Know My Name by Chanel Miller - A Reader's Thoughts
Author: Shay Friedman
I feel an immense responsibility to honor Chanel Miller with a piece that accurately describes how impactful I felt her book, Know My Name, was. Chanel laid her heart and soul out on 368 pages, fully allowing the reader to connect with her over one of the most horrific experiences a person could imagine. I was moved by the grace with which Chanel wrote and led us through her experience. She has an unparalleled gift for storytelling. It was a privilege to read this book, and I feel humbled that Chanel allowed readers into this moment of her life.
Chanel was once known to the public as “Emily Doe,” the young woman Brock Turner had sexually assaulted in January 2015. On that January night, while unconscious outside a fraternity house at Stanford University, Brock sexually assaulted her. The case gained national attention as Brock was an elite swimmer with Stanford. The media spent the next two years focusing on Brock’s side of the story. Through the publishing of this book, Chanel was finally able to control the narrative surrounding her assault.
Chanel has a remarkable way of connecting with the reader, perhaps because she understands that, on some level, most women can identify with being vulnerable, taken advantage of, and having to become strong through the trials of life’s darkest moments. Chanel writes about her experience waking up in the hospital after the assault, describing the sensation as “utter confusion mixed with knowing.” It is a terrifying thing that so many women can relate to this description: the indescribable fear of becoming one in six women who will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime. Chanel discusses how society expects women to instantly identify harmlessness from danger and know what some men are capable of. This is an impossible task and ignores the notion that we must teach men to seek consensual experiences instead of teaching women how not to be raped.
Following an assault and disclosure, many don’t realize the double injury that may occur through victim-blaming and the legal system. Chanel presents the reader with an eye-opening and heartbreaking account of how the events of that night had “become all of our faults, except his.” Brock was held to a standard in which his intoxication worked to excuse his behavior while simultaneously condemning Chanel’s. To quote Chanel, the public “seemed angry that I’d made myself vulnerable, more than the fact that he’d acted on my vulnerability.” Chanel outlines the different standards by which we hold victims and offenders, identifying the concept of the “perfect victim” being expected to meet an impossible standard of purity and perfectness. For Chanel, “to deny my messiness would be to deny my humanity.” This is one of my favorite quotes from her book, as I believe it perfectly captures the idea that victims are imperfect beings. Nothing a victim or survivor does makes them responsible or at fault for their assault. I cannot stress this enough.
Setting aside the court of public opinion, Chanel also had to face the real, tangible court in which her case was tried. There is something wrong with our court system when a victim of assault writes, “The day I showed up in court would be the day I surrendered my safety.” Chanel has a real knack for inciting visceral reactions in her readers, using metaphors and descriptive imagery to make her point remarkably clear. As Brock’s attorney cross-examined Chanel, she explained how she “watched her words fall like birds, shot out of the air.” Throughout the trial, Chanel had no choice but to be exposed, trampled, and torn apart by the defense. Brock’s attorney tried to “smother” Chanel’s experience, erasing her reality while simultaneously painting the assault as an accident (or worse, as a pleasurable experience).
Thankfully, he was not successful. Brock was convicted of three counts of felony sexual assault. Unfortunately, Judge Aaron Persky sentenced Brock to only six months in jail (Persky was later recalled from the bench by California voters, the first in 80 years). For Chanel, it was clear her “pain was never more valuable than his potential,” with the consequences facing Brock being the most “notable loss” following the assault and trial. While I spent much of this book feeling sick to my stomach by the firsthand account of what Chanel went through, both at the hands of Brock and at the hands of the criminal and legal system, it was this final section of the book that created a deep sense of profound pride and comradery between me, the reader, and Chanel. Chanel made it remarkably clear the decision made by Judge Persky had “ignited a tiny fire” in her, driving her to take back her narrative and demand to be “acknowledged, taken into account, taken seriously.” I see you, and I validate you, Chanel.
This book will make you feel deeply, asking you to question the systems we are a part of and our conscious or unconscious biases against survivors of sexual assault. While this book is not easy to digest, it is necessary. Chanel is very much aware of the nation's pain following her assault and the mockery of a jail sentence. She knows how we shared in her win and celebrated, with a strange combination of melancholy and joy, when Brock was convicted and Judge Persky was recalled. Her victory was “celebrated quietly in rooms in towns in states” she had never been to, but that would always hold her up and feel her story in our veins as if it was our journey. For some of us, Chanel was a real human who represented the assault, the pain, the abuse, and finally, the victory, joy, and strength that others would never get. I end this review with a note about human connection and the beauty of a nation coming together to see so much of ourselves, our vulnerabilities, our strengths, and our fears in one young woman: “Living is an incredible thing, just to have been here, to have felt, if only briefly, the volume and depth of others’ empathy.” It has been an honor to be on this journey with you, Chanel.
