses and their reputation to be marred. So they'll let it go. And then that fraternity culture is taken into adult life.
Jonathan Puddle 12:11
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I had Sheila Wray Gregoire and her daughter Rebecca on the show recently talking about some of that research and evangelical programming that many of us received. Like, I mean, my wife... I'm married to a very strong woman, enneagram type eight, and in our pre-marriage counseling we were watching this VHS video series.
Tiffany Bluhm 12:35
Come on now. That's right. You were. What year was this, hold on, context boo, context.
Jonathan Puddle 12:40
Oh, this would have been 2005. So already, we should have been on DVDs. Yes, we should. We were watching VHS tapes, which is perhaps part of the theological problem. And and video number seven, said, "Dear ladies, now that you are marrying a man, your purpose is subordinate to his."
Tiffany Bluhm 13:01
Oooh...
Jonathan Puddle 13:01
God's calling for your life is to support your husband's calling, end of conversation.
Tiffany Bluhm 13:09
I'm so sorry. Can we just lay hands on your wife, I just... that breaks me and that's the thing. That's the thing. This this complementarian but also a faux egalitarian view permeated that culture and that time and that day, and still to this day, until we have proper scholars, Bible scholars, not just pastors and preachers doing and excavating the text to give us a great holistic view of reciprocity. We're going to continue to subjugate women in the name of God.
Jonathan Puddle 13:38
That's it. That is thankfully, my wife was like, "Aww, hell no." And and basically her immediate reaction was, "If that's marriage, then I'm out. Let's forget about it." But you know, we, we meet we learned, reciprocity.
Tiffany Bluhm 13:54
16 years later, you're still here. So that's good.
Jonathan Puddle 13:56
We're still here! Man, I'm so glad that I married a strong woman who, who helped call me up to this, like...
Tiffany Bluhm 14:04
Beautiful. Say it again. For those in the back, say it again. Come on, that was too good.
Jonathan Puddle 14:07
I am thankful that I married a strong woman! Like she has called me to a higher standard than anyone in the church called me to.
Tiffany Bluhm 14:18
Wow.
Jonathan Puddle 14:18
And I'm glad for us. But that is a problem for the church.
Tiffany Bluhm 14:23
Yeah. Yeah. And look what happens when women lead. It's beautiful. When women partner with men, good things happen. We, we swing that pendulum again, it's either the Billy Graham or Mike Pence rule, where women aren't even allowed into the room to help make those decisions and shape those ideas and shape those policies and culture in a way and thinking. But then the other is, you know, where women are seen that they just want to have all the power, and that's not true. You know, I think that feminism has been so co-opted that and given such a bad rap that you know, it's just this... we want to Lord over men. No, no, no. We want partnership. If we wanted what men had, we'd have to oppress a lot of people on the way there. No, we want partnership. We want to work together, because the inherent value in each other is so glorious and when we work together I mean it is just unstoppable, what can be done.
Jonathan Puddle 15:15
Yeah. Did you read Danielle Strickland's book, Better Together?
Tiffany Bluhm 15:18
I actually was just on an interview with her last night. We talked for an hour all about this. So it was a...
Jonathan Puddle 15:22
You said friends in Toronto. That's what you were referring to.
Tiffany Bluhm 15:25
I did. Yeah. Very much, and Cheryl Nembhard.
Jonathan Puddle 15:28
Oh and Cheryl? Yeah. She's awesome too. Danielle was on the show, and, you know, we were talking about the Billy Graham rule, you know, because I've had, I've worked in Christian charities most of my life until I became an author and podcaster. And, and I've had these older men say to me, "Well, the Billy Graham rules never hurt me. It's never let me down." You know, and Danielle's like, because you've got all the power and control. What about all the women that you couldn't effectively mentor because you weren't willing to engage in any level of mutuality with them, because you're afraid that they're some kind of temptress, because you haven't actually seen them for who they are.
