I became a vegan a few months ago.
After being a vegetarian for four strong years, and claiming that I didn't think I'd go vegan - at least, not until later in life - the switch was abrupt and all-too-necessary, given my epiphany with my own personal experiences and convictions about Western - or, more specifically, American - culture. As with most things I believe strongly in, it's something I feel very fiercely passionate about, and I think it's one of the best decisions I've ever made for myself.
The thing is, we live in a pro-violence culture; a culture that encourages, even promotes, videogame violence and war and considers things like rape and "domestic" abuse natural, human behaviors; blames the victim for said behaviors occurring in their lives.
When I became a vegetarian, I felt like I was doing something incredible for myself, for humanity, for the environment, and for animals. I was no longer empowering some rich white guy to line his pockets with the death- and blood-money by viciously and unapologetically murdering defenseless, abused creatures - creatures that are born solely to be killed and eaten - held in captivity all their lives in tiny barnyards where they could barely move, enduring shot after shot of steroids and drugs, fed foods their bodies can't properly digest, standing in their own feces and never seeing the light of day, only to have their throats slit and slowly bleed out or to be boiled alive - vile, torturous deaths you wouldn't wish on your worst foe. I was no longer parttaking in the everyday consumption of death and doing so while disassociating what was on the plate in front of me from the animal it belonged to. I was no longer being one of those individuals who deemed specific species of animals worthy of a happy, healthy, loving relationship with humans (Read: Dogs, cats, and other domestic animal companions) and life lived as sentient beings, while, by action, excluding throngs of other, less-fortunate animals from this elite circle of existence.
When I began delving deeper into feminism, examining my privileges, coming to terms with my rape, and ranting constantly about rape-culture and the abundance of rape-apology that it allows in society, I came to an understanding that rape is nothing more than doing something to someone without their personal consent and enthusiasm. And, thus, the epiphany hit me like a brick to the cheek.
Suddenly, it wasn't enough to be a vegetarian. It wasn't enough to not eat animals. I was empowering the white man to steal from FEMALE bodies - from the mother animal - by force and without apology. I was empowering acts similar to everything I'd been fighting against. I was allowing for someone to steal from and exploit female bodies without the consent of those females. By these actions, I was saying, "Sure, it's okay to do this. It's okay to harm and take what doesn't belong to you and assert your power over someone weaker and without the proper tools to defend themselves."
And then, it was decided - I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't consume dairy products and eggs and honey and anything else that belongs rightfully to the animal it was taken from. I couldn't continue to empower someone to harm and exploit and literally rape non-human females anymore. I stopped immediately once I came upon these realizations, and I have no intentions of looking back.
I'm proud of my decision. Along with converting to Wicca, initially turning to vegetarianism, coming out to my mom, deciding that I wanted - nay, NEEDED - to be a writer, and exerting my life-long inner feminist, my turn to veganism is, I think, one of the absolute BEST, most necessary and sensible decisions I've ever made for myself. My spirit feels lighter than ever, and there is absolutely no more residual guilt mucking around my soul.
I believe whole-heartedly that the reason more people aren't vegans is because the white man hates thinkers. America hates thinkers. The WORLD hates thinkers. The world hates people who think the way that I do.
Maybe it hates people who think like you, too.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Thursday, April 15, 2010
The Vagina Dentata Next Door.
Vagina Dentata is an age-old myth, with the phrase literally translated from Latin to mean "toothed vagina," and aside from the fact that women do not actually suffer from Vagina Dentata, the impact and the fear it has led to in certain cultures is present and correlates directly with attitudes toward women - and our cunts - in Western culture, even today.
The myth of toothed vulvas is often associated with castration-anxiety in men - with charming sexist fascists like Freud claiming that, "Probably no male human being is spared the terrifying shock of threatened castration at the sight of the female genitals," to which I can aptly reply, "Probably no female human being is spared the overwhelming, irrepressible urge to laugh at the sight of the male genitals," but that's another topic altogether - and the myth has its roots in folklore throughout the world. In the modern sense, Vagina Dentata has less to do with dental-related mutation, and is viewed more so as a cautionary tale, warning men of the dangers of exercising promiscuity and sleeping with strange women. It seems clear to me that human males probably have thoughts other than castration when confronted with a naked woman. The outcome is perhaps less clear concerning human females and the urge to burst into a lengthy fit of giggles when confronted with a naked man.
