Let’s be clear: Matt Gaetz paid a 17-year-old girl for sex. He did not “sleep with a prostitute,” which is what some right-wing outlets will tell you. Gaetz, who at the time was 35 years old, paid a girl not old enough to attend college to sexually pleasure him at an invite-only party in Orlando, Florida, then paid her using Venmo.

Oh, Gaetz. What a man. What a politician.

Could you imagine if Pam Bondi, Trump’s new attorney general pick, a former Florida AG, had these sorts of bones in her closet? That it came out that she had had sex at some sleazy party with a boy below voting age? She’d be dead in the water, never to work again, called disgusting by politicians on both sides of the aisle — but because Gaetz is a white man from a good Florida family, he gets off easy.

To All My Feminists Out There:

How do we break the train of wrath wrought by men like Gaetz and Trump? Men who have never had to live in fear because of their caste in the social order. The only fear they face is not living up to their destiny, ordained by white wealth — to have a good, innocent wife to raise the children in their big house while he goes off to work in the world — even granted an unspoken gift to look at other women outside marriage, a present awarded to himself by his own ego, enabled by the patriarchy, reinforced by mass American media that implies women want to be housewives, submissive players in Life.

And some women really do want that — I have a few friends who married in their early twenties — but most have been conditioned into believing it’s what they want. Or so I feel. Later down the line, studies show women who work outside the home report higher feelings of fulfillment than women who stay at home. Hearing this fact can breed resentment from women who’ve chosen the homemaking path — and that’s not what I want to happen. I know housework is work and that women raise the leaders who make it to political power (even though men often forget it).

More than that, I can’t tell you how often I think about finding a good boyfriend to take care of me, freeing myself from the need to work, to make money on my own. But for me these moments are fleeting, and I remember: I don’t want to be dependent on a man. I understand why women marry older men to make them feel safe. And to them I say, more power to you. It’s hard to be a woman in this world. I am privileged to have financial help from my parents.

So I will never look at a woman with side eye for wearing a short skirt or smiling when a man catcalls her on the street. I have been there. I have felt that insecure before. I feel that way often, but then I read feminists like Gloria Steinem and remember how amazing women are. All we need to do is to stay strong for each other. Support women. Believe women. And if you are a woman: read more women, listen to more women, take advice from more women.

While I’m not sure what my future entails, I know that I want to help other young women see their worth in this world.

“Far too many people are looking for the right person, instead of trying to be the right person”

Gloria Steinem