Tiffany Bluhm 16:07
Right there: mic drop. And I just have to say, the most formative influences in my life have been men who have mentored me have promoted me have leveraged their own power and platform and resources, and opportunities to advance my place. I've had incredible examples where no impropriety was present, my loyalty wasn't exploited, my reputation wasn't exploited, my body wasn't exploited, it can be done so well, can be done so well. I mean, I feel like Canada has some great examples. But I mean, when I think of, especially in government and New Zealand, your home country or your first your mother country, we can do this well, it can be done and, and the proof is in the pudding. I don't want to spoil too much for you, since you haven't gotten to the later chapters of how we can solve this issue. But the GDP would rise by 12 billion if more women were empowered. Safer cities are designed when more women are empowered. CEOs are less risky in their decision making when more women are empowered in boardrooms. I mean, it is outrageous, the benefits not just for women but for men and women and children, when women hold power.
Jonathan Puddle 17:13
Yeah, I've read some of that research, especially with the coming out of the micro-loans in Africa. And the ways that just switching a leadership role to a woman has these diffuse, profound communal benefits. Let's roll back though, I wonder, can you talk about the cost to the to the human soul, when a woman has to contort herself, because of these imbalances because of these abuses of power, you know, playing the game, being fun, smiling at things that are actually toxic?
Tiffany Bluhm 17:53
Yeah. I think so many of us are culturally conditioned. And I think for women of color, there's a unique intersection of both race and gender where we are looking to contort ourselves to the dominant culture, to be accepted to be seen, will often talk or dress or admire or go to the same schools or achieve what dominant culture believes is popular—especially dominant white male culture—because historically, they've been the power brokers, the gatekeepers, for those of us who want to advance and as we do, the higher we get, you think we'd make more progress. But in reality, many of us are just more conditioned to stay quiet, more conditioned to default to a men's point of view, because why? We want to honor the gatekeepers who let us in. We don't want to lose our proximity to power, we don't want to lose our resources. We don't want to lose everything we've worked so hard to build. I can think of so many times I was in decision making rooms, and a comment was said where I thought to myself, that is so backwards, that is so destructive. But if I say something, I will lose my place in this room, I will lose my credibility in this room, and I will lose my influence with the rest of this system. Is that a price I want to pay? So I slowly am sitting in this water that's heating up that's boiling, to the point I don't realize I'm burning to death. Because I'm so convinced, I'm so convinced that the price of silence is an act of self preservation and I will ultimately benefit, but in reality, it destroys the soul. It destroys... it destroys us mentally. I mean, the body keeps the score, it destroys us physically. And so many women, especially before we had vernacular to describe our experiences, I mean, we must remember sexism, misogyny, sexual misconduct, sexual harassment, sexual assault... those are relatively new terms. Although these issues have been happening since day one, since the beginning of time. We really have waited... you know, until the late 60s, early 70s, that was not common vernacular. So women didn't have those words, that language, to describe their experience, like we do today. And being able to name what's happened to you, to name your experience, not just be seen as emotional. No, not just be seen as insecure, because I can't even begin to tell you how many strong women, when they brought up an issue, "Hey, that was really offensive," they were labeled as insecure. And they were never in a decision making room again, just just lost everything, by one comment by pushing back even a little bit to that patriarchal structure. So it is it's this internal cost that so many of us pay to be able to stay in the room. But in reality, if we want to architect equitable systems, not just one woman, but many women and men need to be able to name the situation for what it is, and begin to... with a humble posture, architect systems that are equitable for all. And it requires the bravery of women and allowing others to lend their strength because no woman should have to walk this alone. It is not the victim's responsibility to push the line of justice, it's all of our responsibility to push the line of justice. But then, of course, there is a specific role men have in this, because this will not change until men see their power their male, sometimes fragility, dare I say, I hope that's okay to say and be able to own: they do have power. And what would it look like to leverage that power? What would it look like to listen to women's experience, and then to take action, not just listen, vulnerably, but to take action of what they've told you, and not just write it off as emotional, or write it off as insecure or angry, whatever label we place on whatever woman depending on her race or her class, and then, again, move toward those spaces. And it would... Why do we not do this? Because silence demands nothing of us. Action requires, it could require everything, it could require a little bit. We have to be able to move these spaces because as you said, working in Christian organizations working in, in mainstream organizations, this is the norm. We have normalized this culture of the patriarchy where women, sometimes we just give up the fight because we don't see a way forward.
