Men get raped too
September 26, 2024 9:07 PM Subscribe
At least 1 in 6 men have been sexually abused or assaulted. "Baby Reindeer" is helping many finally start talking about it.
(Trigger warnings: rape, sexual assault, child sexual abuse, prison, stalking, suicide.)
If you're a male survivor of sexual abuse, please bookmark some support resources before continuing to ensure that you'll have someone to talk to about anything this post stirs up even if you're not comfortable sharing here:
* RAINN hotline and chat
* 1in6 regularly scheduled support group chats
* Male Survivor support forum
Despite being surprisingly common, the body of literature examining men as victims of sexual violence is lacking.
Social stigmas make male rape victims more likely to be seen as wanting it, assumed to have been turned gay by it, or even seen as deserving it. No wonder they're less willing to talk about it.
But the Emmy-award-winning Netflix miniseries Baby Reindeer (IMDB, Fan Fare) has helped get that difficult conversation started and even inspired a massive surge of first-time callers to a male sexual abuse survivors support hotline.
If you're a male survivor of sexual abuse, please bookmark some support resources before continuing to ensure that you'll have someone to talk to about anything this post stirs up even if you're not comfortable sharing here:
* RAINN hotline and chat
* 1in6 regularly scheduled support group chats
* Male Survivor support forum
Despite being surprisingly common, the body of literature examining men as victims of sexual violence is lacking.
Social stigmas make male rape victims more likely to be seen as wanting it, assumed to have been turned gay by it, or even seen as deserving it. No wonder they're less willing to talk about it.
But the Emmy-award-winning Netflix miniseries Baby Reindeer (IMDB, Fan Fare) has helped get that difficult conversation started and even inspired a massive surge of first-time callers to a male sexual abuse survivors support hotline.
Thank you.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 9:22 PM on September 26, 2024 [3 favorites]
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 9:22 PM on September 26, 2024 [3 favorites]
I was six or seven, I think, when the teenager down the street managed to lure me into the downstairs bathroom of my own house with a Playboy magazine and tried to get me to touch his junk.
Then, as a teen myself, lying alone on the beach, having a old guy approach and try to start a conversation, then suddenly fondle my ass.
Both times I ran. I hadn't really thought about it until now.
posted by CynicalKnight at 10:26 PM on September 26, 2024 [10 favorites]
Then, as a teen myself, lying alone on the beach, having a old guy approach and try to start a conversation, then suddenly fondle my ass.
Both times I ran. I hadn't really thought about it until now.
posted by CynicalKnight at 10:26 PM on September 26, 2024 [10 favorites]
I am incredibly heartened by the increasing number of men who have spoken publicly about assault. Being able to show solidarity and join forces to fight for survivors and against abuse means a lot.
I studied anthropology as an undergrad and grad student. In my lifetime it has been not-uncommon for middle-aged-white-men professors of anthropology to spout off about rape being “about sex”, meaning about some stereotype of cishet men’s desire for sex with cishet women, with the implication often being that we all must accept men raping women as a Fact Of Nature, Because Men Evolved To Want Sex With Women. More men speaking up smashes this facile bullshit to bits, and turns the focus back on power, anger, shame, fear, and control, where it belongs.
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 11:09 PM on September 26, 2024 [15 favorites]
I studied anthropology as an undergrad and grad student. In my lifetime it has been not-uncommon for middle-aged-white-men professors of anthropology to spout off about rape being “about sex”, meaning about some stereotype of cishet men’s desire for sex with cishet women, with the implication often being that we all must accept men raping women as a Fact Of Nature, Because Men Evolved To Want Sex With Women. More men speaking up smashes this facile bullshit to bits, and turns the focus back on power, anger, shame, fear, and control, where it belongs.
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 11:09 PM on September 26, 2024 [15 favorites]
Emotional flashbacks from CPTSD are different from regular flashbacks, at least, according to some. They can last a very long time, days, even weeks.
I very recently came out of somewhat of an experience, where I realized a pattern connecting many dots in my life, an arc going back farther than I imagined. I am quite sure I then immediately relived about 30 years of suppressed memories of trauma, vividly, over the course of about 30-40 days. These were not a random firehose, per se, but a narrative sequence of every single moment in my life I had suppressed, in extraordinarily vivid detail, exactly according to sequence. Flashbacks do not come as memories, there is no fade or encoding or dissociation, you relive the entire sensory, emotional and cognitive feed. My understanding at the moment is that I have not overreacted, so much as I was finally able to react and process the trauma that I should have at that time, and the people who dominated me prevented me from doing so. It has been a journey, and I have realized many things. I have slowly, slowly been able to see this ordeal as a mode for my inner child which abused and under-resourced to communicate where I still am not resourced to this day.
This is awesome! I am able to proactively, deliberately meet these needs, even if they are weird. I've been spending evenings with a good friend and her kids every week; we get to hang out, everyone has more spoons because my friend doesn't have to be everything to her kids, and um, she leaves me voice messages of her reading children of time to them. I have told her exactly why storytime is deeply, deeply soothing for me and keep checking in to make sure it's not weird, but, like, with an actual map of needs I'm finally able to be intentional.
It feels like 30 years of memories have flooded back in, but I suspect it's more likely that I have finally unlearned 30 years of other people's bullshit views which they forced upon my reality. I don't know how to express this, but I had been in cognitive decline for years, but I feel as if I am thinking as I remember myself thinking at 7 years old, but with 30 years more experience, a bullshit recognizer, and a moral compass I am proud of.