Few modern psychoanalysts would agree with Freud about the prevalence of the Vagina Dentata image, and the fear of castration it may invoke unto the psyches of contemporary men. There are, however, a number of scholars, critics, feminists, and analysts that have argued that the prevalence of the image - both in world-mythology and, as they postulate, in the male psyche itself - is an indication of a very deeply-rooted hatred and fear of women, and vulvas in general. Additionally, many aspects of many societies, including modern ones, and Western ones, reflect such an attitude to the feminine.
The vulva - or "cunt," as I prefer to call it - is so undeniably feminine; it is probably the most significant symbol of females and femininity, and yet, many of the cultural stigmas that women face are centered around our vulvas.
The first I'd like to point out is the liberal and often erroneous abuse of the word "vagina." I don't like it, I refuse to say it (unless I'm referring to the actual vagina), and I have no problem educating people about its true meaning, and why it is not only inappropriate to say, but infuriating, as well.
A vagina is a narrow canal inside of a vulva; contrary to what people may think, the word "vagina" in NO way includes the clitoris, the labia, or any of the nerve-endings that are the primary source of sexual stimulation and pleasure for most cisgendered women. For this reason, it is inappropriate and downright criminal to refer to a woman's vulva/cunt as simply a "vagina."
I've said it before, and I'll say it until I'm dead and blue - it is absolutely infuriating to find out that women are still not having orgasms when they have sex with men. It's infuriating that women feel the need to fake orgasms and reward a man by feeding his ego for amazing sex that she didn't get, when he did little else besides use her body for his own gratification, because she's afraid to tell him she's not even CLOSE to having an orgasm. It's infuriating that men don't understand why a woman can't have an orgasm after a few minutes in the missionary position with stimulation that's only good for him. It's infuriating that women are reticent with regard to discussing what they want done during sex, because we're all socially-conditioned to believe that we're not supposed to enjoy sex, that sex is for men, and that we exist solely to please them. It's infuriating that there are still some men who refuse to give cunnilingus, but you can bet your sweet, deep-fried ass that these same men expect twenty-minute blowjobs from the women they refuse to go down on. It's infuriating that men have an alarming rate of impotent behavior when their wives/girlfriends/female lovers are the ones to initiate sex or share fantasies or inform them of something that she'd like to try/wants him to do, because it reminds him that she's a FULL human being with needs and desires and fantasies, and it actually TURNS MEN OFF to know that.
FUCK. That makes me SO fucking mad.
Secondly, menstruation.
Menstruation is a natural process - in direct correlation with the phases of the moon, Inga Muscio insists - during which, on a monthly scale, our uterine walls shed their lining, and our unfertilized eggs are discarded from our bodies. It's how our bodies are made. So how come we see birth control commercials where one of the largest selling-points is that we could shorten the life-span of each period, and only have four a year? Why is society determined to repress this natural function? Why are there commercials with conventionally-beautiful, racially-ambiguous, smiling and dancing women who insist that "four periods a year" is a GOOD thing for us, and why do men cast such women in these commercials to try to trick us into believing it was OUR idea?
I'll tell you why. Because it's NOT good for us. It's good for men. It's good for men who deem us irrational, overly-emotional, whiny, and incapable of making decisions because of our NATURAL uterus-shedding process. Birth control pills are horrible for our bodies, cause heart attacks and blood-clots and high blood-pressure, and yet, we're supposed to be solely responsible for birth control, since we're the ones who get pregnant. Not that men are the ones who, y'know, do the impregnating. It's all-too-inconvenient for men to take five seconds to open and slip on a condom, and it might dull his sensitivity an infinitesimal amount. Nevermind that the pill creates serious health-risks and has the capacity to seriously ENDANGER OUR LIVES, with certain brands like Yaz and the patch not only endangering, but taking the lives of several women.
As the great Inga Muscio said in "Cunt: A Declaration of Independence": "Men who refuse to wear a condom deserve to be fucked only by men who refuse to wear condoms." I absolutely agree, and any man who tells me that I should "get on the pill" can just GET. THE FUCK. OUT.
