Archive for the 'rape' Category

Rape Culture and Triggers

Published on December 20, 2009 in anxiety, assault, consensual non-consent, depression, emotions, Feminism, rape, recovery, trauma and Uncategorized. 16 Comments

*trigger warning*

Earlier today, MasterDoc showed me something on fetlife that he thought was sick and twisted, but sorta funny. I won’t put it here since that would require me looking for it, and that would not be good for me to do. I cannot read it again. To sum up: it was a sp0of on “Twas the Night Before Christmas,” a rhyming tale of a man who chloroforms his wife, invites his girlfriend in to help him fuck his wife while she’s unconscious, (the wife comes in the story while she’s unconscious), he slips her a roofie when she starts to come to, films the entire thing, and then when she gets up in the morning and relates to him the “dream” she had, he tells her that wow, that sounds hot, wish I could have been there. Now, granted, different people read things differently. I had to point out to MasterDoc the fact that nowhere in there was any indication at all that this was consensual. No indication to the reader that this was a D/s relationship where consent has already been given for activities like this. Call me a stuffy old feminist assault survivor, but I don’t find rape funny. He had assumed consent, but when I pointed this out he read it again and agreed, there was no clear, or even implied consent. (And the whole bit about her coming during the assault is typical “women enjoy being raped” bullshit.)

I wasn’t inclined to post a comment myself, as I’ve seen too often that women will be dismissed as lacking a sense of humor for calling this shit out. But as a survivor of non-consensual sex I was really upset after reading this. I burst into tears while talking to MasterDoc about it. It’s an indication of the rape culture we live in that this is seen as humorous and acceptable by otherwise reasonable people. (Someone else we know posted a positive comment on this thread. Women posted positive comments on this thread.) MasterDoc decided to post a comment pointing out the problems with the post but the thread owner opted to delete it. He did, however, write to MasterDoc essentially explaining that he thinks that people on fetlife are all adults and able to look at a poem like that and appreciate that it’s not non-consensual. I disagree.

I wondered aloud if the following poem would have gotten the same level of appreciation: a woman chloroforms her husband without his consent, ties him up, invites in some guys to peg his ass while he’s unconscious, and then she lets him think that the whole experience was a dream (but meanwhile she’s filmed it). Would people find that as amusing? But you know, I don’t think that would ever be put out there as humor. I also think that most people are so conditioned by the rape culture that only other survivors would “get” the problem with it. (I worry that the scenario I just related would trigger a man who’s experienced sexual violence.)

The triggering for me was the way that raping the woman was treated like a big joke. When I was assaulted and wrote on my old blog about it, while most people were appalled at what happened one or two told me that I was blowing it out of proportion. They basically told me that I didn’t have the right to feel traumatized. That it wasn’t assault. The guy who did it to me tried to convince me that it was just an “accident.” While I did get support, the few people who dismissed my trauma as inconsequential did a tremendous amount of damage to me.

In all fairness, I don’t think there was any malice in the posting on fetlife. Not true malice. And MasterDoc felt terrible for showing it to me and said that he should have known better. I’m not at all mad at him as he had no intent of harming me. (Had he thought for a second that this post would upset me so, he would have never showed it to me.) I don’t think the author meant to convey a true non-consensual experience. After all, I can understand the fantasy of intoxication play – where one partner is heavily intoxicated, consensually, and the other person then has their way with them. Done consensually, I could find that really hot. Some people would still be triggered by this.

Driving home today, I started thinking that perhaps I was too sensitive about this. After all, the guy tells the wife that her story is so hot when she relates it to him; one would hope that if she was anything but enthusiastic about her “dream” he wouldn’t say that. But I don’t know – am I thinking this only because I’ve been conditioned as a woman not to cause shit? I’m not naive enough to think that the world is safe and that I shouldn’t ever come across something thoughtless and triggering. Shit happens. And what triggers me won’t trigger the next person, and vice versa. (Over on Shakesville this week there was an open thread about bdsm. I enjoyed reading the discussion concerning bdsm and feminism. But the moderator had to shut down the thread because she was triggered. And I think if she was triggered she totally did the right thing – took care of herself. Just because it didn’t trigger me doesn’t mean it can’t trigger someone else who has had different experiences.) But I do think that times like this are valuable moments to raise the consciousness of others.

