There's no such thing as date rape.
Let me clarify - I'm not saying that I don't believe rape happens. I KNOW it happens. But it's either rape or it isn't. The label "date rape" is complete and utter bullshit and we need to stop using it. Just saying, it really pisses me off whenever I hear this label applied to a crime.
Rape is a crime. It happens to both women and men of all sexual identities, although rape crimes against men by women are largely under-reported, as are rapes in the LGBT community. I had a male friend who was raped by a woman. He was a 6-foot tall man who was training to be a martial artist. She was a tiny 5'2 woman who barely came to his chin in sitletto heels. He reported it. It went to court. She was found not guilty. After a period of depression and being victim-shamed, he killed himself.
When I was 17 years old, I was raped by someone I had known and trusted for quite some time. For purposes of this article, I will refer to him as Dude.
I had known Dude since I was 14 years old. We had lots of mutual friends, and we regularly got together at each other's houses to just hang out and do the things that high school kids did during summer vacation. We were all like family. He lived in a rural part of O'ahu. At that time, that part of the island wasn't really developed. It was mostly agriculture fields, and the closest neighbors were about a quarter of a mile away.
As the gathering began to wind down, I was offered a ride home by another friend. Dude said he would take me home instead, since it would be out of the way for my other friend. I agreed - I had no reason not to trust that I would get home safely. So my other friends all left. Dude grabbed his car keys, and then he said he had something to move out of the shop for his dad real quick before we left. He asked me to help. I agreed - again, I had no reason to not trust.
I'm going to skip the details of what happened and just say that Dude was not kind, and because of the location, nobody heard me screaming. When he got to a certain point, he decided to go get some beer. I should also make note that drinking age in Hawaii at that time was 18. He left me where he hung me - blindfolded, on the hook of a block and tackle engine hoist. I kept screaming - I couldn't stop.
I was rescued by members of his family. His brother had been out with his own friends for the day, and had picked his mother up from work. They had stopped at the grocery store on the way home. When they got there, his brother heard me screaming in the shop. He came in, took the blindfold off, and carried me into the house. I was panicking and trying to get away from him, not realizing that he was trying to help me. I didn't even recognize him in that moment. We passed his mother who was getting the groceries out of the trunk. She dropped the eggs and followed us into the house.
She wrapped me in a sheet and called the police, and then called her husband. Her husband got there at about the same time the cops did. When he saw me, he was pissed - and that's an understatement. When Dude finally came back with his beer, his father tried to beat the crap out of him but the cops stopped him. Dude was arrested.
Because the rape kit had been difficult to process due to the nature of my injuries, and because there weren't many external marks on my body, there was almost no physical evidence to document. The only evidence the prosecution had to rely on was circumstantial - police crime scene photos, tools taken from the workshop, my testimony, and the statements of his family members who had found me.
The day in court was worse than the day of the rape. I had to sit in the courtroom and see the jurors looking at the pictures of my minimally bruised body. I had to watch the judge look at those pictures, and I had known that the defense attorney had seen those pictures. I was grateful that it hadn't made the news. Back then, news outlets in Hawaii didn't report on those types of cases involving minors like they do today, and I'd like to think that it's due to the social culture that was prevalent in Hawaii at the time.
When I was on the stand being cross-examined by the defense attorney, he tried the "date rape" angle. His questions:
"Why were you the only girl there with a group of males? Wouldn't you say that was risky?"
"Why were you there in the first place? Weren't you on a group date?"
"How could you not know that just by being there, you might provoke this event?"
"Wouldn't you say you were dressed too provacatively?"
"If you knew him and trusted him, why would you say that this was not a date?"
"Isn't it just a simple matter of you consented then changed your mind?"
First off - I was there with a group of friends that I considered to be family. I was not the only girl there. I was wearing jeans, my Star Wars Chewbacca T-shirt, a blue flannel lumberjack shirt over that, and Puma running shoes. My hair was long and in a ponytail. I had a baseball cap on. I did NOT consent to this! it was NOT a date! Secondly - if I HAD consented to this, I would not have been in court that day. There was no consent! He didn't ASK me if I wanted this. There were no subtle "come-hither" signals. There were no safe words. But above all, and again - there was no consent.
Dude got a 25-year sentence. He didn't live past the 8th year of it. His family is amazingly caring, and they were my support system. I had not told my own family about any of this, for reasons I won't disclose here. Dude's family helped me put him in prison, where he died from a drug habit and complications of HIV - he contracted the HIV as a result of a drug habit that started while he was in prison. I was not at risk but was tested every year for 10 years after, and thankfully came out clear every time. After the trial, the case was sealed permanently. I can't even find it on Google. That's a blessing, I guess.
It's been 30 years. I had a baby - but I can't have any more, due to the damage done during the rape. My doctor told me that I was lucky to be able to even conceive. My daughter was born with a birth defect, so had to have surgery every year for the first 12 years of her life. She was screened for HIV from birth. She has screened clear every time too.
I still have difficulty going into a Home Depot store. I still have issues with tools of any kind, and I won't watch horror movies unless my boyfriend, Matt, screens them first. Matt keeps his leather-working tools out of sight, and warns me when he's got a leather project to work on. In this way, he gives me the choice to expose myself to this stuff or not. Sometimes I get too brave and then I end up having nightmares.
Don't you dare call me a victim - I'm a survivor, dammit. And there's no such thing as "date rape." I have a whole rant going on in my head right now about this, and it's not pretty.
The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines "date rape" as "the crime of forcing someone you know to have sex with you especially while on a date." Here's the link for the full definition:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/date%20rape
The same online dictionary defines rape as "unlawful sexual activity and usually sexual intercourse carried out forcibly or under threat of injury against the will usually of a female or with a person who is beneath a certain age or incapable of valid consent..." Here's the link for the full definition:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rape
Looks like the same thing to me.
RavenKnighte is a survivor.
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