You're welcome. I haven't told anyone in my RL about the stuff I've talked about on this blog. And even not-so-anon, even just as a venting space, it helped so much. I still get icky thinking about it, but I kind of... well, got over it after talking about it. I feel better, I don't think about it very much or often, but saying something was just extremely cathartic.
And that's a whole other side of this: sometimes talking it out can help the victim. I honestly think that support helped, too, but really? The majority of the help came when I typed it out and pressed post. After that? It didn't really matter to me, because it didn't change the truth or my experience. Just sharing it, though? Meant more to me than I can convey.
"In the conversation, I made a comment that probably every single woman above the age of about twenty-five had at one point or another been subjected to frottage."
This rings true to me. I had a safe and sheltered life growing up and kept out of trouble, and there was still this one instance of this boy when I was 14 or 15, who was fucking huge compared to me and who - on the ground that I had answered 'hi' when he talked to me once - decided it was okay to grope my arse. I didn't know this creep, it was a stranger. He just went to the same school than me. And I had to kick doors in his face and snarl to keep his ugly hands from me. I felt disgusting.
Great post, and so true. We have to talk about it, and similar topics. The thing is that sexual assault is against the law in our society. But is it against social norm? I'm not so sure. A boy wants - he takes, and everyone hides a grin. As long as he didn't penetrate, what harm is there, right? Wrong! Do we teach our boys that?
I've had a few experiences with this, but one that happened almost ten years ago was particularly bad and invasive. I haven't told anyone about that particular experience - not in real life, and not anonymously, with the exception of my closest friend. Part of it was shame, yes, and part of it has to do with who this person is and the shitstorm it would cause.
I've dealt with sexual assault (never rape) many times, and I guess I've just dismissed it because "well, it's not rape." Our society already gives rape victims such a hard time, so there doesn't seem like much hope for victims or a "lesser" sexual assault offense.
But yes, ultimately, I see how this can be letting rape culture win, as if the silence is almost an acceptance of that kind of behavior.
Right. And you help to illustrate my point so beautifully. Because, of course, it is absolutely up to the victim how they deal with the abuse. For some people, coming forward and discussing it would be yet another way in which they would be victimized. Some people find strength in it. No one can choose for someone else how they process their experience.
In addition, though, the reason that people can feel victimized by the discussion is because they unconsciously assume for themselves some of the "blame." I can tell a victim 100 times that the abuse isn't their fault, and I believe that intellectually they understand me and accept it as truth. But unconsciously, they may continue to blame themselves. Victim blaming can be, among other things, another manifestation of self-blame.
I was sexually assaulted by my elderly neighbour when I was 11, and I never told my parents until long after he'd died (he died when I was 14 and I told my parents when i was 18). I didn't think anyone would believe me because as a child i was taught to respect authority, and respect my elders, and utterly utterly believe that adults knew what was best for me, so when he told me not to tell anyone I was just like, of course I won't, you're an adult. I was horribly afraid people would assume I was lying or attention seeking because why would some ugly old guy assault a girl who wasn't very feminine/pretty to begin with? The media portrays only beautiful women as being violated/victims. I was 11 with the body of an adult - tall, early developer - and I was the victim of victim blaming because I blamed myself, and my body, for this disgusting old pervert's behaviour.
My experience (at least the only one I can remember) was with the few and far between. The first female in-home babysitter/nanny my parents hired when I was a little kid inappropriately touched me, in skeevy situations she concocted, twice that I can remember. Thankfully I felt wrong enough to extricate myself from both situations so it didnt go as far as it could have. I forgot about it until I was 19/20. Never told my parents. Thinking back, it could have been even worse, she was sneaking her boyfriend in the house and he was staying in the back room. My sister and I were alone with them all day.
"Like" is wholly inappropriate as a response to this topic. But yes, I too have experienced unwanted sexual contact. And I agree that silence is not our friend. Thanks for raising the issue.
I had a long post that was detailing my experiences, but BL ate my comment, so when I pick up my emotions from the floor, I may write it later on here or in a post on its own, but I just wanted to leave my two cents and thank you for writing this.