In that same vein of menstruation: Ever notice how it's called the "feminine hygiene" aisle? Implying, of course, that cunts are unclean and messy and smelly and a source of shame and humiliation for women, and that we must do all we can to conceal our "odor" and hide the fact that we're bleeding. So, scented creams, and "feminine wash" that throws off your PH balance, and home-bikini-wax kits, and special cunt supplies exist to make us feel BAD for shedding our uterine walls, and having a natural smell, and growing hair like NORMAL ADULT HUMANS DO.
And, I'm sorry, but what's so fucking clean about dicks?
You never see any floral-scented jock-straps, or Hershey Squirt 'n Skidmark Protection Pads, or fruit-flavored ball-deodorants, or baby-powder-fresh penis-wipes, or rose-scented dick-gels, or padded cock 'n ball razors, or any fucking "masculine hygiene" aisles in Anystore, USA, though I've heard tell of serious demand for such products.
In all seriousness, I can only think of one reason cunts are so viciously hated in our society; only one reason things like Vagina Dentata exists.
Because straight men, almost without exception, hate women. They hate everything we are, every function our bodies have, they hate taking any significant amount of extra time to please us in bed, they hate everything that comes out of our mouths and spend time training themselves to set up a mental-blockade so that they don't have to listen to us, and they despise everything we think and feel and desire and dream of. I've heard people say that it's kind of funny how gay men seem to like women better than straight men do, and you know what? It's a sad - but eerily accurate - reality.
Cunts are no exception to the rule. I think it's devastatingly clear that straight men spend so much time trying to fuck women, and yet, they hate our cunts so much. They hate our cunts because, after they're done fucking us, they have to accept the fact that our cunts serve a purpose other than granting them pleasure. They also have to accept that we have sexual needs, too. They have to accept that our bodies - and our cunts - do not belong to them, and that they are not entitled to anything we don't want to give.
Men's hatred of cunts is exactly why myths like Vagina Dentata exist.
Men hate cunts because they're beautiful and complex and mysterious. They represent power and femininity and life. The Vagina Dentata encompasses that fear and hatred OF everything feminine sexuality represents - it paints the female sexuality as voracious, insatiable, enigmatic, unknowable, cold, instrumental, decapacitating, dangerous, predatory, stifling, and engulfing. It represents a testament to male weakness and female power.
The Vagina Dentata and the attitudes it perpetuates in society are all a direct consequence of the way human sexuality is viewed in society; the function of the male orgasm and its superior status in culture; the way the male orgasm is the ultimate sexual paradigm, and all acts of sexual expression and erotic motif and encounter are inferior unless they live up to it.
There are potentially dozens of subjects that I could cover about Vagina Dentata, and the impact it has had on the mentality of modern cultures, but in the end, I would be talking in circles, because it all boils down to a single devastating reality:
It epitomizes and perpetuates the sheer and simple cuntfear that infects our culture every single day.
The myth of toothed vulvas is often associated with castration-anxiety in men - with charming sexist fascists like Freud claiming that, "Probably no male human being is spared the terrifying shock of threatened castration at the sight of the female genitals," to which I can aptly reply, "Probably no female human being is spared the overwhelming, irrepressible urge to laugh at the sight of the male genitals," but that's another topic altogether - and the myth has its roots in folklore throughout the world. In the modern sense, Vagina Dentata has less to do with dental-related mutation, and is viewed more so as a cautionary tale, warning men of the dangers of exercising promiscuity and sleeping with strange women. It seems clear to me that human males probably have thoughts other than castration when confronted with a naked woman. The outcome is perhaps less clear concerning human females and the urge to burst into a lengthy fit of giggles when confronted with a naked man.
Few modern psychoanalysts would agree with Freud about the prevalence of the Vagina Dentata image, and the fear of castration it may invoke unto the psyches of contemporary men. There are, however, a number of scholars, critics, feminists, and analysts that have argued that the prevalence of the image - both in world-mythology and, as they postulate, in the male psyche itself - is an indication of a very deeply-rooted hatred and fear of women, and vulvas in general. Additionally, many aspects of many societies, including modern ones, and Western ones, reflect such an attitude to the feminine.
The vulva - or "cunt," as I prefer to call it - is so undeniably feminine; it is probably the most significant symbol of females and femininity, and yet, many of the cultural stigmas that women face are centered around our vulvas.
