December 23, 2014

“€œConfession time,”€ she told the Brisbane Times.

In my Facebook status, I editorialised. She wasn”€™t sitting next to me. She was a bit away, towards the other end of the carriage.

Oh, and come to think of it, about that stranger removing her headscarf:

She might not even be Muslim or she could have just been warm!

Then when the pair disembarked at the same station? Remember that tearful, sixty-second embrace?

It’s hard to describe the moment when humans, and complete strangers, have a conversation with no words.

Well, yeah …

I wanted to tell her I was sorry for so many things”€”for overstepping the mark, for making assumptions about a complete stranger and for belonging to a culture where racism was part of her everyday experience.

But none of those words came out, and our near silent encounter was over in a moment.

Except this “€œencounter,”€ like the Rolling Stone “€œrape,”€ occurred exclusively within the confines of a woman’s skull.

And Jacobs’s “€œencounter”€ wasn”€™t “€œnear silent.”€ It was completely so.

Look, I”€™m the first to complain that “€œChaney, Goodman, and Schwerner”€ aren”€™t “€œdead enough,”€ but holy hell: At least they went to goddamn Mississippi.

Before continuing to “€œhumblebrag“€ for a few more hundreds of words, Jacobs avers in the very middle of her “€œconfession”€:

“€œBut while I”€™m warmed by the sheer volume of media interest, I am not the story here, and my actions were not extraordinary or heroic.”€

I”€™ll say!”€¨”€¨Here’s the best part, though. Having confessed to the world that her “€œactions”€ were mostly fantasy, Jacobs was back, this time on Twitter:

[T]o those doubting or questioning my story, of course it happened. Is it that unbelievable that strangers could hug?

Oh, dear.

So I”€™m forced to take back that part where I “€œgive her credit.”€

Here’s my noble voluntary gesture of the day:

I”€™d be willing to have one of those sex-change operations if it meant that I”€™d no longer belong to the same gender as Rachael Jacobs.

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