Huh. Reading your post, I realise now that I experienced sexual harassment at 18 in my first office job - I've never thought of it as being that before. He was a 40-year-old client who publicly harassed me in front of my colleagues. I had no idea what to do because he was also a friend of my boss and almost everyday he would come in for an hour after he'd finished work, every time hitting on me and trying to shame me into submission because I was so young and inexperienced - I'd yet to have a proper boyfriend. This went on for months until my only female colleague told the boss, and suddenly the man didn't come in as much. I didn't tell any friends or family because I found it deeply embarrassing that I couldn't handle it.
As a result, I changed my behaviour towards men, practically fearful of them for years afterwards; making as little eye contact as possible in case I was encouraging any of them, and always making sure I wasn't showing flesh or wearing too much make-up. But I'd still attract the creepers. I look very young for my age - as in not legal - and every now and then an older man will approach me. The worst was when I was in the YA section of the library (I get approached there alot so I don't go in much now) where a man said he wanted to be "my friend". I had Pippi Longstocking-style plaits/braids at the time and was wearing teenage clothes precisely to deter attention.
love this post. thank you for raising the issue and sharing. i love the way you articulate the issues. come to think of it, this is the exact reason i fail to find 'rape' an acceptable word to use in casual conversation (heard particularly among men in a non-sexual way, as a way to say they were somehow taken advantage of), because it diminishes the seriousness of the issue/crime more than it demystifies it. I think the fact that people don't talk about it much as a real experience contributes to the sense of it being a rarity and jokey-worthy.
Sometimes telling someone nets you nothing except the knowledge that you didn't stay silent.
I would have been in 5th or 6th grade and spending the night at a neighbour-friends when her older brother decided to sneak in her room in the middle of the night and try to pull something highly inappropriate. I told. I didn't just tell, I got up right then in the middle of the night, went home and woke my mother up and I told her. She called the neighbors and they asked him what the hell? and of course he denied it. The friend was too scared to tell the truth - she told me that she'd found him in her room before. It was suggested that I had dreamt the whole thing. As if. First, I was young. Really young. And naive. I didn't have the capacity at that point to have dreams like that - I'm not sure I even knew the facts about reproduction at that point. Second: Ewwww!!! He was not someone ANYONE would dream about.
In the end, I think it was easier for everyone not to confront it - it was a he said/she said sort of thing. The memory skeeves me out to this day, but I hold no guilt or shame - I did the right thing and I always knew I did the right thing. Freaking nasty grease ball....
Yeah, mine was similar to Murder by Death in that I TOLD.
I'm still not sure if anything really 'sexual' happened...I don't remember parts of that time because I repressed the whole thing (yes you can do that, I know because I did it). My mom was in choir practice along with other kids mothers. The boys banded together and decided to lock the two girls out of the building. It was kinda cold and we tried to get in. The other girl got in first then came out and got me to go in. They grabbed me, tied me to a chair...I think taunted me...one tried to release me and was derided by the others (I still think very highly of him). As the practice was almost over, they knew they couldn't let me go so they moved the chair into the dark guys bathroom (they didn't want to set foot in the girls?) and left me in the dark. I was so freaked. I guess one of them realized that wouldn't work and let me go. I went straight to my mom and told everything. I wasn't about to let the boys go home. One set of parents believed me but, of course, the instigator's parent did not - their child would NEVER do such a thing. I was basically told to my face that I was a liar, got no apology and pushed everything down so much that it was not until my second day at college it came partially flooding back. The dorm I was in was formally a guy's dorm and I walked into the bathroom and saw the urinal...and it came back. I called my mom, got her to confirm what I remembered without me feeding it to her...but know there are still blanks.
I kinda hope they stay that way. I don't know that what happened to me can be classified as 'sexual' but I was definitely dominated and controlled by the boys. My family and my husband knows...I've never told anyone else beyond that night and when I remembered. Thanks for this post Moonlight.