The first I'd like to point out is the liberal and often erroneous abuse of the word "vagina." I don't like it, I refuse to say it (unless I'm referring to the actual vagina), and I have no problem educating people about its true meaning, and why it is not only inappropriate to say, but infuriating, as well.
A vagina is a narrow canal inside of a vulva; contrary to what people may think, the word "vagina" in NO way includes the clitoris, the labia, or any of the nerve-endings that are the primary source of sexual stimulation and pleasure for most cisgendered women. For this reason, it is inappropriate and downright criminal to refer to a woman's vulva/cunt as simply a "vagina."
I've said it before, and I'll say it until I'm dead and blue - it is absolutely infuriating to find out that women are still not having orgasms when they have sex with men. It's infuriating that women feel the need to fake orgasms and reward a man by feeding his ego for amazing sex that she didn't get, when he did little else besides use her body for his own gratification, because she's afraid to tell him she's not even CLOSE to having an orgasm. It's infuriating that men don't understand why a woman can't have an orgasm after a few minutes in the missionary position with stimulation that's only good for him. It's infuriating that women are reticent with regard to discussing what they want done during sex, because we're all socially-conditioned to believe that we're not supposed to enjoy sex, that sex is for men, and that we exist solely to please them. It's infuriating that there are still some men who refuse to give cunnilingus, but you can bet your sweet, deep-fried ass that these same men expect twenty-minute blowjobs from the women they refuse to go down on. It's infuriating that men have an alarming rate of impotent behavior when their wives/girlfriends/female lovers are the ones to initiate sex or share fantasies or inform them of something that she'd like to try/wants him to do, because it reminds him that she's a FULL human being with needs and desires and fantasies, and it actually TURNS MEN OFF to know that.
FUCK. That makes me SO fucking mad.
Secondly, menstruation.
Menstruation is a natural process - in direct correlation with the phases of the moon, Inga Muscio insists - during which, on a monthly scale, our uterine walls shed their lining, and our unfertilized eggs are discarded from our bodies. It's how our bodies are made. So how come we see birth control commercials where one of the largest selling-points is that we could shorten the life-span of each period, and only have four a year? Why is society determined to repress this natural function? Why are there commercials with conventionally-beautiful, racially-ambiguous, smiling and dancing women who insist that "four periods a year" is a GOOD thing for us, and why do men cast such women in these commercials to try to trick us into believing it was OUR idea?
I'll tell you why. Because it's NOT good for us. It's good for men. It's good for men who deem us irrational, overly-emotional, whiny, and incapable of making decisions because of our NATURAL uterus-shedding process. Birth control pills are horrible for our bodies, cause heart attacks and blood-clots and high blood-pressure, and yet, we're supposed to be solely responsible for birth control, since we're the ones who get pregnant. Not that men are the ones who, y'know, do the impregnating. It's all-too-inconvenient for men to take five seconds to open and slip on a condom, and it might dull his sensitivity an infinitesimal amount. Nevermind that the pill creates serious health-risks and has the capacity to seriously ENDANGER OUR LIVES, with certain brands like Yaz and the patch not only endangering, but taking the lives of several women.
As the great Inga Muscio said in "Cunt: A Declaration of Independence": "Men who refuse to wear a condom deserve to be fucked only by men who refuse to wear condoms." I absolutely agree, and any man who tells me that I should "get on the pill" can just GET. THE FUCK. OUT.
In that same vein of menstruation: Ever notice how it's called the "feminine hygiene" aisle? Implying, of course, that cunts are unclean and messy and smelly and a source of shame and humiliation for women, and that we must do all we can to conceal our "odor" and hide the fact that we're bleeding. So, scented creams, and "feminine wash" that throws off your PH balance, and home-bikini-wax kits, and special cunt supplies exist to make us feel BAD for shedding our uterine walls, and having a natural smell, and growing hair like NORMAL ADULT HUMANS DO.
And, I'm sorry, but what's so fucking clean about dicks?
You never see any floral-scented jock-straps, or Hershey Squirt 'n Skidmark Protection Pads, or fruit-flavored ball-deodorants, or baby-powder-fresh penis-wipes, or rose-scented dick-gels, or padded cock 'n ball razors, or any fucking "masculine hygiene" aisles in Anystore, USA, though I've heard tell of serious demand for such products.
