The Dehumanizing: R A P E

“Rape takes who you are and it destroys you as a person. It takes the person you were and shatters it, obliterates it. It leaves you alive and picking up the pieces, but you never really feel safe again after that. You feel imprisoned in your own mind, living in your past, afraid of kindness because what if it happens again? How would you know, what are the signs, how can you prevent it? It’s something you carry; it drags at you, and when you forget it, it has a tendency to pop up and overwhelm you.”

And that is why patriarchy sucks.
“You must’ve done something, it’s your fault, your shame. What were you doing, what were you wearing, what were you drinking?” — And all things victim-blaming and shaming if you are a girl or a woman. “You must have enjoyed it. Lucky you” — is all people say if you are a boy or a man. “Boys don’t Cry. Boys don’t get raped.” —No. They do.

And let’s not forget the lack of attention that marital rape and same-sex rape gets! How the victims and survivors are erased even from the statistics and data if they are non-binary or inter-sex. Let’s not forget how we shame men and indulge in Homophobia if both the victim and the rapist are men. Let’s not forget how we never talk about rape in scenarios where both the perpetrator and the victim are women.

And irrespective of the gender you are if you have been raped and/or abused… the person, the monster who did this to you should be held accountable. It should be their shame, it should be their blame. Because of course it is! 100%

...I grow
snakes for
hair to hold
the venom
secreted
from this
heart loaded
too heavily
with all
they hate
about themselves and if

they hiss
it's only because
like any monster I've
long since
lost
my own
right
to scream"  —  from "Medusa", Reduction Fired

This is why the world needs empowerment, kindness, and accountability. Feminism gives you both. Victims and Survivors of sexual violence are humans from whom the autonomy of their own bodies is snatched away. For their attackers, it is a power move, in that moment the attackers don’t see them as humans. And then whatever is left is picked away and stripped down by society. Vulture culture. At least vultures only eat the dead. Here we rip apart the living and constantly revictimize them with our apathy.

Rape is 100% power play and ego satisfaction along with the belief of the male perpetrators that women are less human than men. It is the rapist’s attempt to individually show women their place. By violating and dehumanizing one woman, they believe that they have violated and dehumanized womenkind as a whole. Rape is their symbolic physical attempt to establish their authority as men.

On the other hand, women who rape men, are a result of conditioning by patriarchy and toxic masculinity that: Men can’t be violated and raped. And it has to be emasculating for a man to not want sex. Of course! he should enjoy it, why wouldn’t he? That’s what society has taught us as ‘normal’: men must be predatory or sex-obsessed, and women must be sex repulsed or at least prudes. That men are incapable of acting maturely or rationally or being in control of their behavior. And that women should be vilified and witch-hunted instead since their mere existence cause temptations. And that turning down sex and saying “No” cannot possibly exist for men.

Frankly, our toxic sexist mindset pit men against women and, cheer to have the men be predators instead of rational human beings. And women merely for male entertainment. Hurting not just women, but all victims and survivors instead – regardless of their gender identity and/or sexual orientation.

There is absolutely zero regard or understanding of boundaries because being respectful and sensitive is looked upon as weak… — again emasculation, because these two are traits that society thinks, should exist in women. And for society – being a woman is being ‘weak’. Either way, regardless of the gender of the perpetrator, and that of the victim…it is the toxic disgusting mindset that drives people to sexually violate another human being.

Completely Dismissing and disregarding another’s consent, feelings, autonomy, comfort, and boundaries

Let me emphasize this very important thing — Rapists just rape because they want to because they think that they can get away with it. They do it because they think they aren’t doing anything wrong, that their victims aren’t human beings but mere opportunities that they need to grab and have their way with. They do it so they can tick that off their bucket list of things they want to try. They do it because they do not see women as beings worthy of being treated with respect and dignity. They do it because for them it isn’t about abusing and humiliating one woman, but womenkind as a whole. They do it because of the power rush they feel by asserting control over their victims. They do it because they think that any woman who isn’t their mother, daughter, or sister, is a walking dick box. They do it to their own blood because their own perverted need comes first. Rapists rape because they are rapists, rape apologists, misogynists, and have zero clue or care about consent or the trauma that follows their victims.

More than anything rape is not just a horrendous act, but the mindset itself, even before it is actually committed by the rapists. But none of it is because of the victims and survivors of rape. None of them is because we wear too tight a dress, too short a skirt, too timid to push them away, too unstable, too drunk, too bitchy, too beautiful, too worthless, too young, too old, too froze, too confused, too asleep, too tired, too stuck up, too arrogant — too much anything.

Women are in danger the moment they are conceived: of gender selection. When they are born: of female infanticide. When they are growing up: relentless gender norm conditioning, misogyny, and abuse — emotional, mental, financial, physical, and sexual violence. Throughout a woman’s life, from a little girl to a teenager, to an adult — they are told what to do, and what not to do. Told to please society, to please the men, and to prevent sexual violence from happening to them. Men, however, even as young boys growing up, aren’t taught to respect boundaries, accept rejections, practice consent, treat women with dignity, and not rape. This is practically women being taught how not to be raped, so that some other woman who doesn’t follow these rules, is raped instead of them! Which is so fucked up!! And even then women get raped regardless. Because again —Rape happens because of rapists. For the perpetrators, it is less about sexual fulfillment and more about dehumanizing the victim. And the rawest and scary part of this is that the only reason a lot of men haven’t participated in this crime is not that committing sexual violence is wrong, or because they respect women…but because of their fear of getting caught.

We live in a Patriarchal society, exercising power based on rape culture, run by men who personify toxic masculinity — birthed by complicit women who themselves are victims of generational brainwashing and misogyny conditioning.

That is a mindset we must relentlessly fight to dismantle. All of us, together.

The lifelong trauma that the survivors have to endure, can not be written down or explained even in scientific books. Words aren’t enough. Time isn’t enough. Only patience, kindness, and respect for survivors.

And shame, blame, and accountability for the perpetrators: social, moral, financial, and legal.

"The Gorgon Medusa presents herself to us here and now, requiring us to be fully present, to listen deeply—past the noise of accumulated judgments—to the Ancient Wisdom that is our true inheritance. As the Great Awakener, She reminds us of our mortality and encourages us to reclaim whatever has been silenced or diminished within us while we are privileged to be alive. We are admonished to have the courage to act and speak what is true, to trust ourselves to hold her gaze and know we will not be turned to stone." — Joan Marler, Re-visioning Medusa: from Monster to Divine Wisdom

“Still, Medusa clenched her fists and promised every god still in existence that she would go down fighting this time.”
Barbara Ann Wright, Coils

So, the survivors keep fighting this endless battle against the monsters that now only remain their memories, persistently haunting their dreams, sometimes still feeling the disgusting touches on their skin. Yet still fighting to heal, and hoping to feel normal again. One day it will feel okay again. Whatever that means. But nevertheless persevering. We ought to recognize this invisible battle, and ensure that at the end of the day we are turning monsters into stone: together, united in humanity, kindness, and love.