According to statistics, 1 in 5 women will be raped in their lifetime.

I'll be honest.
This article is nothing pretty. It is a topic I have debated long and hard about writing on. I would never pretend to paint it as something that was easy, something to be discussed using beautiful words or phrases, but it is something that deserves to be voiced. It is something we need to make more known. Something we all need to get more real about.

Rape.

I remember the first time I heard the "R" word.
It was on T.V. It was probably something in the news, some court trial- maybe it was something in some show series. I remember it was something serious, but I never understood what exactly it was.

The next time I heard it used in a sentence was while I was at my neighbor's house. We were good friends, and he was playing a video game; probably Call Of Duty or something of the sort. He would get a "kill," then another one, and then would pronounce proudly, "Man, I am just raping this dude!" Implying, he was without a doubt, winning against his opponent.

The next time I heard this word was in high school; from multiple public speakers in the auditorium; from my friends whispering; from my counselor.

You see, when we went through Sex Education in middle school, they didn't tell us what to do to protect ourselves when you drink too much for the first time and a boy offers to take you home, but doesn't do just that. They didn't teach us that you could change your mind when things got heated and that he wasn't supposed to get mad. They didn't teach us that guilting your way into sex, wasn't sex at all- They didn't teach us any of that. Instead they taught us "abstinence is key", because no one was comfortable enough to talk about what sex actually was. Instead, they decided the fate for us that one day we would learn about what sex is, but by then it would have been forced upon us without us actually even knowing.

It is far too commonly assumed that teenagers were built to be promiscuous. Or that teenagers always somehow find their way into trouble. Or that rape only occurs to people based on where they are/what they're wearing/how much they had to drink. It is far too commonly assumed that every person who has had sex before the age of 18 made that decision whole-heartedly on their own. Why do we assume these things when statistics show that 82% of rape cases happen to juveniles?

The fact is that we have more knowledge in our smartphones about what sex is than what adults are teaching us. The facts are that people can be mean and judgmental, and being young is hard enough without not knowing that when rape happens to you, it is not your fault.

"Rape: unlawful sexual activity and usually sexual intercourse carried out forcibly or under threat of injury against the will usually of a female or with a person who is beneath a certain age or incapable of valid consent—compare sexual assault, statutory rape."
(Defined by: Merriam-Webster)

"Incapable of valid consent"
This means drunk. This means manipulated. This means anything other than being 100% in the most sober state of mind and consenting to having sex.

Consider this: Consider that girl on the news that was sexually assaulted was your sister. Your mother. Your best friend. Your daughter.

Would you tell her then it was her fault because she had too much to drink? I don't think so.

To the girls and boys who never got the chance to say no, or did and just weren't heard out- on behalf of our failed sex education systems, on behalf of many of our failed court systems that believe the reputation of a criminal is more important than the mental health of an abused rape victim- I am sorry you have been failed. I am sorry we live in a culture that says rape prevention is more important than justice for those who have been raped.

Stop telling young girls to dress a certain way if they "don't want to be raped." Stop telling young boys it is okay to make rape jokes or base a woman's worth on their appearance or sexual value. Stop making these behaviors okay. Because it is the furthest thing from okay, and it will never be okay. It will never be okay until the "R" word is something we can say out loud without having to be ashamed. It will never be okay until we stop teaching our future generations how not to be raped instead of how not to rape.