Jonathan Puddle 22:00
Yeah, I found I found it very convicting. There were stories that you share, there was examples and narrative that you tease out. And there was times where I'm like, oh, man, that reminds... I can remember when I said something like that...
Tiffany Bluhm 22:18
Mmhmmm.
Jonathan Puddle 22:18
I can remember. I can't remember the time I asked someone to take notes. And she was offended. And, and I didn't understand why she was offended. And we had a conversation... she spoke up and we and we spoke about it later. And I, you know, basically, she was like, why did you choose me to take notes? Why not anybody else in the meeting, including half the men in the meeting? And I had no answer. Right. And that was the problem, like, at least...
Tiffany Bluhm 22:51
So culturally conditioned, that implicit bias.
Jonathan Puddle 22:55
And that was it, I had to own that and do that work at that time. But reading through it, you know, I think the thing that was so shocking to me, because I live and work in this space, and most of what you're describing here to me was not new news. I think what was shocking to me was as you tease out how complex the system is, the idea that ultimately, practically, everybody who breaths has had some form of complicitness in this. In this, whether intentionally or not, at some stage, and it requires every one of us to wake up to that. And, and that was really sobering, but I completely agree with you.
Tiffany Bluhm 23:39
Yeah. And the complicity can be anything from asking somebody to take notes in a meeting to what we saw in Atlanta, right? Complete complicity into a patriarchal structure to eliminate is to, you know, quote, unquote, "Eliminate his temptation." So we have this huge spectrum of how complicity plays out. But unless we're willing to excavate our own heart, mind, soul, and do this work, we will continually perpetuate these cultures. And you know, who's doing a lot of this is women. And I know I'm calling out my own species over here. But truly, I think especially you know, white women often shape this narrative, and I'm an Indian immigrant woman living in the United States. I have, I have seen women turn on women. And it is a particular kind of harm. Because for many of us, we can name a monster in our life. We can name like, he done did it. This is how it happened. I knows what's happened. There's witnesses. But then to have women defend an abuser of power is particularly distressing, because it continually upholds this power, and it's a free pass for the man who abuses his power, because I couldn't possibly be the monster that you're painting me out to be if other women are going to defend me. It's his first line of defense. A man who abuses power, and research shows that men who have an ascent to power, First in, in patriarchal, evangelical Christian religious, honestly, we can broaden that scope, religious settings, will often shed the virtues that got them there in the first place. The fruit of the Spirit, you will not... you will see less of that. And more of those narcissistic tendencies that we often paint as leadership qualities, their version events distorting reality, you are there to serve their agenda. If you're not, you need to get off the bus, don't rock the boat. This is the will of God, all of those things that we've heard time and time again. But then just across the board, research shows that as you have more access to power and unchecked accountability, truly unchecked accountability, where you believe that you can get away with anything, you see yourself as a man as more sexually desirable, and will seek out sexual affairs, misconduct. And of course, not always consensual. There is a twisted view of power and one's own sexuality. As a man, when they're, when power is involved. It is sex, money, power, there's there's there's a reason those are often together and truly, it's this is not about sex. This is about power. This is about power.
Jonathan Puddle 26:11
Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I've... my experience as a man, at times had different amounts of power explicitly given, workplace settings and so on, completely agree. And even and even for many men, issues of porn come back to power. I mean, we can go even deeper and talk about emotional trauma and why we want power because we're trying to prevent harm to ourselves. Yes, you can unravel that whole thing. And if you're looking to heal yourself, you should unravel that whole thing.
