Brief Interviews With Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace Page A

to say that’s a good thing, I’m not saying that, nobody’s going to say the sick bastards that did it shouldn’t go to jail. Nobody’s suggesting she was liking it while it was happening or that it should have happened. But let’s put two things into the perspective here. One is, afterwards she knows something about herself she didn’t know before.’
    Q.
    ‘What she knows is that the totally most terrible degrading thing that she ever could have even imagined happening to her has really happened to her now. And she survived. She’s still here. I’m not saying she’s thrilled, I’m not saying she’s thrilled about it or she’s in great shape or clicking her heels together out of joy it happened, but she’s still here, and she knows it, and now she knows something. I mean really knows . Her idea of herself and what she can live through and survive is bigger now. Enlarged, larger, deeper. She’s stronger than she ever deep-down thought, and now she knows it, she knows she’s strong in a totally different way from knowing it just because your folks tell you or some speechmaker at a school assembly has you all repeat you’re Somebody you’re Strong over and over. Alls I’m saying is she’s not the same and how some of the ways she’s not the same—like, if she’s still afraid at midnight walking to her car in a parking garage or whatever of getting jumped and gang-raped, now she’s afraid in a different way. Not that she wants it to ever happen again, getting gang-raped, no way. But now she knows it won’t kill her, she can survive it, it won’t obliterate her or make her, like, subhuman.’
    Q….
    ‘And plus now also she knows more about the human condition and suffering and terror and degradation. I mean, all of us will admit suffering and horror are part of being alive and existing, or at least we all pay lip service to knowing it, the human condition. But now she really knows it. I’m not saying she’s thrilled about it. But think how much bigger now her view of the world is, how much more broad and deep the big picture is now in her mind. She can understand suffering in a totally different way. She’s more than she was. That’s what I’m saying. More of a human being. Now she knows something you don’t.’
    Q.
    ‘That’s the knee-jerk reaction, that’s what I’m talking about, taking everything I say and taking and filtering it through your own narrow view of the world and saying what I’m saying is Oh so the guys that gang-raped her did her a favor. Because that’s not what I’m saying. I’m not saying it was good or right or it should have happened or that she’s not totally fucked up by it and shattered or it ever should have happened. For any one case of a woman getting gang-raped or violated or whatever, if I was there and I could have the power to either say Go ahead or Stop, I’d stop it. But I couldn’t. Nobody could. Totally terrible things happen. Existence and life break people in all kinds of awful fucking ways all the time. Trust me I know, I’ve been there.’
    Q.
    ‘And I get the feeling this is the real difference. You and me here. Because this isn’t really about politics or feminism or whatever. For you this is all ideas, you think we’re talking about ideas. You haven’t been there. I’m not saying nothing bad ever happened to you, you’re not badlooking and I bet there’s been some degradation or whatever that came your way in your life. That’s not what I’m saying. But we’re talking Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning –Holocaust-type total violation and suffering and terror here. The real Dark Side. And baby I can tell just from just looking at you you never. You wouldn’t even wear what you’re wearing, trust me.’
    Q.
    ‘That you might admit you believe yeah OK the human condition is full of terrible awful human suffering and you can survive almost anything or whatever. Even if you really believe it. You believe it, but what if I said