I have an addiction to Law and Order, especially SVU, I mean Olivia Benson am I right? When I get home from work it is the perfect show to put on, and I don’t know, escape in a way. That sounds really screwed up. The only way to escape is to become utterly consumed by someone else's pain...anyway that's not the point of this article, just some food for thought.
Now, I think that SVU is a great way to raise awareness about the reality and different forms of rape. Its touches on consent, and all those great things that we shouldn’t have to learn about through TV. But there’s one type of rape that they don’t touch on, I don’t even know what to call it; the I didn’t know I was raped? Let me explain.
In our society it is engrained in women's mind that their sole purpose in life is to serve the man. While this standard is slowly transforming, it has in no means evaporated. When you compile this with the low self esteem that lives within a majority of girls you get a situation where the word “no” is vacant from their vocabulary.
Consent used to be defined as verbalizing “no” or “stop.” But people realized that this definition wasn’t enough. So society expanded it. If your partner is emotionless and motionless then something is wrong, and maybe just maybe you should stop. This sounds like common sense, right? Apparently not. The amount of incidents that go unaccounted for in just the United States is disgusting.
There is this resistance when it comes to the conversation of rape, and I don’t entirely know where it comes from. I feel as if a majority of people can agree that rape is a complete tragedy, but actually discussing it is completely out of the question. I was talking about law and order once with my family and they said they couldn’t watch it, it was too sick. You’re right it is. But it is also what is happening to millions around the globe, and there doesn’t seem to be any sign of it slowing down. Not talking about it won’t make it go away, it will only make it worse.
If you have to think to yourself, was I raped? I’m going to say that the answer will almost always be yes. If at any point you felt trapped, taken advantage of, emotionless, detached, scared, helpless something's not right. It's not supposed to be like this. Being raped doesn’t have to be one of these violent ordeals that is portrayed on television. Sometimes, rape is painfully silent.
If I have to leave you with one thing it would be to never let anyone else tell you how you feel. You do not need anyone else to validate your pain. You know yourself best, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