Tiffany Bluhm 26:44
Come on. Amen.
Jonathan Puddle 26:45
But yeah, wow. The... you describe, you describe in the book, how and why this happens with powerful women. And the bind that people end up in, where they sort of can't do one thing and can't do another. One of the aspects of that that really stood out to me was when a powerful woman doesn't speak up, how future women who experience some form of abuse, harassment, assault, whatever, then look at the scenario and go, "Well, so and so interacted with this guy, and she never said anything. And she's a strong woman. So if she said nothing. Am I just going crazy?"
Tiffany Bluhm 27:28
Yes, again, points the arrow back, a victim will blame themselves. Victim blaming is both external and internal. And, you know, if he... I think the subtitle of that is "He's done so much for her." And I use the example of Larry Nasser, and how, you know, some of the lesser known athletes, a volleyball player, who was like, but look, he's the Olympic coach, you know, athletic physician. If he's doing this, it must be okay. Because none of these girls have said anything. Nobody's spoken up. Surely he's done so much for her. I mean, Harvey Weinstein used that same, same line. Look what I did for Gwyneth Paltrow. Do you want all these Academy Awards? Do you want to be on the red carpet? Do you want to be a household name? Do this for me, you know. And, and these women feeling like, what did I do to deserve this? There's something, there must be something inherently in me, where I'm, I'm, I'm drawing this upon myself. What have I done to deserve it? And when there, again, when other women don't speak up... but every woman is counting her cost, every woman is thinking of her proximity to power, every woman is facing self-silencing in her formative adolescent years, she had parents who silenced her for a variety of reasons. If a... you know a boyfriend took advantage of her, if she tried to speak up when she was younger, and fell silent. She's taking that that belief into adult life that she will not be heard. And then you add on to it. The cultural conditioning of NDAs, settlements and payouts and the threat that you'll lose your job. I mean, there's just so many reasons that women are silenced, both self silencing and exterior silencing. But then, when we fail to see others speak up bravely, it just begets.. Silence begets silence and bravery begets bravery and courage begets courage.
Jonathan Puddle 29:15
We will take a very quick pause so I can thank all of my Patrons. This show is made possible by my monthly and annual supporters on Patreon.com. These folks are the most encouraging, wonderful people. They keep me uplifted, they are beta readers for when I've got new material coming out. They can kinda like a sounding board where I can test ideas that I'm working on, test out theology, and they also have access to the B-Sides. Each week, I put out a B-Side to each Puddcast episode, where my friends and I kind of sit down and discuss each episode in detail. And so if you want access to the B-Sides, make sure you jump on Patreon. You can get in there for as little as $3 a month or $30 a year. Big shout out Gill and Fabian, who are my newest patrons, thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate having you. If you want to, sign up patreon.com/JonathanPuddle. Thanks, guys. Let's get back to the show.
Tiffany Bluhm 30:13
And so it is it. I even think of Doctor Christine Blasey Ford. You know, she was never intending to testify before the Senate Hearing Committee against Justice Brett Kavanaugh. And a document was leaked and many people don't know that full story even.
Jonathan Puddle 30:29
That was fascinating when you unpacked that. Because again, from I've heard from women, "Why did she... if it was that bad, she would have come forward!"
Tiffany Bluhm 30:38
Other women. Isn't that wild?
Jonathan Puddle 30:40
"She's clearly just trying to tear down a godly man!"
