I think I become more furious every time my grandfather tells me to be careful or never to walk to my car alone or never to put my drink down when I'm in public. It makes me angry when I tell him every time that I can protect myself. And not because he's overprotective, although that's the joke we always make; it makes me uncontrollably angry to actually think about what it feels like to be a father absolutely terrified his daughter could be raped or killed every time she walks out the door. It makes me uncontrollably angry to think that a father has to teach his daughter not to trust men instead of teaching his son not to take advantage of any woman.
If you can't tell by now, the title of this blog post is satirical--meant to grab your attention at its outlandishness. 'Rape' is a word that elicits a very strong reaction from almost any person on whose ears it falls. So why would a twenty-year-old woman declaring that drinking too much or wearing "provocative" clothing proves a woman wants to be sexually assaulted draw you as a reader to click on that link? Because we've somehow allowed a culture to develop that avoids the significance of the action behind the word 'rape' altogether by changing the way we talk about it.
The truth is that sexual assault is any forced sexual advance without consent, regardless of the excuses or names we give for it. The truth is that we've allowed each other to make jokes about sexual consent and rape. We've allowed each other to have opinions on the type of clothes she is wearing or the number of drinks she's had or the number of people you've heard she's had sex with. We've allowed each other to say things like "I like freshmen because they'll sleep with me," and we've laughed about it like it's okay to think these things. We've developed a culture where all of these words and thoughts and practices are accepted so that we can sleep in peace at night knowing our brothers, our aunts, our boyfriends and our mentors aren't technically rapists--that the one in four women who are sexually assaulted in college, most oftentimes by someone they trust, don't have to be real until we talk about them.
So instead we've just accepted that sexual violence happens and let it instill fear in us. And we've let that fear create a culture in our country that women are either too fragile or too stupid to make decisions about their bodies. We've done it for so long that most women even believe it's our job not to tempt men to assault us. We've allowed a culture that men, or any individual regardless of gender or sexual orientation, deserve a yes. That they are entitled to consent to satisfy their needs. That a yes is implied. That even if she says no or if she says nothing at all, you can still take what you want and excuse yourself on the premise that she didn't stop you. Because it isn't rape if she didn't try to stop you.
The culture that allows us to say or do anything rooted in sexual entitlement, victim-blaming or interpersonal violence for any reason and in any situation is a grossly over-accepted norm. You do not have a right to my consent. And 'no' does not mean 'no.' Because "she didn't say no" and "I thought she liked it" should not be a part of the conversation we even reach. It starts so far before victim-blaming that any person or institution who questions a victim is almost embarrassing itself and certainly reinforcing this culture. Forcing yourself on any person who does not explicitly tell you they want you to, is rape. If I'm not making myself clear, let me do you one better: you don't get to get off unless he or she wants you to. Period. And sexual assault and the culture that accepts it and excuses it have to stop being the norm.
So quit hiding behind your arrogance and your entitlement and live up to what you are. Quit laughing at your friend's borderline-creepy-rapist jokes. Quit spewing statistics that blame fraternity men or black men or white women or parents or peer pressure or alcohol or the media or the girl that is now too scared to speak up. Quit trying to brush aside the thousands of individuals standing up to this culture because I promise you we aren't going anywhere.
As I've said before, it's not until people are no longer afraid to talk about something that any truth or hope can be found in it.
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