Tag Archives: sexual assault

Rant

Liars!!!

Leave a comment

An Emily Wright original rant on Rape Culture: Yesterday’s Bad Boy Behaviour breeds today’s liars.

    Trump and Bush, I am sure that is a punchline to a joke right there. However, a few years back, a recording of Billy Bush speaking to Donald Trump hit the headlines. You may recall, it was October 2016, and Donald Trump was caught making crude comments about women.

“And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything. Whatever you want. Grab them by the pussy.”

Those were Trump’s words as Bush jeered him on. This is old news. It comes up again now because my son has just started dating and he plays hockey. Trump had defended himself by saying that…

…it was guy talk, just locker room banter.

Personally, I dated my fair share of hockey players in my youth, and it pains me still to consider the context of my name mentioned during ‘said’ locker room banter. There are countless teammates out there who know intimate details about my relationship. I know that when a girl’s name comes up within the confines of that smelly cinderblock room, it is not favorable to her reputation. Her body type would be offered up as bits of entertainment, followed by the length she is unwilling or willing to go to display her affections.

No doubt, she is unaware that she has been entered into a sex competition by a boy who claims to love her, but would never admit that in the locker room. This I know.

Let me be perfectly clear, I did not date the pigs. ‘This’ was how the ‘better boys’ behaved.

Just another example of rape culture and how our society has normalized misogynistic ideals towards women and their sexuality. Without her consent, her body is served up as a topic of conversation and an object to be used and abused at the will of others. 

The stories I heard about the pigs I cannot bring myself to repeat. However, the betrayal I experienced was far-reaching, well beyond the comprehension or shelf lives of my ex-boyfriends. I remember a night, long after my puck bunny days, when I met a boy at a bar. We really hit it off, or so I thought. It was not until the goodnight kiss on my porch that I realized that he knew me way better than I thought.

Having knowledge of a long-gone relationship of mine, his expectation was to get in on some of that. The date came to an abrupt end, but not before his intended angle bit in and left its mark. He did not go away quietly, to the point that I instantly regretted letting him drive me home, thus knowing where I lived.

After Trump’s comments had gone viral, as did his locker room banter defense, a reporter went to the dressing room of an NHL team that will remain nameless. The players denied locker room banter and were adamant that they had better things to talk about.

Bullshit! You bunch of pussies! You are so aware of how badly you behave that you can not even defend the (then) President of the United States!

The #MeToo movement has men spinning as they consider all the ways they have objectified women in their past and pray to God that no one calls them out for it as they attempt to slither over to the right side of history.

Here is proof that locker room banter happens and how quickly mindsets have become outdated.

Consider the movie ‘Mystery Alaska.’

In 1999, Russell Crowe starred in a hockey movie; one that I really enjoyed at the time. I could relate. Of course I could; I grew up in a hockey town. Within the main storyline there is a thread; a misogynistic, incriminating little thread. A character appropriately named Skank; the town player brags about a sexual conquest in the locker room. Another teammate, Bobby, told his girlfriend what Skank said. She, in turn, repeated it to the girl the comment was about. Rightfully pissed off, she hit Skank over the head with a shovel when he showed up on her doorstep for the inevitable booty call.

The punishment for this violation of trust was to skate ass first into a snowbank wearing only skates, helmet, and jock. The offender was Bobby, the player who repeated something said within the confines of the locker room, breaking some sacred code where boys can behave like utter jack-asses in common company. 

‘Bros before hoes’ is a well-known slang term referring to a brotherhood, a camaraderie among men that grotesquely twists and forms into the framework that supports and defends rape culture.

Moral of this story–boys enable, encourage, and embrace bad boy behavior. Or they used to. Only they can change that by rejecting it. Hopefully, we are able to raise better men who have the power and courage to change the topic of locker room banter.

‘Mystery Alaska’ is just one of hundreds of movies made in the last 30 years that highlight the now outdated attitudes towards women. Behavior that all men took part in or witnessed at one time. I have little sympathy for those scrambling to rewrite history that casts themselves in a different light as they are now fathers, husbands, managers, professional athletes, politicians, pillars in their communities and/or ‘respectable’ men. 

This is to address only the mistreatment of women. Don’t get me started on the full spectrum of equality as it relates to the LGBTQ community, race relations, economic divisiveness, representation of the disabled, and any group that is marginalized in any way.

