Disclaimer, this post is going to make me sound like a total asshole, but right now I'm too pissed off to give a crap. Also, it's going to discuss rape and sexual assault. If this is going to bother you, click away now.
Recently the media has been flooded with stories of sexual assault at the hands of high profile politicians and celebrities. This, in turn, started the #metoo campaign, where people across the globe revealed they had also been subject to, what they considered to be, similar attacks.
Now, a vast majority of these revelations have been related to sexual assault and I've read some things horrified me. However, I have also read a few that have really really fucked me off.
To put it briefly, there is no way on earth that being told you are beautiful in the supermarket is AT ALL an equivalent to actual sexual assault. The comparison is at best hyperbolic and, at worst incredibly INCREDIBLY offensive to people who have actually experienced such events. Did it make you feel a tad odd for a few minutes before you got on with your day? Maybe. Did someone force themselves on you and engage in non-consensual (another phrase I despise) sex? No. What you've experienced is annoying, but certainly not comparable to rape. A woman eyeing up a guy in the street is exactly the same as it happens to a woman, but you don't see the women of the internet essentially being told to shut up and sit in a corner for fear of accidentally making someone feel a bit gross.
Another thing that is getting to me, which is going to make me sound like even more of a cunt, is the fact that people are only coming forward now. Why wait 5, 10 or 15 years to tell people about your experience when you could just as easily have done it at the time? I did! I am aware that there are extenuating circumstances but all holding on to information is doing is making it harder to prosecute the person at fault. I've been told that I can't be angry at people for not being as brave as me but, actually, I can. I put my entire world on hold to ensure that no one was ever touched by the man that raped me again, really don't see why others can't try and do the same.
I expect a lot of self-righteous and 2017 opinions and comments in response to this post, and that's okay. But to the people who have compared being made to feel a tad uncomfortable by a man to being raped, remember that for every time you do so, you're belittling the experiences of people who've actually survived these kinds of attacks.
xXx, one very pissed of world-changer.