In all seriousness, I can only think of one reason cunts are so viciously hated in our society; only one reason things like Vagina Dentata exists.
Because straight men, almost without exception, hate women. They hate everything we are, every function our bodies have, they hate taking any significant amount of extra time to please us in bed, they hate everything that comes out of our mouths and spend time training themselves to set up a mental-blockade so that they don't have to listen to us, and they despise everything we think and feel and desire and dream of. I've heard people say that it's kind of funny how gay men seem to like women better than straight men do, and you know what? It's a sad - but eerily accurate - reality.
Cunts are no exception to the rule. I think it's devastatingly clear that straight men spend so much time trying to fuck women, and yet, they hate our cunts so much. They hate our cunts because, after they're done fucking us, they have to accept the fact that our cunts serve a purpose other than granting them pleasure. They also have to accept that we have sexual needs, too. They have to accept that our bodies - and our cunts - do not belong to them, and that they are not entitled to anything we don't want to give.
Men's hatred of cunts is exactly why myths like Vagina Dentata exist.
Men hate cunts because they're beautiful and complex and mysterious. They represent power and femininity and life. The Vagina Dentata encompasses that fear and hatred OF everything feminine sexuality represents - it paints the female sexuality as voracious, insatiable, enigmatic, unknowable, cold, instrumental, decapacitating, dangerous, predatory, stifling, and engulfing. It represents a testament to male weakness and female power.
The Vagina Dentata and the attitudes it perpetuates in society are all a direct consequence of the way human sexuality is viewed in society; the function of the male orgasm and its superior status in culture; the way the male orgasm is the ultimate sexual paradigm, and all acts of sexual expression and erotic motif and encounter are inferior unless they live up to it.
There are potentially dozens of subjects that I could cover about Vagina Dentata, and the impact it has had on the mentality of modern cultures, but in the end, I would be talking in circles, because it all boils down to a single devastating reality:
It epitomizes and perpetuates the sheer and simple cuntfear that infects our culture every single day.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
The Sociopath Next Door.
(TRIGGER WARNING.)
Early this year, I came to very traumatizing terms with the fact that I was raped. By someone who was supposed to be my best friend.
And that's the reason I felt safe; he was my best friend; someone who was supposed to love and support me, someone who was supposed to be there for me, want to protect me, want to make sure I was okay. He was the person who claimed to love me to the sky and back.
And now, he's my rapist.
The background story is that, at the time I was raped, we were former lovers; met in high school, dated for two years, broke up, and remained good friends; eventually evolved to "best friend" territory; told each other everything, hung out all the time, laughed at the same stuff, had the same taste in music, books, movies, art, etc. Being young and naive and without a lot of experience in getting screwed over, I idealized him; ignored all of the signs of sociopathy that are now so crystal clear. It's funny how that happens; how all of those issues rush back once the rose-colored glasses are gone for good.
He's your average, textbook sociopath: superficially charming and charismatic; popular and good-looking; spewed lie after lie and broken promise after broken promise coolly and pathologically; always had an astounding lack of regard for others and absolutely no empathy toward anyone or anything; domineering, and he'd become SO bitter and outraged if someone ever did anything to dwarf him or knock him off of his throne; shallowly emotional; had no remorse, or dramatically feigned remorse for humiliating and degrading others; completely smug and smarmy; unaware and in absolute denial of privilege; impulsive by nature; deliberately manipulative; self-serving and self-absorbed; total know-it-all; never took responsibility for anything, or blamed OTHERS for the things that he did; and most of all, he never thought anything was wrong with him, and it was always everyone else who had the problem. All of the classic traits we all know and love. And by "love," I actually mean "morally despise."
As for the actual rape... I'll never forget that day.