Tiffany Bluhm 30:44
Yes, yes. And this belief that if if something happened, women would tell right away. And that's not how trauma works, you know, we're usually very frazzled in our trauma. And many women until their late 30s, early 40s even admit that what happened happened, because we don't want to believe that we put ourselves in harm's way. So they're just reckoning with what we went through and the way our body stores trauma. And, in fact, the confusion of events and being able to communicate them in a frazzled manner is proof of trauma, not a dismissal of trauma. I mean, there's just so much to this. And other women who haven't gone through something like that, or who have denied their own trauma and their own microaggressions aren't going to be the ones to raise a flag. And here's another thing: when it's anything political we have such a hard time seeing past our own camp, our... past our own value system. And this was, this was not a political act in the fact that we demonized it to be one. It was just so... was so devastating. This is a graduate professor who knows what she's talking about, in Silicon Valley, who was just reduced to nothing. Still has private security detail to this day. And Kavanaugh's on the bench. So you see how we treat people who come forward, the world was watching, not just Americans, the world was watching how this woman was treated, how she was trending, memes of just distorting her face. I mean, it's just terrifying to think about how she was treated. So of course, we can't expect a McDonald's worker making minimum wage, when she's corralled into the bathroom on her break by her manager, to speak up if we're going to treat women who are, you know what I mean, this trickles down. And so we have to be able to build a culture where women are allowed to tell truths that could affect systems, because we'd love to believe that a woman did something deserve it, because then we can victim blame, we can isolate the event. We don't have to address the entire complicit system. Because trauma is a one-two punch, the first punch is what happened to her. The second is the complicit system saying we should come forward early if it really happened. Are you sure that even happened? What'd you do to deserve it? What were you wearing? How were you walking? Did you lead him on? All those questions that we ask that just heap on shame, is that second punch.
Jonathan Puddle 32:57
Yeah, yeah, for real, seriously. I have a question that I and I hope this doesn't come in the wrong kind of spirit. I absolutely... let us keep fostering a world where everyone speaks up and we're... as you said, courage begets courage and so on. I was discussing it with my wife and talking about strong women in the situation of you know, where a strong woman hasn't said something. And my wife was sharing with me her experiences throughout her career. And she said to me, it's a really heavy burden for a woman to carry every future woman on her shoulders. That that, in addition to all the other counting the costs that she has to do, a woman has to say, what about every single woman that comes after me? And my wife was saying that that's not to be taken lightly. But that also feels like, like, when has any man had to think, oh, what about the men who come after me? Like, that's not a thing that happens in our brains.
Tiffany Bluhm 34:06
Yeah.
Jonathan Puddle 34:07
And so I wonder. I wonder if you have thoughts on the heaviness...
Tiffany Bluhm 34:10
I definitely do. And this goes back to the what I said earlier: it is not the victim's responsibility, and in this case, we're talking about women; it is not a woman's responsibility solely to carry this. It's not. This is why Prey Tell is written for the bystander. Like, I was a bystander in my situation. Yes, I experienced the harassment, but not to the degree that others in the system did. And it was this moment of, "Not my circus, not my monkeys," or do I have a moral, ethical and Christian obligation to do something, to lend my strength in a way and to invite others to lend their strength in a way that could bring wholeness and reconciliation and healing and compensation and redress for the system particularly? And I think, going back to what your wife said, she's right, it is not on those who've experienced the harm to fix it. Sadly, the oppressed have been the one to march and demand that the dominant power players of their time and of their space and of their world bend toward justice. But we have to be able to architect a space where it's not the powerful and the powerless. We have to level that. And that's, again, what Prey Tell's all about, but demanding that it's on the victim to carry that burden alone is, is the reason we haven't had the forward movement we'd hope to, honestly.
Jonathan Puddle 35:35
Yeah, thanks. That's good. That's really, that's a really good clarification. One thing that you touched on earlier was the intersectionality of this, right? That like, I know, a lot of spaces that I spend time in, there's an awareness that feminism has really only done things for white women. And you know, so you have mujeristas and womanist voices and other pieces being added to, but I think the example that you use that, that I'd love to hear you unpack more is the difference in treatment between someone like R. Kelly, and Harvey Weinstein, because I remember hearing about R. Kelly, like, like five or six years ago, just like rumors, but nothing like Harvey Weinstein.
