I say no to things

And am I the only one who felt a little anxious during the eclipse?

Last week, a reporter from the Associated Press e-mailed me. There was a news story related to my area of expertise¹ and he was looking of that ‘expert opinon’ (see previous footnote). I don’t know what his angle on the story was—if it was one I would have agreed with or not. I’m often wary of the way many reporter use ‘expert opinions’ in their articles, anyway.

None of that is why I said no.

I got the e-mail on the day of the eclipse, which meant it was already an anxious sort of day. Watching the sun slowly disappear was, yes, awesome. Also, anxiety-provoking. I forgot how the wind picks up. How the temperature drops. I forgot how wrong an eclipse feels on some deep cosmic level to a creature, like me, whose existence is dependent on that great, glowing orb.² Maybe I just forgot how so many things that used to be delightful are threaded through with anxiety in 2024, in this world we live in where anxiety is always lurking. Sometimes everything seems edged with fear.

I was already unsettled when I got the e-mail, is what I’m saying. I’ve been reading a series of essays by women who are public figures about the harassment they face online, but also sometimes also in the communities where they live. I’m not going to lie. This is scary stuff.

I am not famous or, as far as I can tell, much subject to online harassment. In my inbox, I have a folder labeled ‘Angry People.’ It’s a collection of e-mails I received last year when CNN published an op-ed I wrote about gender and athletic ability.³ The folder would be more accurately labeled ‘Angry Men,’ but not all of the men I heard from were angry, so I was trying to be fair.⁴

Photo by Daniel Herron on Unsplash

No one in these e-mails threatened me. They told me I was stupid, but not ugly. They called me a clown, but no one used ‘bitch’ or ‘cunt.’ I got off pretty easy, all in all.

I’m not going to lie to you and tell you that it felt good to get those e-mails or to see those Tweets. It did not. I’m glad I wrote the op-end. It didn’t change my life. It didn’t get me a book deal. It did put my nervous system on high alert for about 72 hours.

There’s every chance that nothing similar would have happened if I’d talked to the reporter. There’s every chance, given how AP articles get picked up by other media outlets, that it would have been even worse. There’s every chance that the contents of that ‘Angry People’ folder would have doubled or tripled. Who knows? Not me, because I said no.

“It won’t sell any books,” I said to my husband that day as I was thinking through my decision out loud.

“No, it won’t,” he agreed.

Maybe you disagree. Maybe it’s worked for you. Certainly, if I still had an agent or an editor, they probably would have told me to talk to the reporter. Publicity and all that. They wouldn’t have to read the angry e-mails.

Anyway, as a writer in 2024—in this publishing ecosystem—I don’t need an agent or editor telling me that. I’ve internalized those voices already. Say yes to all of it. Put yourself out there. Go viral. Hustle and dance and damn the consequences.

“I don’t want to do it,” I said to my husband.

“You don’t have to,” he said.

I said no. What I think about the topic the reporter wanted to talk about is perfectly clear. I’ve written about it again and again.

I said no and maybe that makes me a coward, but it’s an ugly place for women online. It’s ugly for Black people and trans folx and disabled people and so many types of people. I appreciate the people who say yes and then withstand the storm. I sat this one out.

I said no and the older I get the more no’s I want to say. I want to say no to making and posting videos on Substack. I want to say no to figuring out a new algorithm. I want to say no to anything that doesn’t feel absolutely right and—is this too much to ask?—relatively safe.

This is the only life I have. I want to live the rest of it as well as I can. I want to make a calmer world for myself. One of the building blocks for that life is made up of no’s.

1. Of course, I don’t think of myself as having areas of expertise, because in academia that would mean you have studied the same very narrow topic for at least twenty years (I have not), on top of the fact that I do no original research. That, and imposter syndrome, leads me to deny any expertise. Nonetheless, to an AP reporter, nonfiction book by a college professor = expertise.

2. Like, almost everything I eat (okay, except mushrooms) can be traced back to plants which are fucked without the sun. Therefore I, too, am fucked without the sun.

3. Why would you save those e-mails, though, Robyn, you might be asking. Good question. Because if someday someone sets my house on fire or kills one of my cats or otherwise harms me or mine, I want a record. Maybe that’s paranoid. Maybe not. That tells you all you need to know about what it’s like to be a woman and have an opinion on the internet. It means in some corner of your mind, you’re always thinking, what if they come for me?

4. And see that? See how careful I am about not painting all men with the same brush? And see how not careful a lot of men are sometimes about painting all women with the same brush? Or all Black people? Or all immigrants? Or all people on welfare? And on and on and on.