In the meantime, I hope to raise a son who is strong enough to reject the bad boy behaviour that aims to humiliate, objectify, or disgrace others. Phasing out rape culture starts with our sons, the new generation of men. 

Dark Realities

Victim Blaming

Leave a comment

I blame myself.

He attacked me, and I didn’t tell.

Victim Blaming
Victim Blaming – Break the silence

This is my first Me Too story.

Even at the tender age of eleven, I could not climb the stairs from the basement to tell my parents what had happened. What is more upsetting is that I am uncertain to why. I may have been afraid of not being believed, although it is more likely that I feared being blamed. Instead of saying anything, I slipped soundlessly into a chair at the kitchen table to sit next to the middle brother, Wes. The only one in that house whom I trusted.

 

“Johnny tried to kiss you, didn’t he?”

Johnny was Wes’ older brother, and this omission was in the form of a question. This startled me, but I could only nod. Wes was doing his homework and I sat stunned, scared and unmoving. Until, of course, his dad came in. This wiry man was my mother’s best friend’s husband and he shooed me away to the basement again.

“Wes doesn’t need any distractions during his studies.” His father had said.

The meager smile the boy gave me was meant as an apology. Wes knew what the basement would hold for me and didn’t tell.

Victim Blaming
Victim Blaming

Slowly, I descended the stairs in my fuzzy pink pajamas with purple feet and mitten-shaped pockets. There, Johnny was with his littlest brother, setting up a board game. The safest place seemed to be on the floor at the opposite end of the coffee table. So, I masked my reluctance and joined. How could I have known that from beneath the table his leg crossed the distance? Every time he tried cramming his foot into my crotch, I smacked it away. On the third try, he sent his little brother upstairs.

“Don’t go” I plead but the words were stuck in my throat, the frights to big for two syllables. I scrambled to my feet in hope to make room for them to free from tongue.

Before I knew what was happening, he had me pinned down on the couch, and I still remember his crushing weight. In my panicked frenzy, I somehow managed to get away. Straight up two flights of stairs, I ran clutching the waist of my pajama bottoms. I hid under the covers of where I would be sleeping that night; except; I didn’t sleep. I sobbed quietly, gripped by the fear that Johnny would try again. Luckily, he did not.

 

  Memory is a funny thing.

Somehow, for a while, I was able to get past

Victim Blaming
Victim Blaming

that night at my parent’s friend’s house. There were a few years of blissful forgetfulness and denial. Until one day that memory came crashing back fully loaded with the fear of an eleven-year-old child.

Never Buried Forever

In grade ten drama class, we were to perform self-written monologues. One of these performances was of an intimate account of a sexual assault from the point of view of the victim as if he were talking to his counsellor. Everything he said bore into a wound I hadn’t known was there. The memory of my attack resurfaced, and it distorted all that I knew and tainted every relationship I had. Resentment chewed away at me and left a predominate chip.

Mercifully, I never saw Johnny again. But even now, thirty years later, on those rare occasions his name is mentioned in casual conversation, I stiffen and my stomach twists. That night will play over in my head, and the agonizing self-deprecation begins.

 

I should have recognized the danger in the way he looked at me.

I should have declined the can of pop he offered me.

I should have kept my distance and not stood next to him when we were picking out a movie.

I should not have changed into my pyjamas.

I should have…

I should have…

I should have…

 

 

I should have told someone.

 

 No one blames the victim more than the victim blames themselves.

This needs to change! Why did I feel the need the justify how old I was or what I was wearing? Would I have been lesser of a victim if I had been eighteen, full-figured and scantily dressed? The answer is NO! The end of victim blaming starts with victims and potential victims. Why didn’t I tell?

 

A victim is … a victim is… A VICTIM.

 

Johnny was fourteen when he attacked me. I worry that I may have encouraged his warped approach to women and sex by not telling. I may have been able to stop him. The truth is, I really don’t know. I bolted and did everything in my power to ignore and avoid him. There is no way of knowing how many girls and women he has victimized over the years. This thought haunts me.

 

Now I have a daughter of my own, and I struggle with how to protect her without having to tell her of the many threats that may surround her. I want her to be aware without being jaded. I want her to be safe without losing her innocence or free spirit. More importantly, I want her to always talk to me.

 

Victim Blaming must end
Victim blaming must end

 

I resent having to raise my daughter to be cautious of predators. Programming women to scrutinize their own actions as a way of preventing someone from wronging them is fundamentally backward and socially corrupt. The blame falls solely on the offender.