Things to remember on the journey of (re)discovering sex
By: Matthew Aksamit, contributor
CW: sexual assault, rape culture
This is written from the personal perspective of the writer. Everyone’s experience looks and feels different and can by no means be blanketed by a single perspective. This article has been edited by The Silhouette and Student Health Education Centre for clarity.
Right off the bat, I feel the need to clarify what I mean by sexual assault. After all, we are in a capitalist institution in which the normalization of rape culture is not only perpetuated, but also thrives — the university. I have heard countless “justifications” of assault: they were drinking or otherwise intoxicated; they were wearing provocative clothing; they were alone in a bad neighbourhood; or it does not count because it was their partner. The list goes on. There are also complexities when it comes to legal definitions of assault.
So, when I say this article is primarily for survivors of sexual assault, who am I talking about? Ultimately, I am talking about anyone who believes I am talking about them. If you are vocal about your experience or hesitant to share it, if you have pursued legal measures or if you have not, if you feel that twinge in your stomach every time you hear the word assault, or if you do not even know what to call your experience, if you are someone who has had a non-consensual encounter of a sexual nature, this is for you. These are the things I wish I knew and while I know it will not fix everything, I hope it helps.
Sexual desire after assault manifests differently for every survivor!
While some individuals may experience a reduced sexual drive (hyposexuality) as a result of sexual assault, some may experience the opposite (hypersexuality). It is important to note that both, in addition to falling anywhere on the spectrum of sexual desire, are equally valid reactions to trauma. The way you feel after assault should never be used to diminish or invalidate your experience. My personal experience manifested in hypersexuality and represented an effort to reclaim control over a narrative in which I previously didn’t have it.
Boundaries are your new best friend!
No, really! They are there to help make sure you are doing what makes you feel safe, comfortable and sexy. Boundaries are interlocked with consent and both are necessary to ensure a) this is sex, which requires consent to differentiate it from trauma and/or assault and b) you get to do the things that actively excite and please you!
Boundaries also extend far beyond the realm of sex and practicing establishing boundaries in other areas of your life, such as saying “no” to an event you really do not want to attend, can help make it feel more natural.
Give yourself time and space to mourn and heal!
One of the things I struggled with most after being assaulted was what to do after. I am very much the kind of person to try and shrug things off, get back to work and bury myself in things. Unfortunately, this meant I never really processed the trauma until it started affecting me months later. I had nightmares, panic attacks and, above all, I was confused as to what I should do.
This is where giving myself a space to mourn and heal came in. Creating a safe(r) space for myself meant surrounding myself with close friends who gave me their support and presence when it came to seeking medical care and contacting a mental health professional and a doctor. I was lucky enough to be able to see a therapist for free for a few months. Through these sessions I was able to talk through my experiences while being heard, supported and validated, all of which were necessary in my journey.
I also realize, however, that therapy is not available for everyone due to financial and other barriers, so I would also like to mention some free local and campus-based resources: the Sexual Assault Centre (Hamilton and Area) offers a 24/7 survivor support line, the Student Health Education Centre offers anonymous, confidential pregnancy testing, peer support and referrals to local services, the Women and Gender Equity Network offers support to all victims of sexual and gender-based violence and the Pride Community Centre offers support to 2SLGBTQIA+ and questioning individuals. The Student Wellness Centre also offers valuable resources to students.
You deserve peace and goodness!
When I was assaulted, in some twisted way, I thought I somehow deserved it. I thought it was my fault and I was ultimately responsible for my own unhappiness. I struggled and, to this day, struggle with the notion that I am a bad person. While this has not completely faded from my life, one of the things that has helped has been trying to take note of the inherent dignity I have and deserve because I am a human being. I am not perfect but in no way does this make me at fault for the situations in which I was taken advantage of.
So, what does sex after assault look like? Well, it looks different for everybody. What is important to remember is healing happens at a different pace for everyone and your path is not abnormal because it does not line up with someone else’s. And remember, as long as there is consent, there is no such thing as doing sex wrong! Explore, have fun and know you deserve all the light the sun has to offer.
By: Isabel Contin
Last week, I was leaving a small get together at my friend’s apartment building. As I was walking to my car at around 2 a.m., I noticed someone following me. Out of fear and panic I decided not to look back and walk as swiftly as I could to get to my car safely.
The unknown stranger never said or did anything, but I could hear his footsteps following closely behind me. As the only girl in my family, I had been raised to always stay aware of my surroundings when walking alone. I managed to get into my car and lock my doors immediately before buckling in and driving away. I have no idea if this man was out to get me or if he simply was coincidentally walking the same way as me at two in the morning, but sadly being in this world for so long has taught me one thing: to be afraid.
