Chana Joffe-Walt
Act 3, "Onnesha."
Most other girls quit being friends with boys earlier, but Onnesha was 13, and she still liked her friends. That summer, she hung out with the same boys she always had, in the same places-- the kitchen, her friend's basement playroom, or--
Onnesha
We would all go to the pool together, and I had this tie dyed bathing suit, this one-piece. And you know, like, most of my other friends were, like, wearing bikinis. But you know, it was like, no, I'm good.
Chana Joffe-Walt
At the snack bar, they would get popsicles.
Onnesha
You know, there would always be, like, talk about the scene at the pool, you know, like, talking about different girls, that would occasionally be part of a conversation. I think they probably reined it in when I was around, but there would occasionally be comments. And so they were, like, they had named someone The Hypnotizer. Like, there was this title for some woman.
Chana Joffe-Walt
It would have been nothing if it was like the other girls they talked about, a passing thing. But this one persisted for weeks.
Onnesha
It got to a point, I recall, where they talked about it enough that I was like, oh, who is she? You know, I wanted to be in on it. I was, like, show her to me, you know. And they were all cryptic about it. They were like, oh The Hypnotizer, The Hypnotizer. Oh, she's here. Or, like, did you see The Hypnotizer. And I can't remember how I found out, but eventually I found out it was me.
Chana Joffe-Walt
It was the first time Onnesha had the feeling. There was her, and there was someone else she hadn't known was there, a person who looked good to these boys, her friends.
Onnesha
I guess a part of me was pleased by that, but the more prevalent feeling was like whiplash. They were talking about me in front of me. It's like there was the me that was present and there and interacting with them, and then there was this other separate, objectified body. It just feels like this whole other person enters the room.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Another person who is you?
Onnesha
Yeah. Well, or I guess, fundamentally, I felt the same. But suddenly, I had to reckon with the fact that I did not look the same to other people.
Chana Joffe-Walt
It was obvious to Onnesha how to reckon with that. She needed to crush that other person. She did not want to wear the tie dye bathing suit ever again. She slouched. She wore baggy clothes. It wasn't like a decision or anything, it was just instinct. She watched the girls in bikinis that summer, and considered if they somehow had the opposite instinct, or maybe they had made a decision to actively try to merge the two girls, the one with breasts and the one from before. It really seemed easy for some of them, like they welcomed it.
Onnesha
And a part of me wishes that I could do that, sort of own it, you know, and, like, use it like a power. And it's just never struck me as a power. It feels like a false power. It feels like if that is somehow getting me attention, like it could turn. Like, that's not a safe kind of power to traffic in.
Chana Joffe-Walt
By the time Onnesha met Don, she wouldn't have been able to say if wearing loose clothing was her fashion sense or strategy. She was 23 years old. She'd been guarding against that separate person, The Hypnotizer, for a decade by that point. AlterNet was Onnesha's first real job, the first time she had a desk that was hers, the first time she learned a male colleague was getting paid more than her for the same work, the first time she asked for a raise from her boss, Don, which did not go how Onnesha expected.
Onnesha
Yeah, so I, like, build this whole case, and I get in there, and I'm nervous. I have my opening foray where I'm just like, you know, I've been doing x and y, and the quality of the work I've been doing, how I've been working really hard, and I'm like, you know, and it's hard to survive in this city on such a low salary.
He just, like, latched onto that. And he kind of leaned in, and was like, oh, are you having trouble paying rent? And I remember that so specifically, because it was like, my rent. It was so oddly personal, and unnecessary, and out of left field, and I was completely disarmed. And I didn't know how to respond. And I think I just sort of stuttered, and was like, no, it's not that.
Chana Joffe-Walt
He wasn't offering to pay her rent directly, just did she need a salary increase to help pay her rent, which Onnesha did not want to talk about.
Onnesha
I don't remember whether I said no, I'm not having trouble paying rent. I think I'd tried to avoid answering that, because I didn't want-- I felt like that was none of his business. But when I tried to shift the conversation back to this is about being compensated, I don't remember if he got angry angry, but he was definitely visibly displeased. And he did not want to give me a raise.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Instead, he offered her a title change.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Wait, but had you-- what would have happened had you said, yeah, I am having trouble paying my rent.
Onnesha
He would have won.
Chana Joffe-Walt
What do you mean, he would have won?
Onnesha
He would have won a little corner of more power over me.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Wait, but would he have paid it? Would you have--
Onnesha
Probably.
Chana Joffe-Walt
--gotten money.
Onnesha
He probably would have.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Oh, so you would have won. You would have gotten more money.
Onnesha
No, I would have lost.
Chana Joffe-Walt
Onnesha felt like Don was not talking to her, but to The Hypnotizer, that he did not want to engage her as a professional discussing her compensation, but as an attractive young woman struggling with her rent. He didn't want to be a boss paying for her work, but a savior paying for her life. Onnesha didn't want that kind of help.
Onnesha
Maybe it's kind of petty, but I was like, you are not going to win.
Like, you don't get to have this.
Chana Joffe-Walt
So she won, but she didn't get a raise.