As Ilona said, I was sexually abused repeatedly as a boy and an adolescent by adult women.
Regardless of that fact, it doesn’t make my experience the same as this young woman’s, and I can’t tell you from my experience what happened in that fraternity house. What I can tell you is how damaging it is when other people decide what a victim should have done, said, or remembered before they’ll take the harm seriously.
Here, there are serious allegations and serious disputes about the evidence. The prosecutor is reopening the case, and that process matters. So does asking whether the woman was heard carefully the first time, whether the university did enough, and what the men around her understood and did. Men have a responsibility in this conversation beyond saying that assault is terrible. We have to challenge the behavior and the talk that make it easier for someone to be treated as though her consent doesn’t matter.
We do indeed. It’s a tragic topic and when you interject both genders as victims into the equation, it gets complex. One thing to consider is how male privilege, in this case, works against the man and actually exacerbates the problem. I struggle with how to deal with this as a man and victim; I so don’t want to make it sound like it’s about me, when women face this in so many aspects of their everyday lives. Even though I’m also a victim, that still gives me no right to say I understand what a woman goes through emotionally. I think about that a lot.
As Ilona said, I was sexually abused repeatedly as a boy and an adolescent by adult women.
Regardless of that fact, it doesn’t make my experience the same as this young woman’s, and I can’t tell you from my experience what happened in that fraternity house. What I can tell you is how damaging it is when other people decide what a victim should have done, said, or remembered before they’ll take the harm seriously.
Here, there are serious allegations and serious disputes about the evidence. The prosecutor is reopening the case, and that process matters. So does asking whether the woman was heard carefully the first time, whether the university did enough, and what the men around her understood and did. Men have a responsibility in this conversation beyond saying that assault is terrible. We have to challenge the behavior and the talk that make it easier for someone to be treated as though her consent doesn’t matter.
There are a lot of layers to this, and a lot still forthcoming. I think we will have a lot to talk about.
We do indeed. It’s a tragic topic and when you interject both genders as victims into the equation, it gets complex. One thing to consider is how male privilege, in this case, works against the man and actually exacerbates the problem. I struggle with how to deal with this as a man and victim; I so don’t want to make it sound like it’s about me, when women face this in so many aspects of their everyday lives. Even though I’m also a victim, that still gives me no right to say I understand what a woman goes through emotionally. I think about that a lot.
Good on you not succumbing to pressures to perform. You be you!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks, girl!