Everyday I wake up, brush my teeth, and go to class. Everyday, I eat the same bagel and drink the same coffee. This has been my routine for the past 2 semesters. Nothing special. Just trying to survive. My life follows the same kind of repetitive routine. I have classes everyday but Friday. I go to my voice lesson on Wednesday. I do my homework. I watch Netflix. I sleep. The cycle repeats every Monday. It's boring, but it's nice.
Every so often, something will shake the structure up a bit. Usually the change in routine is good.
This time it was not.
I got off the bus the other day and walked right by the person who raped me. I've worked through most of the internalized victim blaming with my therapist and I don't hate myself for what happened anymore. I don't blame myself either. But, I do still have PTSD as a direct result of what happened and seeing the person who caused it talking to my neighbor as if he was a good guy triggered a lot of things.
First, I felt invalidated once again. Time and time again I have had people invalidate my sexual assault because I was drunk at the time. As much support as I have gotten over the years, I have also gotten a lot of disbelievers. I've been called a basket case, a loon, a liar. Seeing my rapist walk free, even after someone pressed charges against him, will always be a slap in the face to me. He ruined high school for me, got me sent to a psych ward, but he gets to go to an Ivy League while I sit in a community college because I dropped out of high school so I wouldn't have to see him in the hallways everyday. Watching him turn and smirk at me as I walked down the street was degrading and invalidating and for the first time in a really long time, I hated myself for what happened to me.
That self-hate spiraled into a deep depression. I couldn't move. I couldn't eat. I could barely talk. My schoolwork suffered. My friends suffered. I yelled at and shunned half my family for no real reason. I wanted to kill myself.
I've had a gradual, slow recovery since then. I can eat now. My grades are back up. I have friends again. I don't want to die anymore. And though I run the risk of being invalidated yet again, I want to talk about sexual assault.
The facts (USA-based):
1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted.
1 in 33 men are sexually assaulted.
63% of rapes go unreported.
12% of child sexual abuse is reported to authorities.
The percentage of false reports falls a little above 2%.
(https://www.rainn.org/statistics/victims-sexual-vi...; http://www.nsvrc.org/sites/default/files/publicati...)
Things that we need to discuss:
Let's talk about this 2%. Falsely reporting such a horrendous, traumatizing crime is cruel to both real victims and the person who is being falsely accused. That said, with a statistic like that, why is the first thing everyone says when someone reports a sexual assault "well, they could be lying"? I can't speak for all survivors, but the fear of being disbelieved is what made me not report in the first place. The fear of being called a slut. The fear of being told I wanted it. Those fears proved to be justified when his next victim pressed charges and that was exactly what happened to her.
Let's talk about the men who have been assaulted. Male victims often feel ashamed to come forward because of the hyper masculine culture forced down everyone's throats. MEN CAN BE RAPED TOO! Rape is not "having sex". It's not "getting some action". It's rape. Rape is about power, not sex. Men are survivors, too. It is our job to listen to them.
Women can be rapists. It's important we remember that and discuss it when it is needed.
Stop invalidating victims. Stop teaching "don't get raped". Teach "don't rape".
