An acquaintance asked me: “Why didn’t they speak out before, all these women?”
It makes you wonder, he said.
Yes it does.
Speaking out after sexual assault and harassment requires enormous courage What is to be gained, the victim thinks, especially when time has elapsed? The more time the greater the doubt.
You risk being called a liar. There is the question of evidence, especially when, as is usual, there are no witnesses. It is your word against theirs.Why should you be believed when the abuser may be a respected and admired member of the community?
You fear the condemnation or the ridicule of trolls on social media; and, not least, there is the impact on one’s family to consider. You risk being blacklisted or made unemployed.
Does one have the will to fight a Sisyphean battle? To endure another violation, facing possible legal and often ruinous financial pressure.
Waiving the right to anonymity; having to relive and reveal the intimate details of the horrific experience in public, tried for a crime you have not committed.
To be blamed. And shamed.
Yet the victim feels the shame before anyone blames them.
Was it my own fault? Did I lead this person on? Did I signal in some way that I consented or was willing? Was it what I was wearing? My tone of voice? Did my friendliness come across as flirtation? Will I destroy this person’s career, his family?
We need to teach boys and young men how to be allies of women, to respect them as equals and reject gender stereotyping and toxic concepts of masculinity
When one blames oneself the focus is shifted immediately from the perpetrator to the victim.
Pernicious cycle
Our sense of who we think we are is eroded and it takes a long time, if ever, to recover one’s true self. Sexual assault is not just a violation of the body but of the soul. It leaves in its aftermath a torment of guilt, self-blame, denial and anger. And profound psychic pain. Fear and shame render the victim powerless, which in turn allows the continuation of a pernicious cycle as the abuser moves on to find others to violate.
The victim, male or female, must always be believed, presumed innocent rather than guilty. Moral judgment suspended. No person is ever guilty of an act of sexual violence perpetrated against them. The legal definition of rape is a lack of consent for whatever reason, whether the crime is committed by an unknown or known person (most assailants are known to the victim).
Sexual assault is less about sex than about the desire to exert control and power over another. It is a crime of violence and punishment.
The rationalisation surrounding assault results in blaming and stigmatisation of the abused. That the act was in some way consensual. That women are asking for it by being drunk in public or dressing provocatively. That men are somehow biologically hardwired for aggression, have psychological problems or are influenced by pornography and so on.
The truth is always that no human being asks or deserves to be raped or sexually harassed.
You can threaten, enforce your non- disclosure agreements and make your settlements to buy people off but you cannot prevent the whispers among those you have wronged. You are known
Men learn from an early age that we are the dominant sex. That violence is an accepted resolution to conflict; an idea relentlessly reinforced by films, music, videos, the fashion industry, pornography and advertising. The woman is submissive, an object. Whether these messages are subliminal or not they have become ingrained in the culture and still, to a great extent, are unexamined in depth and unquestioned.
We need to teach boys and young men how to be allies of women, to respect them as equals and reject gender stereotyping and toxic concepts of masculinity. As a society we must critically challenge the cultural assumptions of the patriarchal society in which we all live. To reject the axiom that women are inferior by dint of their biology and that man is the conqueror and master by right. That women’s rights are human rights.
As long as you can regard a woman as unequal, less than, not as deserving of respect, you can feel entitled to boost your own sense of power by violating her. She is an easy target.
Pervasive phenomenon
The notion of sexual harassment is relatively recent and hasn’t really been understood by society at large. It is however an omnipresent and pervasive phenomenon inflicted on half the population, ie our daughters, mothers, friends, wives and girlfriends.
As regards sexual assault one study finds that 13 per cent of women and 5 per cent of men in Ireland have experienced varying forms of contact sexual abuse. Rape is the most under-reported crime. The aftereffects of sexual violence can have psychological, physical and emotional repercussions such as depression, substance abuse, suicide, etc.
Harvey Weinstein was so powerful it is said that he could spin or suppress any investigation of his now revealed predatory sexual behaviour.
He used watertight non-disclosure agreements and financial settlements as well as outright threat. He lured vulnerable young women into hotel rooms with the promise of movie stardom. He was by turns charming, flattering and manipulative. And, has been revealed, physically threatening.
His power seemed unassailable.Yet something of a shift was happening in the culture with the revelations about Bill Cosby, Donald Trump, Bill O’Reilly and Roger Ailes at Fox (“Disgusting pigs,” as one victim says ) who had got away with abusing women for years.
Weinstein currently has the starring role in his own hideous movie but doubtless he was enabled by a cast of morally repugnant individuals who not only knew what was happening but did nothing to stop it. Because he operated behind closed doors with their collusion, most people were genuinely shocked at the extent of the appalling crimes of which he is accused. The victims were silenced by fear and shame, convinced they would not be believed.
Although the spotlight is currently shining on Weinstein, sexual violence is a societal and cultural problem we all urgently need to address.
There are are his likes closer to home in Dublin and London who should be feeling nervous in the wake of the expose of Weinstein.
You can threaten, enforce your non-disclosure agreements and make your settlements to buy people off but you cannot prevent the whispers among those you have wronged. You are known.
To all victims of sexual assault, harassment or rape, male and female, no matter how long ago, I hope you can find the courage to speak out.
I do not underestimate how painfully difficult that might be.