Hill/Thomas

I enjoyed this chapter—it was like watching a DVD with the commentary on. The “story chapter” is always a good choice because I’m able to keep myself from blanking out for 40 pages by convincing myself I’m having fun.

It seemed power played a significant role throughout this chapter. I’ll breeze through a few main points:

Power and threats – Good lord! I did not care for the implication in Simpson’s little speech that “[Hill] will be injured” or that harassment of the sexual kind isn’t “real” (or at least not as real as the beating in court that Hill was promised). Lakoff makes a good point: The powerful don’t need to come right out and say what they’re threatening because anyone who’s aware of the power aligned against them already knows the threat.

Power and race v. gender – Who knew race trumps gender? It was interesting how Hill’s defenders tip-toed around the issue of race, not wanting to be labeled racist, while Thomas’s defenders didn’t seem to care about seeming sexist and used “the race card” to their advantage, building power against Hill’s “gender” case.

Power and position – Lakoff describes Thomas as “a long-time Washington insider.” Clearly, he knew the ropes, knew the people, and knew how to work the system. Hill pretty much just knew Thomas, which didn’t get her anywhere. As a result, Thomas was able to use his pre-existing status to stay one step above Hill.

Power and questions – This is where it gets juicy (not really) and we can see how people recognize the importance of power. If asking a question is really a sign of weakness, and if during a trial people ask a lot of questions, then somewhere people begin to find ways of flipping power to their side even when they’re admitting weakness (asking questions). Thus, the tag (Is that correct?), which “emphasizes the power of the questioner to force a response.”

Since “no comment” can’t be used to respond to a question during a trial, power is given to the questioner. As a result, Thomas was able to give a lot of “yes/no” answers, which painted him as clear-headed and in control. Hill, meanwhile, was encouraged into rambling responses making her seem more unsure than Thomas.

(Urgh, this is getting long so just one more.)

Power and titles – “Professor” and “Judge” are clearly titles of distinction, while “Miss,” “Ms.,” and “Anita” imply informality, lack of status, and lack of deserved respect. By never calling Hill by her title as “Professor,” Thomas and his defendants were taking her down little notches on the power scale to make her seem less reliable than he is as “Judge.”

In conclusion, I’m not happy with Lakoff for ruining the plot of Thelma and Louise for me.