One good thing

LAST WEEK’S hearing with Judge Brett Kavanaugh and his accuser, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, stirred a lot of emotions across the country. It left plenty of people inside Washington—and outside Washington—thinking that this country, or at least its Senate, had sunk to a new low.

But we’d like to make the case that at least one good thing has come out of Dr. Ford’s testimony: Her courage to take the oath, testify publicly and detail her own sexual assault has given courage to other survivors to come forward.

Victims of rape and sexual assault often say they don’t talk about their attacks for a number of reasons: fear, shame, pain and so much more. As a result, many who should be in prison simply go free about their lives, perhaps able to continue assaulting victims. While America is busy fighting about whether Judge Kavanaugh should be raised to the U.S. Supreme Court, previously silent victims and survivors are taking the initiative to step forward into the spotlight themselves, grab the microphone and reveal their own tragic tales. For some, this means closure. For others, it means justice. Perhaps, for many, it means healing.

If there’s one thing this entire process has taught us, it should be the importance of listening. That doesn’t mean an automatic guilty verdict for people accused of such heinous acts. It just means listening to both the victim and accuser.

And we need to give the accused a chance to defend himself—and it’s almost always a him—before rushing to judgment. False accusations, although a rarity, are a reality. And it doesn’t take much to ruin someone’s reputation in the days of 24/7 news cycles and social media.

We’d say the jury is still out on the Ford/Kavanaugh situation, but the truth is, neither are on trial. There may never be a verdict. The only thing we can say for sure is that in many precincts in this country, there needs to be more . . . listening.

As a great Teacher once said: He who has ears, let him hear.