Stephanie Gregory (aka Stormy Daniels) 
                                                                    high school yearbook photo 1997





                                      

                                                                        Stormy Daniels (2017) 
                                                                  (credit: Wikimedia Commons) 

                            Of Porn Stars And Presidents

The photos above tell a tale of woe, especially as one gets to know more about the life of the woman in them. In the top picture, she was 18 when the photo for her high-school yearbook was taken. The lower pic was taken when she was 38. She is one of the leading porn film stars of this era and is also the center of one scandal currently plaguing the sitting president of the U.S., Donald Trump.

Questions swirl around this woman. How intimate was she with Trump? How perverse were their encounters? According to Daniel’s latest book, due out in a couple of weeks, he is only a small "p" pervert, but she describes it all and even goes into lurid detail about the odd appearance of his penis.

Now we still are faced with the question of how much to believe of her story, but on the other hand, it has stayed consistent for months running into years now. In addition, no one who might challenge her story is doing so. Always a bad sign for those accused, in this case, Donald Trump. He is a multi-billionaire and he is in the most powerful office in the world, but he has had little to nothing to say on this case in months. 

Unfortunately, the very sad thing for her is that while most of Trump’s supporters are indifferent to her revelations (according to polls), the liberals of the American public, who one would think might celebrate his being publicly shamed, have also apparently lost their sympathy for her. To them, she now looks like a hectoring, vindictive harlot trying to spin what she knows about a wealthy man into more and more money. The fickle sympathies of the masses.  

Concern for the democracy of her country and how it's being misled by its sitting president is not what comes through in either the substance or the tone of what the book has to say. No higher motives. Just hurt, anger, and revenge. And greed.  

But I feel there’s another way to see her actions, and it’s distressing to me that no reporters in the media are following this other line of interpretation.

In the background to all of this ranting on every side about this scandal, one of the facts described in the book, a fact that has been mentioned in the media, but then glossed over, is the fact that this woman was repeatedly raped and saw her friend being raped. She was thus both victim and witness, and it all took place when she was a little girl. Nine years old. Nine.  

Does she look hard in the 2017 picture? A manipulator? Breasts enhanced with implants in order to thereby "enhance" her charms? Determined to play this moment of notoriety for every dime she can get?

Cynics who answer "yes" to such questions simply aren’t getting what’s going on here, in my view, anyway.

She was a little girl when the abuse at the hands of unprincipled men began. Nine years old. For me, as a man who has women in his life that he loves, the ensuing discussion fades to inaudible at this point.

She was 9.

And now, at 39? With a long career as a porn star and prostitute behind her - a career that studies have shown was far more done to her than chosen by her - is she hard? Cynical? Manipulative? Mercenary?

The amazing thing is that she survived at all. Many don't. 

My bet is that not one of those who have raged, smirked, or jeered at her image on their televisions over the past few months, if they had undergone what she underwent, would have done any better. Most not as well. At least she has made some money.

Whether the case against Trump, alleging that he directed money illegally toward paying her off and shutting her up, results in a conviction or not, I wish her luck. 

If all she has alleged about Trump and the other abusers in her life stands as the truth in the coming months - as it appears very likely to do - then, in my view, she has suffered enough. Likely years of anxiety and fear. She got hard. She had to or go mad.

The rest of us, men and women – black and white, Asian, native, gay, straight, bi, trans – we could all do well to pause and reflect on Stormy Daniels. She did not deserve what happened to her, but she found a way, nevertheless, to survive. 

And finally, in the bigger picture, if Stormy winning her case will aid women all over in finding their voices and stopping the madness that has been done to them for so long, then I hope fervently for her victory in an open court.

I'm very wary of false accusations. I know manipulators are out there. But I also know that the real rapists who walk away unscathed from their acts outnumber by far the falsely accused whose lives are ruined by a liar. Complex realities are why the law is as nuanced as it is. And why we must keep working to improve it and make it fairer. If anyone ever tells you life is easy, spin that person around and kick her/his butt. 

In the meantime, I shall watch Stormy's case - no, Stephanie's case, because that is who she really is - Stephanie from Louisiana - with interest. So many levels, so much being revealed about all parties involved right up to the level of the whole of American society. 

Let the games about games about games begin.

In the shadow of the larger mushroom cloud, and the shadow of this smaller, but still important, cloud, you have a great day anyway.

(She was 9 years old.)