Tiffany Bluhm 36:15
Yeah, I mean, isn't it wild? When we think of... when you think of R. Kelly, it took Lifetime, a cable channel making like trashy movies for women, to do an exposé on this guy, for the Department of Justice and the FBI, and different states to get involved. I mean, we're talking about edutainment, you know, like, being the driving force, women's women created content. And so, you know, everyone experiences this, every woman experiences this as we've definitely already laid that foundation. But the response is varied. Depending on your class, and on your race, on your age, on your immigration, or citizenship status is all is varied. So you look at R. Kelly, and we're talking about under-age girls that he had in this harem that he lured in at concerts and their parents are trying to get them back and get a hold of them. And they don't even know where they are and the authorities won't help them because the girls don't want to come home. They've been you know, just brainwashed into his way of thinking and doing things.
Jonathan Puddle 37:21
And if I can just... we say under-age, which is accurate. But I mean, I think in some cases they were children,
Tiffany Bluhm 37:26
Yes. Under age... yes, they're children. They were children. I mean, we're talking 12, 13, 14 year old girls, this is terrifying stuff. And and it's estimated that over 1000 people who knew R. Kelly knew what he was doing. We're talking everybody from music industry marketing executives, down to craft services, making sure the bagels and cream cheese were on set for his music videos. A lot of people knew what he was doing. And when it finally came out, first of all, the fact that nobody was willing to be like, "This is wrong, I don't care that you're a cultural icon. This is wrong." That's a problem. Why? Because he made money. You see the response to his victims was don't speak up against your own community. How dare you attack this man of our time. Who'se an R&B legend. What are you doing for the black community? I mean, just all just demonizing these... we're taking again, like you said, children, we're demonizing these children and punishing them for finally getting the bravery and just being able to escape that toxic culture, and even their own families turning against them for speaking up against R. Kelly. And the public, of course. And then you have Harvey Weinstein, the you know, Gwyneth Paltrow and Ashley Judd and Rose McGowan are seen as heroes of the #metoo movement. And they are resource, they have a voice, they have a platform, they're well known, they're household names. Their treatment has been outrageously different. Now the harm isn't different. They, the both of these women experienced outrageous harm. They were afraid for their lives and their livelihood and their future and their reputations, and their bodies, and that is egregious. But the idea that white women have shaped this, and women of color have always been seen as either hyper-sexual, as I mentioned earlier, or deserving or subservient, is is really halted societal sympathy and empathy necessary for them to get the healing that they need. And it is it is one that I pray that resourced women would see as, "How can I leverage this?" Because at the same time that R. Kelly and Harvey Weinstein when that was hitting national news, that very same time this McDonald's case where 1000s of women in a class action lawsuit came against their employers... and McDonald's still to this day isn't held liable for all the harassment and misconduct that's happened on their premises of their franchises. That's been happening to low wage earning women who they gotta show up to work so they can feed their babies. You know, I think of one case where it was a mother and daughter both worked at McDonald's and they lived together. And then the daughter had a baby as well. So she's got grandma and mom and baby. And both of them are being fondled and harassed and groped while they're trying to take a Big Mac order. But they feel like what can I do? How am I, how am I going to feed my kids? How am I going to pay my light bill? So we have this, the way we even react class wise, is particularly painful. But when you see specifically black women treated so poorly, you think of Anita Hill, you think of obviously, R. Kelly's victims and the list goes on and on. The term, Moya Bailey, she's a scholar, she calls it misogynoir. This mysogeny against the black community is particularly painted in this revisionist view, where women again somehow deserved it even more, or that they are inherently worth less, therefore there's not as cause for concern.
