Women tend to just take a lot of stuff hurled at us, without responding, because when we do, we’re again called aggressive and rude or whatever other dismissive, sexist stuff we’ve become accustomed to taking.

And there are certainly situations where even if you do respond, that’s not the end of it, because whatever was intended to cut you down to size lingers. People read it. They heard it. It’s out there.

Unless there is a very public retraction and apology for these offensive and troubling statements, which there seldom appear to be, they permeate the atmosphere like rotting garbage, and they may take up real estate in your own head for longer than they should.

It suddenly occurred to me in the context of the other things I’ve been thinking about and building to guard against the pervasive and constant silencing of women by a thousand cuts, especially in criminal defence, that there are positive lessons to be learned and shared, from all this vile bile – so I posted this:

Here is this entire Twitter thread from my account on December 28 2021.

Women lawyers are too often gaslighted into thinking we’re not enough or denigrated for thinking we’re too much. Recently, some man tried to diminish & dismiss my own contributions to the law & my accomplishments. This prompted another colleague to do a little research on me.

Turned out I have more reported cases in my name this year alone than the writer has throughout his career to date. In fact, at his pace, it would take him somewhere between 100-500 years to catch up to me, depending on whether you count only appeals &/or hearing matters.

I hadn’t thought of that. When I read the damning remarks, I was thrown. Confused, hurt & humiliated. I knew it wasn’t correct or fair, but it took another friend to do the numbers. My point? Your track record speaks for itself. Never let fear, envy or misogyny get to you.

My year-end case count shows us opening 5 Supreme Court of Canada matters in 2021 along with 14 appeals I argued as counsel or co-counsel in our Court of Appeal. Add to that hundreds of tribunal level matters & I can confidently say we are litigators & I am in those trenches!

Women in criminal defence & working for vulnerable clients including in mental health justice comprise not just an important part of the practising bar. We do some of the best work. We work in the trenches at every level, including at the top of our profession. We are enough!

And then I had to block those Men who decided to become Exhibit A to this entire thread……