Consent Part Four: The Things They Said

I have been wanting to write this for a while, but couldn't figure out how to do it. Actually, there is a much larger piece I would like to write, but I don't have the bandwidth in my mind right now. That piece would be about what we consider to be the "right" kind of victim of sexual abuse, including the "right" kind of response that such a person should exhibit. But I get tired just thinking about that. Also, I have thought about writing about what the perpetrators of various acts have said to me, but I don't think their voices really deserve to be heard. So instead, I'm going to do this: I'm going to give examples of things that were said to me by OTHER PEOPLE, many of them female, some of them adults, some of them police officers and other figures of authority, when I tried to tell about something that happened to me. It is because of these types of responses that I decided I wasn't talking. It's bad enough to experience something you know is wrong; it's worse being told you are lying or crazy or just to SHUT UP about it already. It's bad enough having something happen once, but the reality is that most girls and women and yes some boys and men too have so many of these things happen to them over and over again that it begins to seem like something that is just par for the course, an inevitability, and THAT, my friends is how silence is perpetrated and the rape culture continues.

People said these things to me after I tried to tell about a variety of incidents: molestation as a young girl; what I understand to be sexual assault now (when I was growing up, there was rape or no rape--nothing else short of penetration "counted"), threatened gang rape, stalking, propositions from a teacher, various kinds of sexual harassment (at school, at work, online, on the street) etc. While none of these things happened to me at the hands of any of my chosen partners, some of these things were done by people I considered to be friends or trusted figures of authority. And then, I eventually tried to tell someone. And they said these types of things to me.:

I guess it's a good thing you weren't drunk.

What were you wearing?

Why were you in that room with them?

Oh, you are so conceited!

(eyes rolling): Stop looking for attention! (I also heard, "you always get all the attention!")

If he didn't physically assault you, there's nothing we can do about it.

You're overreacting.

He was just being friendly.

That's impossible. I've known him since I was little.

It's normal for him to think that way, even if he's an adult.

What did you expect?

Big surprise! I mean, look at you!

Someday you'll wish you got those kind of remarks from men.

You should be grateful.

But isn't that how you see yourself?

You must be used to that kind of thing.

Why don't you cut your hair?

Well, you DO look older.

Well, you DO look younger.

What does Gabe (or insert name of current boyfriend) think about that?

Why didn't you call the police?

You were lucky.

This happened such a long time ago. Aren't you over it yet?

GET OVER IT.

I could go on, but do I really need to do that?

There are two things that are coming to my mind right now. One involves the things that were not said, the things that were not done. When I got called into the Dean's office in high school because I had ditched so many English classes, she was furious and confused. I told her this: Every single time that Mr. X substitutes, I will turn around and walk out the door. I will ditch every single time. And I was practically begging her with my youthful defiance to ask me why, but she didn't. She didn't say a word. She gestured for me to leave her office. And she never again called me back in or threatened to punish me if I ditched.

And then I am thinking of that moment right after the little voice in my head told me I was trapped, that it was hopeless. I was being held by two boys, both so much stronger than me, one behind me and one in front of me, both of them holding one of my arms so I couldn't fight and both of them taking my clothes off and undoing my bra and abusing me with their other hand while other boys did nothing or stood there laughing or started walking over to me while I screamed. When the boy in front moved one of his hands so he could unzip his pants the little voice in my head said "now's your chance" and somehow willed my little fist in my suddenly free hand into a ball for the first time in my life and I punched that boy square in the mouth. And I can hear his words all these years later, and I can see the hate-tinged surprise on his face as I successfully ran away:

"What a fucking bitch."