Street harassment is a very real problem that we are sadly faced with on a daily basis. As women, it is not uncommon to be afraid to walk out at night by ourselves, or even just walk through a group of men in plain daylight. It is intimidating and frightening and it makes us feel vulnerable. Recently, non-profit organization Hollaback released a video of a woman walking through the streets of New York City. They claim she was harassed over 100 times in a span of ten hours. Although we only see a small portion of that amount in the video (and some claim that they might have embellished the total number for effect), it is shocking to see the amount of times she is harassed over such a short period of time.
Being catcalled, groped, harassed, followed, assaulted or even stared at in an aggressive manner all count as street harassment. I have heard many arguments defending the way these men act, from the ever persisting “yeah, well what was she wearing?”, to the more subtle “maybe they find you attractive, learn how to take a compliment.” A compliment is meant to you feel better; being catcalled, followed or talked to in a sexual manner is not a compliment. It makes you feel uncomfortable and frightened. On top of that, the way someone is dressed should never be an excuse for unwanted attention and harassment. I should not be afraid of someone following me in the middle of the night when I have done nothing to make me think I am in danger. However, everything I have seen and heard on top of the cultural habit to turn a blind eye when something horrible happens made me feel terrified in the situation.
We live in an time in which rape and harassment are not only normalized, but expected. We, as women, are taught to be the careful ones. We’ve been conditioned to think in a certain way. It’s like we’re told “hey, don’t you dare get drunk at a party, because some guys might take you into a bedroom and do unspeakable things to you while you are not able to give consent.” Victim blaming seems to be the norm in this day and age, which is both offensive to the woman being harassed and anti-progressive for society as a whole. How about instead of teaching women to cover up and be careful who they trust, we teach men to be more decent human beings and not take advantage or objectify women?
Sexual objectification is real, victim blaming is real, street harassment is real, and gender inequality is real. Rape culture continues to be a problem because of societal attitudes towards rape and harassment. We need to educate ourselves and completely eliminate it from our society. It is definitely not a hard concept to grasp, and it is baffling that everyone does not see a problem with it.
Men may be tired of hearing women “complain” and speak out about harassment and rape issues, but guess what—we are even more tired of talking about it. Give us a reason to stop.
Sauder School of Business at UBC was graffitied in response to the pro-rape chant being lead during frosh orientation week. C/O Reddit
By now, you’ve probably heard about the Saint Mary’s University and University of British Columbia frosh week rape chant debacle. And, if you’re a decent human being, you’re probably also appalled by it.
In short, frosh orientation leaders at the two universities (that is, the two universities it has surfaced at so far) have come under fire for a cheer that goes, “Y is for your sister, O is for oh-so-tight, U is for underage, N is for no consent, G is for grab that ass.” It’s inappropriate, inexcusable, and frankly, inhuman. But that we already know.
What has come under less fire is how the media, the universities, and the students involved have handled the whole situation. That’s where my beef is.
To start, this article is one of only a few newspaper pieces you’ll find that actually puts into print all the verses of the chant. Most condense it, and only include excerpts – strange to me, considering it’s a whopping 26 words long. They usually eliminate the “oh so tight” part, perhaps to avoid offending readers (and yet is that not the whole point that this is really offensive?), which becomes convenient when they then water-down their adjectives to the stuff of mere “sexist chant” instead of acknowledging the vaginal violence that phrase indicates: rape.
Indeed, the National Post ran the shockingly forgiving headline “Saint Mary’s University student president apologizes for ‘sexist’ frosh chant that critics say ‘reinforces rape culture’”. So we’re relying on critics to confirm that that disgusting string of words is, in fact, offensive? And what is with those scare-quotes? Is the National Post so insecure in its values that it has to only tentatively identify that the chant ‘reinforces rape culture’? Grow up, NP, and tell it like it is.
The Globe and Mail, too, published, “Frosh video cheering on non-consensual sex is ‘sexist and offensive,’ Saint Mary’s University says.” Let me make something clear right now: sexism is stuff like believing women are worse drivers than men by the mere fact of their gender. Sexism is by no means harmless, but it’s not on the violent level of this rape promotion. This frosh chant goes way beyond sexism, and to reduce it to that is to belittle the severity of the situation.
Enough with the “non-consensual sex” language, too. Rape is rape. Let’s not dilute the violence of that word by smothering it with “non-consensual” euphemisms. Doing so decreases the urgent sense of violence and pain that the term “rape” appropriately connotes, and disrespects the countless victims of this horrible crime whose experiences are downgraded by such rhetoric.