We hadn't seen each other in a long time. It was summer, and he came over to my house for a visit, under the guise of watching The Goonies and playing bad video games. In retrospect, it just seems like the entire act was premeditated. He hadn't even been in my house for twenty minutes before he began kissing me and fondling me in ways I wasn't comfortable with, given that we were not a couple and I was no longer interested in him; definitely not interested in having sex with him. I asked him to stop, and he did... at first. Not five minutes later, he began again with the kissing and inappropriate touching, only this time, he was a lot more aggressive and less willing to listen to me when I told him to stop. He began trying to weasel my shirt off and I resisted, but then he pinned me down. I got pretty freaked out and there wasn't much I could do to fight him off; I'm a tiny girl, and he's a foot taller than me and a good 80-100 pounds heavier. And, beyond that, what can you really do to stop someone after they've eradicated your basic humanity to the point where you're nothing but a cunt and a set of tits? I asked him over and over why he was doing this, wouldn't kiss him back, struggled to break away, and uttered, screamed, cried, and whimpered a pregnant series of ignored "no"s, pleaded him not to do this, and was completely and systemically disregarded and outright ignored. Soon, I was lying under him, staring up at a corner in my ceiling with tears in my eyes, trying and failing to ignore the feel of his weight pinning me down, his rough, grabbing hands, wet, slimy mouth, and, most significantly, the unwanted penetration; trying to block it out, transport my mind, disassociate from my body completely, and hoping against all hope that I would soon wake up from this nightmare that I was painfully aware was not a sleeping nightmare.
Within the next few days, after hating myself and crying and never wanting to leave the shower, I spoke with him over the phone. I told him, point-blank, that the "sex" was non-consensual, and how upset I was with the entire situation, how angry I was that he could do that to me. Instead of being respectful, or remorseful, or even decent, he chose to shame me out of calling it what it was; insisted that I was being a "crazy bitch," wanted it as much as he did, and that I "let it happen," and thus, it was not rape. Not to mention that we had a previous romantic relationship during which I HAD consented to sex with him a great many times, though even then, in retrospect, he coerced, demanded, goaded, laid guilt-trips, or otherwise manipulated me into having sex with him quite a few times after an explicit "no" or three was loudly declared.
However, it was full-on rape, that day. And I'll tell you why, from my own experiences, thoughts, and perspectives:
Consensual sex doesn't make you cry and hate yourself and curl up into a ball on your bed for three days after and invoke a fear of being intimate with people you WANT to be intimate with.
Consensual sex doesn't cause you to make excuses to keep every significant other you've had afterwards at an arm's length because, even though you know you can trust them, and they would never hurt you (especially not like that), it's hard to trust anyone fully.
Consensual sex doesn't give you the frantic NEED to constantly keep your mind busy just so you can grapple for ways not to think about it.
Consensual sex doesn't make you positively nauseated when you look back on it.
Consensual sex doesn't cause you to mentally transport or disassociate from your own body when you're having sex you actually want to have.
Consensual sex doesn't cause panic attacks when you take your clothes off in front of someone else, or when one of your partners touches you in a similar way and it triggers a flashback.
Consensual sex doesn't implant irrational thoughts in your head every time you leave your house, that you need to keep a watchful eye on him, and him, and him by the bus stop, and him in the juice aisle, him, and him, and him.
Consensual sex doesn't make you seriously consider enlisting the services of a good therapist.
I should know, because I've had consensual sex, and I've been raped. I've also been through every single one of these scenarios (and others) since that day.
For a long time, I shamed MYSELF out of calling it rape, because, in addition to the vitriol he spat at me that day when I laid out my initial accusations, the many narratives of the rape culture we live in went through my head, over and over. Because I didn't know any better. I thought what we're all taught to think: Rapists are strangers in bushes in the middle of the night. Rape is a power-struggle, and includes palpable physical violence and vicious threats; maybe even the use of an assault weapon. You can't be raped by a person you've consented to sex with in the past, because if they've stuck it in once, they're entitled to do it whenever they please forthwith. I blamed myself for letting him kiss me and then trying to back out, and being alone with him, and not asking him to leave the first time he kissed and touched me and I didn't like it.
And all of that is the result of a society where it's not only acceptable, but commonplace, to blame the victim. And a society believes that rape is considered a natural, human behavior; not the vicious, violent, life-altering, filthy, personally-ruinous, disgusting, degrading, dehumanizing act that it actually is.
I think that's what bothers me the MOST.
I have to live with all of that for the rest of my life; the humiliation, the degradation, the disgust, and aberration, the complete and total depletion of my peace of mind, the mental-instability, the emotional exhaustion, the suffering, the nightmares, the tears, the trauma, the sexual paralysis, and the reminder that the person who was supposed to be my BEST friend - who was supposed to love, support, respect, and protect me - raped me. My wounds will heal through time, but the feelings I associate with that day and with this period of coping will never be forgotten.
