A ‘Period Dignity Officer’ Seemed Like a Good Idea. Until a Man Was Named.
“He came in wearing a badge and a hat, and he thought his job was to make me feel good.”
In the years since she wrote the piece (“For Every Day, We Must Have a Day”), I’m sure that my mother would have laughed at the idea that an official called “Dignity Officer” would go to the trouble of making me feel good.
But that’s the job of the Dignity Officer. (Actually, I suppose it could be worse. A “Dignity Officer” might not even be a good idea.)
They come into your life and hold you accountable to a series of things.
“I had an official sitting in the room and I was told I was at high risk for things that happened at school that I had no control over. I was asked to apologize to him for things that had happened before he arrived. I was asked to tell him the things I had forgiven. I was asked to tell him the things I was learning and what I had learned from this meeting for my own healing.”
“I was told I wasn’t at a high risk of things that happened before he arrived, and I was asked to say it with a better attitude. I was asked to go back to doing things that I liked to do. I was asked to leave school and move out of my community and go live with my parents. I was asked to stop using drugs and to stop getting into trouble. I was asked to apologize for not doing my schoolwork to my teachers and to stop getting in trouble in school.
What was my punishment? I ended up having to take a test that a teacher had told me I wouldn’t have passed. I ended up having to go