Enough, too, with all this talk of sensitivity training. The people who chanted the rape cheer were fully aware that it was wildly inappropriate – it’s common sense. No amount of university-administered sensitivity training or bringing in bullying professionals (the actual response at SMU) will awaken them to something they already know, or solve the deep-seated indifferent misogyny that perpetuated the chant’s continuing presence at so many years’ frosh events.
What does need to happen is to hold students more accountable for their actions – upper-year coordinators and first years alike. It shouldn’t have taken days for the Saint Mary’s student’s union president – who led the cheer, among others – to step down. He should have been fired - immediately. The schools shouldn’t be promising to “investigate the incidents”; the frosh leaders involved should be suspended, and maybe even expelled.
Consequences need to apply to the youngest people involved, too. First year students are, on average, 18 years old. They are legal adults who can vote, can drive, and have achieved secondary school grades high enough for admission into a university-level institution. So I don’t care about group mentalities, or how impressionable these young adults are. They are autonomous, intelligent individuals who have no excuse for singing along, for not blowing the whistle sooner on this chant, and who then grow up to become frosh leaders who propagate this whole cycle.
I’ve never heard anything like that cheer at McMaster, and I hope I never will. But I won’t be surprised to hear about more students criticizing and publicizing similarly violent and vulgar experiences at other universities after this coast-to-coast reveal. For in a country where our media sugarcoats, our administration band-aids, and our students deny responsibility, where's the pressure for this culture to change?
View the full video that kickstarted this whole discussion, here:
[youtube id="SMY9Tqxz-Ec" width="620" height="360"]
“I get that it’s important to teach rapists not to rape, I mean yeah, that’s great,” I overheard someone say the other day and thought to myself, okay, yes, good we’re all agreed, until they continued on to say, “but I just don’t get why we can’t also teach women how to not get raped. I mean, it’s not like they’re mutually exclusive.” At this point my jaw opened and my brain shut. I said nothing, but I should have. As I was relaying this to a friend later on, she offered the term “esprit d’escalier” to express what I was feeling. Which was the perfect term to describe it, though I am glad I did not literally experience this in a stairwell, lest I’d throw myself down it.
Let’s go chronologically, here. First, we have the statement, “it’s important to teach rapists not to rape”. Right, yes I’m on board, obviously, with this sentiment. I’m talking campaigns like Don’t Be That Guy and other, including non-gender specific, campaigns that make it clear that if you are having sex with someone without their freely given and enthusiastic consent, you are committing rape. Yes means yes. Anything else means no.
Good, all right, that’s out of the way. Next, we had the question of “why we can’t also teach women how to not get raped.” Well, what does that look like? From what I’ve experienced, this teaching looks like being told to avoid certain streets at night, to be aware of what message my clothing is sending, to not drink too much. All this despite the fact that about 80% of sexual assault happens in the survivor’s home, despite the fact that the most common outfit survivors report to have been wearing is jeans and a tee-shirt, despite the fact that more rapists have reported being under the influence of alcohol than survivors have.
What this teaching does is place the onus on potential victims, rather than potential perpetrators. This is why we still get people asking, “well what was she wearing?” and “was she drunk?” Pretty straightforward victim blaming. These kinds of widespread teachings just support harmful systems and thought processes, for those involved directly, and indirectly, in sexual assault. It can serve to reinforce feelings of guilt many survivors experience, and restrict them from accessing important resources and support.
So you see, Person I Overheard, there are a few more things to consider on this matter than whether or not these teachings are “mutually exclusive”. Which, I mean, is logistically fair enough. We could also teach people how to build sandcastles at the same time as we hand out tiny bulldozers and point out flaws in sandcastle construction techniques.
Teaching people not to rape and supporting harmful ways of thinking about rape, though not impossible, is kind of like hosting your sandcastle-building seminar in the middle of the ocean.
This is what I should have said.
Edward Lovo / Silhouette Staff
Rape is a social problem perpetuated by the culture of rape. Rape culture is an unfamiliar concept to many, and because of its unfamiliarity, many will deny its existence. Really. However, the concept becomes easy to digest when attention is drawn elsewhere.
Over the past few months, CNN has provided a lot of coverage on India. CNN reported on the case of a New Delhi gang rape occurring shortly before the new year.
The protests that the case initiated spread in pockets of India and Nepal. There’s been aggression on the peaceful demonstrators committed by the police force, rapes committed by the police and more cases of gang rapes (including the even more recent case of a Swiss tourist), met with commitments from India to reform legislation.