He gets to walk around with a big, stupid, ignorant smile on his face, and never think about it again, because he wrote it off long ago.
Thank you to anyone who took the time to read my story. I really needed to get it off of my spirit. And it's helped. For now.
Blessed be.
Early this year, I came to very traumatizing terms with the fact that I was raped. By someone who was supposed to be my best friend.
And that's the reason I felt safe; he was my best friend; someone who was supposed to love and support me, someone who was supposed to be there for me, want to protect me, want to make sure I was okay. He was the person who claimed to love me to the sky and back.
And now, he's my rapist.
The background story is that, at the time I was raped, we were former lovers; met in high school, dated for two years, broke up, and remained good friends; eventually evolved to "best friend" territory; told each other everything, hung out all the time, laughed at the same stuff, had the same taste in music, books, movies, art, etc. Being young and naive and without a lot of experience in getting screwed over, I idealized him; ignored all of the signs of sociopathy that are now so crystal clear. It's funny how that happens; how all of those issues rush back once the rose-colored glasses are gone for good.
He's your average, textbook sociopath: superficially charming and charismatic; popular and good-looking; spewed lie after lie and broken promise after broken promise coolly and pathologically; always had an astounding lack of regard for others and absolutely no empathy toward anyone or anything; domineering, and he'd become SO bitter and outraged if someone ever did anything to dwarf him or knock him off of his throne; shallowly emotional; had no remorse, or dramatically feigned remorse for humiliating and degrading others; completely smug and smarmy; unaware and in absolute denial of privilege; impulsive by nature; deliberately manipulative; self-serving and self-absorbed; total know-it-all; never took responsibility for anything, or blamed OTHERS for the things that he did; and most of all, he never thought anything was wrong with him, and it was always everyone else who had the problem. All of the classic traits we all know and love. And by "love," I actually mean "morally despise."
As for the actual rape... I'll never forget that day.
We hadn't seen each other in a long time. It was summer, and he came over to my house for a visit, under the guise of watching The Goonies and playing bad video games. In retrospect, it just seems like the entire act was premeditated. He hadn't even been in my house for twenty minutes before he began kissing me and fondling me in ways I wasn't comfortable with, given that we were not a couple and I was no longer interested in him; definitely not interested in having sex with him. I asked him to stop, and he did... at first. Not five minutes later, he began again with the kissing and inappropriate touching, only this time, he was a lot more aggressive and less willing to listen to me when I told him to stop. He began trying to weasel my shirt off and I resisted, but then he pinned me down. I got pretty freaked out and there wasn't much I could do to fight him off; I'm a tiny girl, and he's a foot taller than me and a good 80-100 pounds heavier. And, beyond that, what can you really do to stop someone after they've eradicated your basic humanity to the point where you're nothing but a cunt and a set of tits? I asked him over and over why he was doing this, wouldn't kiss him back, struggled to break away, and uttered, screamed, cried, and whimpered a pregnant series of ignored "no"s, pleaded him not to do this, and was completely and systemically disregarded and outright ignored. Soon, I was lying under him, staring up at a corner in my ceiling with tears in my eyes, trying and failing to ignore the feel of his weight pinning me down, his rough, grabbing hands, wet, slimy mouth, and, most significantly, the unwanted penetration; trying to block it out, transport my mind, disassociate from my body completely, and hoping against all hope that I would soon wake up from this nightmare that I was painfully aware was not a sleeping nightmare.
Within the next few days, after hating myself and crying and never wanting to leave the shower, I spoke with him over the phone. I told him, point-blank, that the "sex" was non-consensual, and how upset I was with the entire situation, how angry I was that he could do that to me. Instead of being respectful, or remorseful, or even decent, he chose to shame me out of calling it what it was; insisted that I was being a "crazy bitch," wanted it as much as he did, and that I "let it happen," and thus, it was not rape. Not to mention that we had a previous romantic relationship during which I HAD consented to sex with him a great many times, though even then, in retrospect, he coerced, demanded, goaded, laid guilt-trips, or otherwise manipulated me into having sex with him quite a few times after an explicit "no" or three was loudly declared.