Book Review: Healing Sex

Published on September 7, 2009 in anxiety, assault, bdsm, bisexuality, embarrassment, emotions, fantasy, Feminism, kink, lesbian, libido, masturbation, rape, recovery, reviews, sex, sex toys, sexuality, trauma and trust. 0 Comments

When Babeland offered Staci Haines’ Healing Sex for review, I decided to snap it up. You see, after I was sexually assaulted in 2005, a friend at that time had Haines’ Healing Sex DVD and lent it to me sometime in the months following the assault. While Haines’ focus is on survivors of childhood sexual abuse, her techniques can definitely be applied to recovering from any sort of sexual trauma. I remembered the DVD as being insightful, so I was happy for the chance to read and own Haines’ book.

Staci Haines specializes in the somatic approach – “an educational and transformational approach that assumes that the body, mind and emotions are one interconnected biological system.” (p. 15) She discusses a great deal the concepts of being aware of what you’re feeling, or indeed being aware if you’ve dissociated and stopped feeling. Being present during your sexual experiences is a major first step towards healing. Being aware of your body and reactions helps get you away from dissociating – “checking out” – during sex.

Haines is realistic about the conflicting emotions that survivors may feel – they may feel guilt or shame when they feel sexual pleasure, they may love and hate their perpetrator at the same time. Being triggered during sex with a partner may cause a survivor to take their anger out on their partner. She doesn’t paint a picture of recovery as being all hearts and flowers – but she does point you towards the wonderful future you can have if you take the time to heal. As they say, nothing worth doing is ever easy.

The approach is entirely sex-positive. She explores different types of sexual expression, everything from oral sex to S/M and in between. There’s chapters on sexual anatomy, creating boundaries for yourself, partnered sex, navigating your way through triggers and how to work on healing them, and even the use of sex toys. Many of these chapters have interesting sex-positive information that would be useful for anyone. (The book is aimed at women survivors, of any sexual orientation.) While she discusses the problem of survivors sometimes becoming sexually compulsive in reaction to the abuse, she makes clear the point that being a fully realized sexual woman with a stronger sex drive than our society thinks you should have is NOT the same as being compulsive. She then goes on to discuss the real difficulties with actual compulsion. She also doesn’t glamorize sex as being the perfect image we see in porn or read about in books. Haines is clear that we bring our quirky human selves to our sex lives – there will be times when things go wrong and you and your partner end up laughing. Sometimes you may need to stop the action for a time and get back to it after dealing with difficult memories. There’s even a chapter for partners of sexual abuse survivors.

The final chapter in the book is a phenomenal collection of resources – everything from healing sexual trauma, to dealing with any sort of trauma, to women-friendly sex-positive sex toy stores (Babeland is on the list).

One minor gripe: this book has more than an average number of typos that were not caught and fixed. If you’re a grammar nut like me this may irritate the heck out of you.

Downhill

Published on February 21, 2007 in anxiety, assault, rape and stress. 0 Comments

The week seems to be going downhill, in stark contrast to how happy and optimistic I felt last weekend. Granted, I think having memories of the assault triggered have put me in a funk, and I’m probably looking at this much more darkly than I should. I just want to move on and not have it affect my life anymore!

I mentioned to J. how the assault came up in conversation with L. and his email back included the sentence, “Tell me more about the assault.” So now I’m thinking, “Great, this will somehow be a strike against me. He won’t want to fool around with someone who is willing to say that someone assaulted her. He’s probably worried that one wrong move and I’d say the same thing about him.” And that’s not the case. I’ve been coerced and pressured into sex more times than I can count, but I only count one time as rape and one time as assault. Both those instances were clearly above and beyond the others. At least with pressure and coercion I made the choice to give in. There was still choice involved. With the rape and the assault, my option to choose was taken away from me.