Wow...not sure I have the nerve to post this...and I think I need to watch some comedy now.
Thanks for posting! That was very brave of you. Thanks for sharing - the more people speak out the less others realise how common this kind of occurrence is.
Thank you writing this post, I never knew what it was only I didn't feel right in a situation and got out or told. Like many posting I had my own run it with a guy my age group in school who comp a feel at age 13- 14 I was pretty developed to being with. I was so ashamed and MAD so I tuned around and gave him a black eye. There's been times afterward where I've come into situations that I've walked away grossed out but I didn't walk away without smacking someone or making a loud scene
Adding my thanks to you for posting this. Something that strikes me -- not just based on my own brushes with this type of situation (and yes, MR, I do think you're right, there probably isn't a woman who couldn't report some sort of occurrence like this), but also going through the many above posts by others -- is that:
(1) It seems to occur distressingly frequently in our own social circles, and the perpetrators are distressingly frequently men we know, rather than total strangers, and
(2) The mere fact that the perpetrators are not total strangers but people we interact with on some sort of level, even if not necessarily with the intimacy of family relationships, makes the whole situation just so much more invasive, and also so much more difficult to speak about it. Don't get me wrong: It's *bad enough* -- AND of course JUST AS WRONG -- if it's a total stranger. But going to your parents to tell them that "our neighbor Mr. XYZ [or my girlfriend's elder brother, etc.] felt me up/ forced a kiss on me/ made me touch him" when you know (a) the man in question is going to deny it if confronted with your accusation, AND (b) you're going to have to go on meeting this person in the hallway, at your friend's house etc., is apt to turn the embarrassment into a permanent one, which you're even less likely going to want to confront than the embarrassment of publicly exposing a stranger's offense.
(Apart from the fact that virtually every transgression, regardless whether outright rape or some of the other experiences others have talked about here, comes with an element of either physical or psychological exploitation ... everything from exploiting the advantage of age difference/maturity vs. inexperience, to outright violence.)
So I guess one take-away from this is that not only do women of all ages need to learn to speak up, and not only do we need to educate men on just how rampant this still occurs (and precisely what sort of behavior is experienced as transgressive by women to begin with) ... we also need to be, and make others aware, that the potential perpetrators are NOT just those anonymous strangers we won't ever be encountering again, but just as likely, people we know and interact with fairly regularly ...
And that's a whole other side of this: sometimes talking it out can help the victim. I honestly think that support helped, too, but really? The majority of the help came when I typed it out and pressed post. After that? It didn't really matter to me, because it didn't change the truth or my experience. Just sharing it, though? Meant more to me than I can convey.
This rings true to me. I had a safe and sheltered life growing up and kept out of trouble, and there was still this one instance of this boy when I was 14 or 15, who was fucking huge compared to me and who - on the ground that I had answered 'hi' when he talked to me once - decided it was okay to grope my arse. I didn't know this creep, it was a stranger. He just went to the same school than me. And I had to kick doors in his face and snarl to keep his ugly hands from me. I felt disgusting.
I've dealt with sexual assault (never rape) many times, and I guess I've just dismissed it because "well, it's not rape." Our society already gives rape victims such a hard time, so there doesn't seem like much hope for victims or a "lesser" sexual assault offense.
But yes, ultimately, I see how this can be letting rape culture win, as if the silence is almost an acceptance of that kind of behavior.
In addition, though, the reason that people can feel victimized by the discussion is because they unconsciously assume for themselves some of the "blame." I can tell a victim 100 times that the abuse isn't their fault, and I believe that intellectually they understand me and accept it as truth. But unconsciously, they may continue to blame themselves. Victim blaming can be, among other things, another manifestation of self-blame.
I only felt safe to talk about it after he died.
As a result, I changed my behaviour towards men, practically fearful of them for years afterwards; making as little eye contact as possible in case I was encouraging any of them, and always making sure I wasn't showing flesh or wearing too much make-up. But I'd still attract the creepers. I look very young for my age - as in not legal - and every now and then an older man will approach me. The worst was when I was in the YA section of the library (I get approached there alot so I don't go in much now) where a man said he wanted to be "my friend". I had Pippi Longstocking-style plaits/braids at the time and was wearing teenage clothes precisely to deter attention.