Jonathan Puddle 41:00
Yeah, yeah, wow. I'm really, I'm... yeah. Again, your work is so thorough. And you, you really dismantle each of these bits and pieces so well. For those again, who just don't know yet the book is called Prey Tell: Why We Silence Women Who Tell the Truth and How Everyone Can Speak Up. The first section is sort of like, why this happens. And then again, the how it happens. And again, it's just so illustrative in terms of all the ways intentional, but especially unintentional, just cultural formation, things that are normative for us, but that are wrong. So I haven't got into the final third yet. So I haven't heard you lay out how we can start speaking up. So I, I want everyone to read the book. But I would love if you can give me... What's a preview or a trailer of what I'm going to find once I get to the last third?
Tiffany Bluhm 41:57
Well, I'll tell you what, it's encouraging. And it really points back to Jesus' encounter with women and how we have evidence that he not only wanted their salvation, of course, but he protected their reputation and their bodies. We often see his physical protection his, his intent to protect their reputation, even if it put him in harm's way. You think of the woman caught in adultery, the fact that he aptly put in his own bystander intervention that we see, you know, executed in the military and universities. He went in the moment, he disrupted the situation. And we're talking, you know, before we say something on CNN or BBC News, we could be part of the answer. And it could be so simple that sometimes we're willing to overlook it. When we laugh, at coarse joking, when we turn the other way, when we see a little bit of imbalance or impropriety, we don't have to do those things. We don't have to laugh it off. We don't have to walk away thinking this is just the way it is. If we see something, we can walk in the middle and just change the situation. I'm going to give an example. Let's say Doug and Rosie, maybe they're at the water cooler. Maybe when they're in the foyer at church, I don't know. But you notice Doug is kind of posturing. He's got kind of a dominant voice. And Rosie's darting her eyes and you're like, something's not right here. You go in, "Hey, Rosie, I had something at the coffee machine. Did you want to? Did you want to check that I wanted to fill you in on a meeting that we have later." Just disrupt the situation, just change the subject. And then you go back to Doug later and say, "Hey, Doug, did you see how you came across to Rosie, I don't think she really appreciated that." Doug's been seen. Doug's on watch. And then we go to Rosie say, "I might be totally off base. But were you uncomfortable in that?" Being able to lend your eyes and lend your presence in that moment before something kicks off that I'm talking about, pre... before we talking about the vision of what could be, just preventing it. She might say, I don't I don't I don't feel comfortable with that. Or she might break down be like he's been hounding me for months and I'm so uncomfortable around him, or he took advantage... may not know what to do. Or it could be nothing and you say, "Rosie, I'm always here. If you need to go to HR with somebody, if you need to go talk to me to go talk to an elder. If you need to call the police. I want you to know I'm here for you." Because the, one of the main reasons women don't speak up is because they don't have somebody to go the journey with them. They don't have somebody to walk alongside them. And again, the bystander we have a role to play. But now that these things already have happened, what do we do? First we must lament, we have to lament that this is even happening. Denial is part of the problem. You think of Bill Hybels, Carl Lenz, Ravi Zacharias, Andy Savage, the list goes on. And what's our first reaction? Oh, that could have never happened. My guy could never do that. Why? Because if somebody has been generous, benevolent and kind, it's a dissonant position to believe that they're both capable of good and evil. But to accept that they are capable of good and evil. And so just reconciling that and grieving that harm happens. Interior collectively grieving, we must lament. Without that act of lament, we cannot walk this out for righteousness. We can't walk this out where women will be valued. After we lament, we have to listen. So many women will not speak up because the, those who are listening will shame them. They'll ask those questions like, what were you wearing? Where were you... but what did you say first, we'll find a way to victim blame as we listen to her. So to withhold judgment, because what happens is we often provide how we think we would have acted in a moment of a microaggression, or trauma or some sort of experience where there was an imbalance... we respond to her with how we think we would have acted rather than her lived experience with her own formation and thoughts and feelings and freeze response or flight response of how she acted in the moment. We must not trump up our what we would have done in theory over what she actually lived through. So to consider our body language, consider our facial expressions, truly listen, without trying to solve it, without trying to make it smaller than it is. But just simply listening. We're not looking for evidence. We're not trying to downplay it, we're not trying to be outraged. We're letting her tell her story. Because there's an act of healing just in being able to talk about it. And the next we have to learn how these things happen, because they're going to continue to happen unless, as we've talked about so much in our in our conversation, unless we're willing to do the work. And then lastly, we have to pursue love as justice in the, in the faith community specifically. We're so quick to offer forgiveness, without pursuing justice, and we serve a God of justice, we serve a savior of justice, again, same side of the coin. And often forgiveness is given without repentance, where there's no evidence that this person wants or will change, but we're told to just forgive and move on. Because we'd love for there to be a short expiry date on a woman's pain, because we don't want to deal with that. We haven't created systems to walk her through her wholeness, therefore, I decided that you're not struggling and you need to get over it. So to truly pursue justice for all... I believe it was Dr. Cornel West who said, "Love out loud, love in public is justice." So truly, if it's calling the police if it's going to another, pursuing justice for all, not just for the perpetrator.
