A response to the hostile, condescending and all-too-familiar emails women receive simply for speaking publicly with authority.
Dear Reader,
I am not alone in receiving unsolicited emails—especially as a professor, public writer and thinker, and woman who dares to speak her mind. Often, the emails are thoughtful, engaging and sometimes deeply moving expressions of gratitude that warm the heart. However, from time to time, there are the crude, crass and obtuse intruders, thrusting insults and even threats into our inboxes. These expressions of masculine fragility and anger—whether intended to or not—chill the receiver’s speech and cause women to silence themselves.
Here, then, is my response to Mr. Sawyer—but also, in many ways, a response to the countless men who insert themselves into women’s inboxes with condescension, hostility and misplaced certainty. Women in public life know these messages well: the unsolicited lectures, the attempts at intimidation, the casual cruelty masquerading as critique. Consider this every woman’s letter to the crass and crude male intruder in her inbox. I hope you enjoy.
Dear Mr. Sawyer,
I hope you are well. Thank you for your passionate email and expressing your feelings today. We do not know each other and have never met. Given this, you took some effort to reach me after viewing a clip on the local news. It is not uncommon for women to receive communications laden with vitriol and aspersions from men they do not know and have never met.
As a law professor, I work with facts, evidence and analysis. I also share opinions—but opinions grounded in reality. There is a difference between what “would have” happened and what actually did happen. That difference matters. It is the difference between an argument rooted in fact and one driven by assumption, emotion or misinformation. Or inaccuracy.
I take emotions seriously, so I do not fault you for expressing yours. But the news coverage in question was not about feelings—it was about facts.
The information surrounding President Trump’s visit to China and his meetings there is publicly available and easy to verify. I encourage you to look at the reporting closely. Compare sources. Examine the evidence. Ask yourself what is true, not simply what feels satisfying to believe. One of the greatest intellectual failures is ignoring facts that complicate your worldview while clinging tightly to those that confirm it. Good thinkers—and good students—learn to confront inconvenient facts honestly.
Today, you objected to my reference to a longstanding democratic principle: that presidents of the United States should not personally profit—or appear to profit—from public office while serving in it. That expectation extends to their children and family members as well.
Yet the words you reserved for me were “dishonest” and “disgusting,” not for the erosion of that principle itself. What seems to have offended you was not corruption or the appearance of self-dealing, but the act of naming it. Your feelings were hurt? That is worth reflecting on.
Mr. Sawyer, try not to cling too strongly to the one or two facts that satisfy you or make you feel good, while bypassing, neglecting or discarding the other more obvious facts and realities. If you follow this advice, it will enhance your reasoning skills and could potentially make you a stronger thinker.
The best thinkers confront honestly the facts that might otherwise hurt their arguments or challenge their feelings. Today, your email fell short.
I advise that if you should ever write to me again, you do so with greater reflection, reason, discernment and judgment. Bring a rigorous argument rooted in fact and robust analysis, rather than hot emotion and fragile feelings. I encourage you to guard against slipping into cheap and sophomoric rhetoric and disparagement simply because you struggle against a set of facts. Certainly, you must see yourself as better than that?
Should you wish to learn, I recommend that you start with the Emolument Clauses: Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 and Article II, Section 1, Clause 7 of the Constitution.
You might also consider The Wall Street Journal’s reporting, here and here.
Or if you are more of a viewer than a reader, this short clip from Bloomberg may be the right speed for you.
Or you might consider the analysis from think tanks such as the Brennan Center to offer greater insight.
There are countless credible sources available to help you better understand the Constitution’s emoluments principles and how they have applied to former presidents—including former presidents and their family members. A simple internet search will provide ample reporting, legal analysis and historical context should you choose to engage with it.
Finally, I encourage you to use a thesaurus and choose words with greater precision and nuance to sharpen your thinking. Insults and tirades can expose a lack of thought and reflection. The kind contained in your email was neither original nor clever. Rather than strengthening your argument, the disparagement distracted from it and ultimately came across as sloppy, dull and unimaginative. Try to do better.
Be well and keep reading—for a mind is a terrible thing to waste.
—Dr. Michele Goodwin
Editor’s note: You may also like On the Issues With Michele Goodwin, the Ms. podcast where Goodwin and guests report, rebel and tell it just like it is, with multiple new episodes per month.