I would have been in 5th or 6th grade and spending the night at a neighbour-friends when her older brother decided to sneak in her room in the middle of the night and try to pull something highly inappropriate. I told. I didn't just tell, I got up right then in the middle of the night, went home and woke my mother up and I told her. She called the neighbors and they asked him what the hell? and of course he denied it. The friend was too scared to tell the truth - she told me that she'd found him in her room before. It was suggested that I had dreamt the whole thing. As if. First, I was young. Really young. And naive. I didn't have the capacity at that point to have dreams like that - I'm not sure I even knew the facts about reproduction at that point. Second: Ewwww!!! He was not someone ANYONE would dream about.
In the end, I think it was easier for everyone not to confront it - it was a he said/she said sort of thing. The memory skeeves me out to this day, but I hold no guilt or shame - I did the right thing and I always knew I did the right thing. Freaking nasty grease ball....
I'm still not sure if anything really 'sexual' happened...I don't remember parts of that time because I repressed the whole thing (yes you can do that, I know because I did it). My mom was in choir practice along with other kids mothers. The boys banded together and decided to lock the two girls out of the building. It was kinda cold and we tried to get in. The other girl got in first then came out and got me to go in. They grabbed me, tied me to a chair...I think taunted me...one tried to release me and was derided by the others (I still think very highly of him). As the practice was almost over, they knew they couldn't let me go so they moved the chair into the dark guys bathroom (they didn't want to set foot in the girls?) and left me in the dark. I was so freaked. I guess one of them realized that wouldn't work and let me go. I went straight to my mom and told everything. I wasn't about to let the boys go home. One set of parents believed me but, of course, the instigator's parent did not - their child would NEVER do such a thing. I was basically told to my face that I was a liar, got no apology and pushed everything down so much that it was not until my second day at college it came partially flooding back. The dorm I was in was formally a guy's dorm and I walked into the bathroom and saw the urinal...and it came back. I called my mom, got her to confirm what I remembered without me feeding it to her...but know there are still blanks.
I kinda hope they stay that way. I don't know that what happened to me can be classified as 'sexual' but I was definitely dominated and controlled by the boys. My family and my husband knows...I've never told anyone else beyond that night and when I remembered. Thanks for this post Moonlight.
Wow...not sure I have the nerve to post this...and I think I need to watch some comedy now.
(1) It seems to occur distressingly frequently in our own social circles, and the perpetrators are distressingly frequently men we know, rather than total strangers, and
(2) The mere fact that the perpetrators are not total strangers but people we interact with on some sort of level, even if not necessarily with the intimacy of family relationships, makes the whole situation just so much more invasive, and also so much more difficult to speak about it. Don't get me wrong: It's *bad enough* -- AND of course JUST AS WRONG -- if it's a total stranger. But going to your parents to tell them that "our neighbor Mr. XYZ [or my girlfriend's elder brother, etc.] felt me up/ forced a kiss on me/ made me touch him" when you know (a) the man in question is going to deny it if confronted with your accusation, AND (b) you're going to have to go on meeting this person in the hallway, at your friend's house etc., is apt to turn the embarrassment into a permanent one, which you're even less likely going to want to confront than the embarrassment of publicly exposing a stranger's offense.
(Apart from the fact that virtually every transgression, regardless whether outright rape or some of the other experiences others have talked about here, comes with an element of either physical or psychological exploitation ... everything from exploiting the advantage of age difference/maturity vs. inexperience, to outright violence.)
So I guess one take-away from this is that not only do women of all ages need to learn to speak up, and not only do we need to educate men on just how rampant this still occurs (and precisely what sort of behavior is experienced as transgressive by women to begin with) ... we also need to be, and make others aware, that the potential perpetrators are NOT just those anonymous strangers we won't ever be encountering again, but just as likely, people we know and interact with fairly regularly ...