However, it was full-on rape, that day. And I'll tell you why, from my own experiences, thoughts, and perspectives:
Consensual sex doesn't make you cry and hate yourself and curl up into a ball on your bed for three days after and invoke a fear of being intimate with people you WANT to be intimate with.
Consensual sex doesn't cause you to make excuses to keep every significant other you've had afterwards at an arm's length because, even though you know you can trust them, and they would never hurt you (especially not like that), it's hard to trust anyone fully.
Consensual sex doesn't give you the frantic NEED to constantly keep your mind busy just so you can grapple for ways not to think about it.
Consensual sex doesn't make you positively nauseated when you look back on it.
Consensual sex doesn't cause you to mentally transport or disassociate from your own body when you're having sex you actually want to have.
Consensual sex doesn't cause panic attacks when you take your clothes off in front of someone else, or when one of your partners touches you in a similar way and it triggers a flashback.
Consensual sex doesn't implant irrational thoughts in your head every time you leave your house, that you need to keep a watchful eye on him, and him, and him by the bus stop, and him in the juice aisle, him, and him, and him.
Consensual sex doesn't make you seriously consider enlisting the services of a good therapist.
I should know, because I've had consensual sex, and I've been raped. I've also been through every single one of these scenarios (and others) since that day.
For a long time, I shamed MYSELF out of calling it rape, because, in addition to the vitriol he spat at me that day when I laid out my initial accusations, the many narratives of the rape culture we live in went through my head, over and over. Because I didn't know any better. I thought what we're all taught to think: Rapists are strangers in bushes in the middle of the night. Rape is a power-struggle, and includes palpable physical violence and vicious threats; maybe even the use of an assault weapon. You can't be raped by a person you've consented to sex with in the past, because if they've stuck it in once, they're entitled to do it whenever they please forthwith. I blamed myself for letting him kiss me and then trying to back out, and being alone with him, and not asking him to leave the first time he kissed and touched me and I didn't like it.
And all of that is the result of a society where it's not only acceptable, but commonplace, to blame the victim. And a society believes that rape is considered a natural, human behavior; not the vicious, violent, life-altering, filthy, personally-ruinous, disgusting, degrading, dehumanizing act that it actually is.
I think that's what bothers me the MOST.
I have to live with all of that for the rest of my life; the humiliation, the degradation, the disgust, and aberration, the complete and total depletion of my peace of mind, the mental-instability, the emotional exhaustion, the suffering, the nightmares, the tears, the trauma, the sexual paralysis, and the reminder that the person who was supposed to be my BEST friend - who was supposed to love, support, respect, and protect me - raped me. My wounds will heal through time, but the feelings I associate with that day and with this period of coping will never be forgotten.
He gets to walk around with a big, stupid, ignorant smile on his face, and never think about it again, because he wrote it off long ago.
Thank you to anyone who took the time to read my story. I really needed to get it off of my spirit. And it's helped. For now.
Blessed be.
The Feminist Next Door.
Yes.
I am paying homage to the probably-hundreds of thousands that came before me in this grand, vast vehicle we all affectionately know as "cyberspace" or, technically, the "world wide web."
I'm writing my own blog, on a page used solely for blogging. It's specifically dedicated to feminism, feminist issues, and feminist theory. I reserve the right to piss, moan, whine, rant, boast, complain, rave, review, critique, curse, cry, blame the patriarchy, share too much information, liberally use the terms "douchebag," "dudebro," "the white man," "cunt," and "asshole," write freely about my menstruation, talk some SERIOUS shit, and post the occasional delightful vegan recipe.
Love me or hate me, I'm here. And I'm queer. And I'm not going anywhere.
I am paying homage to the probably-hundreds of thousands that came before me in this grand, vast vehicle we all affectionately know as "cyberspace" or, technically, the "world wide web."
I'm writing my own blog, on a page used solely for blogging. It's specifically dedicated to feminism, feminist issues, and feminist theory. I reserve the right to piss, moan, whine, rant, boast, complain, rave, review, critique, curse, cry, blame the patriarchy, share too much information, liberally use the terms "douchebag," "dudebro," "the white man," "cunt," and "asshole," write freely about my menstruation, talk some SERIOUS shit, and post the occasional delightful vegan recipe.
Love me or hate me, I'm here. And I'm queer. And I'm not going anywhere.
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