This is partly because of pressure from protestors and partly because of the international spotlight. CNN even included firsthand accounts by Anjana Menon and Shreyasi Singh detailing the culture of rape in India.
However, CNN and other media sources have fixated on rape culture in India to the point of losing sight of rape culture in North America.
To make myself clear, rape culture is different in India than it is in North America, but this doesn’t change the problem that is rape culture here.
For CNN and other media, the theme of rape undergoes a transformation from India to North America, or from East to West.
The network is quick to highlight the backwardness of other cultures, but when addressing rape cases of its own society, it participates in the practices that it condemns in those cultures.
CNN eagerly reports that women are raped by police in India, but doesn’t lift a finger to type the same stories in North America. CNN eagerly reports the rape culture in India, publishing firsthand accounts, but what about the many women that have spoken out against rape culture in North America? CNN is vindictive of rapists in India, but somehow found the heart to sympathize with the rapists in the recent Steubenville case.
The disparity of coverage between India and North America by CNN gives birth to the illusion that rape is not a social problem in North America, but that it is in India. CNN isn’t the only culprit; ABC, NBC and USA Today have also contributed to this illusion. There is rape culture in North America. Rape is a problem here, and it must be treated as such.
Ironically, CNN has been participating in rape culture from the very beginning of its coverage on India. Due to the differences in rape coverage for CNN in the East and West, recipients of media are the recipients of distorted representations.
Hidden in between the lines is the message, “India is backward, not us.”
This message is part and parcel of rape culture, contributes to it, perpetuates it and glosses over it.
We’re backwards. After all, SlutWalk didn’t start in Toronto for nothing.
Allison Barrie / The Silhouette
Well, it’s official. Steubenville, Ohio’s football team is ruined. The lives of Trent Mays and Ma’lik Richmond are destroyed, along with their reputations as good students with promising football careers. Nothing will ever come easily to these boys; for the rest of their lives they will forever be publicly known as registered sex offenders.
Oh, I almost forgot, the 16-year-old girl that they raped might be damaged as well - the CNN glossed over that part.
This past Sunday, the most recent report by the CNN on their website mentioned the boys’ verdicts. According to Judge Thomas Lipps, they are guilty and will be sentenced to time in a correctional facility for raping a 16-year-old girl. However, the way that reporter Poppy Harlow presented the story makes the viewers sympathize with the two people involved in this case that should be receiving the least amount of sympathy in the entire story. In her piece, she expresses how emotional and difficult it was to watch these two young men apologize in court and realize that their lives would forever be changed because of the crime that they committed.
The problem here is that the media is so focused on sympathizing with these boys, that we forget about what they actually did. They took advantage of and raped a 16-year-old girl. She was drunk and she was passed out, but none of these facts should take away from what actually happened and how her life has changed because of it.
It all started in August of 2012 at a string of parties where the victim got very drunk and was raped by two members of the local football team, Trent Mays and Ma’lik Richmond.
What started out as a small-town incident turned into a national issue and is now getting worldwide attention. Not only just because of what happened, but because these boys were star football players on the town’s prized football team. Matters have only gotten worse now for this young woman who was victimized when she began receiving threatening messages over Twitter simply because she testified against her abusers.
What message does this send to our society? The upsetting truth is that by reporting your case to the authorities, your perpetrator may receive justice. But in doing so, you will also be harassed and criticized by media and people on the opposition, especially if the accused are viewed highly in the eyes of everyone else. So now why in the world would a woman who was sexually abused even think about reporting her case? She won’t, and this is the problem that we now as a society need to deal with.
What we need to remember is that rape cases such as this in Steubenville occur all the time. The only difference with this case is that this young girl spoke out and got justice for the crimes committed against her.
The media and the people harassing this victim are prime examples of what is discouraging people all over the world from reporting similar cases. The common belief around reporting such crimes is that embarrassment, harassment and shame all come hand in hand with the justice that you may receive.
How do we fix this issue? We need to rethink how we report news and issues that are occurring everyday.
Although it may be easier to take a certain side on an issue, it’s important to understand all of the facts and understand who is reporting and what kind of bias might be involved. It’s easy to get swept away with a convincing story from a trusted news station, but one must also recognize the importance of understanding facts for oneself instead of believing everything that is said in the news.
In the end, we can all breathe a sigh of relief for this young girl as her case is now coming to a close and she can get on with her life, but the question of “what happens now?” will always be in the back of our minds. It’s impossible to predict how Trent and Ma’lik will live their lives and what kind of obstacles they will face with their new titles as sex offenders. What we do know is that they are not to be pitied for the mistake that they made. They’ll learn their lesson and eventually move on, and that’s all that can be said in their defense.