I’m a world-class worrier, like my grandmother was, so telling me to just chill and not worry won’t work. I’m trying to stop worrying. I know I’m making this into a bigger deal than it probably is. I wish I could just put that goddamned assault behind me permanently. All that work in therapy, I seemed to be much better (hell, I’m horny as I sit here and write this – something I didn’t feel much of for a while) and now it’s come up to the surface again, like a floating mass of pond scum from the depths. I need an extra strong filter to get rid of it, asap.

I just want to be my happy-go-lucky, slutty, horny self again. I’m almost there – in some ways I’m there. But I need to get past these current hurdles.

The Past Comes to Slap Me in the Face

Published on February 19, 2007 in assault, dating, rape and sex parties. 2 Comments

I had a lovely date today with the Latina. We had lunch then knitted and crocheted and talked. We seem to really click and have a lot of the same philosophies. Things were going great. Then we got on the subject of sex parties, and she mentions one she’s just started going to in a particular part of the city. Oh no. I said, I hope it’s not the same party in that area that I used to go to. She named the host and I blurted out, “He assaulted me.” I explained to her what happened, and how she really needs to be careful going to those particular parties (I don’t want her to go quite frankly, but it’s not my place to tell her how to live her life). She seemed to take the situation very seriously and understood my professed anger at the perpetrator.

But still, a dark cloud settled over me. Why the fuck can’t this man stop fucking up and affecting my life? And an irrational (semi-irrational) fear settled over me – what if she doesn’t believe me? Now all signs point to the fact that she did, but after having everyone at those parties want to minimize and make excuses for what happened to me, I’m understandably panicked that that might happen again. I dealt with a bunch of people who didn’t want to make waves and possibly get themselves uninvited to a sex party, and therefore they tried to talk themselves and me out of looking at what happened. I really wish just one person would have spoken up and said that what he did was wrong. I also really wish he could have just taken responsibility for his actions and apologized, instead of going on about how it was just an “accident.” When he chose to keep hurting me after I asked him to stop, it became a matter of personal responsibility. And I’m angry that he didn’t take responsibility for it. Hell, I’m angry at what he did. I’m just really fucking angry.

I’ve emailed the Latina to ask her not to mention me to this guy, or anyone else at the parties. I don’t want to have any contact with him, no matter how indirect. I hope I never have to hear his name ever again. I also fear that her association with me could cause him to do her harm as well.

I’m frustrated that today could have been all good – after all, she gave me a couple of lovely kisses as we said goodbye – but instead has left me an upset mess. Shortly after getting home I told Davey all about it and cried.

Old Times

Published on February 13, 2007 in assault and rape. 1 Comment

I’m planning on deleting my old kinky librarian email address on yahoo, so I went through some old emails and contacted a few people who used to be readers. I wonder if this new blog would be of interest to former readers. Time will tell. I really liked having regular readers who appreciated my writing and sent kind emails from time to time.

Reading through the old emails (as I’m a digital packrat and there are still many in my inbox) reminded me of how much support I received after the assault a couple of years ago. That support was a tremendous help as I went through a very difficult time. Ultimately, I needed to stop blogging for a while to heal, but I really appreciated my supportive readers. Oh and if anyone still wants to kick the guy in the balls for me, I’ll gladly point you in his direction.

While I’m getting back to my old self (two years later…) and dating again (and possibly even fucking at some point in the future) I’m still haunted by the assault. I find myself reluctant to fool around with Davey sometimes, and it’s nothing to do with him and everything to do with being a little freaked out by sexual contact still. Once we get started it’s great, and I’m glad I’m at that point after a lot of hard work in therapy, but I still find myself shying away from sexual contact with men.

I hate this.

I hate that I’m still so affected by this. I hate that the dickwad who assaulted me only has karma to sort him out (hopefully). If I believed in hell, I’d hope there’s a special place in it for alcoholic assholes who ignore requests to stop hurting people. I hate that nearly two years later this is still prominent enough in my mind for me to still talk about it.

For the guy who assaulted me, and the guy who earlier on had raped me, I hope there’s a hell and that the flames are extra hot for them. Either that or they get a taste of their own medicine.

Angry? Me? Nah.