Jonathan Puddle 47:01
So good. So good, Tiffany. Friends, make sure you go and grab this book. It'll be linked in the show notes. Tiffany, where can people find out more about you and your work?
Tiffany Bluhm 47:11
Yeah, everything is at TiffanyBluhm.com. B L U H M. You can read the first chapter for free, you can listen to the first chapter for free. You can see the book club guide, you can watch the trailer, all the good stuff, links to your favorite mainstream and indie retailers.
Jonathan Puddle 47:26
Tiffany, would you, would you pray for us as we seek to put ourselves into this and be responsible?
Tiffany Bluhm 47:34
Yeah. God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God of Rahab, Tamar and Deborah. God of Mary Magdalene, God of the adulterous woman. You are a God of redemption, and wholeness. You're one who uplifts, you came and sent your son to move the moral arc of the universe toward justice. This was the freedom and liberation you spoke of both individual and societal. And Lord, would you both enrage and empower us to play our role in human history? One of goodness and righteousness, one that enables women to be the voice, to be the leaders to be the mothers and the daughters and the sisters, and simply the human beings that you created. Not to be complicit in systems that tear down, but enabling ones that uplift goodness and reciprocity. This is your command. These are your marching orders. Let us never weaponize or twist scripture to fit our view or agenda, to play small. Let us not give in to the idea that silence is acceptable, when silence is violence. But let us use our voice. Let us lend our strength. Let us walk alongside our sisters and our brothers. To bring heaven to earth. We love you. Have your way in our lives. Amen.
Jonathan Puddle 49:07
Amen. Thank you, Tiffany. Friends, go check the show notes you will find links to order Tiffany's very important book Prey Tell: Why We Silence Women Who Tell the Truth and How Everyone Can Speak Up. And I gotta be honest, I've been looking at, I've been reading this book and I've been looking at it sitting on my on my table in the living room. And it only just occurred to me right now, what the title means. Cuz even though I knew the spelling wasn't pray, tell like P R A Y, like "Pray tell, what are you trying to say?" It didn't really click until about 45 seconds ago. And it's talking about prey, like predators and pray. So I hope that occurred to everyone else sooner than it did to me. But there you go. Now you know the truth. So thankful for Tiffany, thankful for her work. Go follow her on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, @TiffanyBluhm, B, L U H M. Everything's in the show notes, of course, as well as the transcription. Friends. I'm excited to keep doing this week by week. We've got a wonderful episode scheduled for next week, all about depression. Last week, we had Morgan Harper Nichols on the show. In January, I wasn't totally sure how much longer I want to continue with the podcast, I was just tired... but somehow we got into a thrilling new series of episodes and I am just loving. I'm having a wonderful time. I have no, I have no desire to not keep going. A lot of that is thanks to your feedback and your support. Thank you everybody. Much love. You'll find me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, tiktok, even, @JonathanPuddle. Much love. I'll catch you next week.