There was more to the experience. I remembered a lot. I realized a ton. My understanding is mixed with experiences that were purely internal reality as well, and I am unable to perfectly separate which is which. But I am able to live in rapport with my parts, and have found something of an extraordinarily functional balance. The balance is a sort of flow, it takes some maintaining, and I just learned I can go right back to CPTSD land in a heartbeat. But I think this is going to get easier. A lot easier.
My place is trashed. Long term care providers and other people in my support network are convinced I have been on drugs and have either withdrawn entirely or are pretty damn angry. Ha, food and money. But, this so hard to express, I am finally able to think clearly again. Because of this, everything is different. I need anyone who is going through anything like to know, it is possible for things to get better. It is actually fucking possible. I spent years "stable," treading water, circling the drain, I didn't care. I needed to take care of others who would have it worse if I didn't. But the sparkle had gone out, and I had resigned to that being my lot. I was wrong.
I have so much work to do. No buffer is an absolutely enormous issue, but for the first time in very, very long time I am able to actually capitalize on opportunities rather than automatically sabotage them. I know my own needs well enough to actually craft positions around them. Many things seem suddenly, extremely obvious, and my little 7 year old brain is playing legos with some very adult tools and uh, some of this shit looks like it could work. I have a hypothesis for how cooperation can outcompete competition. I believe collective ownership will become a more and more attractive deal as wealth stratifies, employment becomes increasingly unstable, and nations cede responsibilities to corporations and other warlords. I think I need to move out of Oakland immediately; I need so much help and I don't think Web3land is where the dreamers are anymore.
I wanted to share this just in case anyone needed it. IT CAN ACTUALLY GET BETTER. Please please please don't lose hope, I cannot give anyone guarantees, I only know that it is actually 100% possible on the table to turn something like this around. Not healed exactly. But fuck, I have not felt this drive or purpose for so long. I have more energy in any given day then I've had in previous weeks. My senses have come alive, I have never been so grateful to be alive.
One of the very first things I learned as a very, very, very young practically non-verbal child was that insofar as I had wants or needs outside of my parents's wants or needs, I was bad or wrong. I remember not being allowed to move from a chair as my mother dragged electric clipping shears through my ear, yelling at me not to scream, it shouldn't hurt, and thinking oh, I wasn't a real boy. She did relent when the clipper gumed up with my blood. I didn't wake up until high school, when a creative writing teacher expressed interest in a story of mine that was not just a reflection of someone else. I had to go back into workhorse mode when I dropped out of college. It has been a long, long ride.
Life is worth it. It is all worth it. I know it didn't feel that way. I remember that, so vividly, so many days.
But I get to be alive again
If anyone tells you differently, ignore that asshole! Especially if it's yourself, do you have any idea what a dick you are to you?
love got me out all of this. If you could use some, my DMs are open
posted by 1024 at 11:20 PM on September 26, 2024 [38 favorites]
I very recently came out of somewhat of an experience, where I realized a pattern connecting many dots in my life, an arc going back farther than I imagined. I am quite sure I then immediately relived about 30 years of suppressed memories of trauma, vividly, over the course of about 30-40 days. These were not a random firehose, per se, but a narrative sequence of every single moment in my life I had suppressed, in extraordinarily vivid detail, exactly according to sequence. Flashbacks do not come as memories, there is no fade or encoding or dissociation, you relive the entire sensory, emotional and cognitive feed. My understanding at the moment is that I have not overreacted, so much as I was finally able to react and process the trauma that I should have at that time, and the people who dominated me prevented me from doing so. It has been a journey, and I have realized many things. I have slowly, slowly been able to see this ordeal as a mode for my inner child which abused and under-resourced to communicate where I still am not resourced to this day.
This is awesome! I am able to proactively, deliberately meet these needs, even if they are weird. I've been spending evenings with a good friend and her kids every week; we get to hang out, everyone has more spoons because my friend doesn't have to be everything to her kids, and um, she leaves me voice messages of her reading children of time to them. I have told her exactly why storytime is deeply, deeply soothing for me and keep checking in to make sure it's not weird, but, like, with an actual map of needs I'm finally able to be intentional.
It feels like 30 years of memories have flooded back in, but I suspect it's more likely that I have finally unlearned 30 years of other people's bullshit views which they forced upon my reality. I don't know how to express this, but I had been in cognitive decline for years, but I feel as if I am thinking as I remember myself thinking at 7 years old, but with 30 years more experience, a bullshit recognizer, and a moral compass I am proud of.
There was more to the experience. I remembered a lot. I realized a ton. My understanding is mixed with experiences that were purely internal reality as well, and I am unable to perfectly separate which is which. But I am able to live in rapport with my parts, and have found something of an extraordinarily functional balance. The balance is a sort of flow, it takes some maintaining, and I just learned I can go right back to CPTSD land in a heartbeat. But I think this is going to get easier. A lot easier.
My place is trashed. Long term care providers and other people in my support network are convinced I have been on drugs and have either withdrawn entirely or are pretty damn angry. Ha, food and money. But, this so hard to express, I am finally able to think clearly again. Because of this, everything is different. I need anyone who is going through anything like to know, it is possible for things to get better. It is actually fucking possible. I spent years "stable," treading water, circling the drain, I didn't care. I needed to take care of others who would have it worse if I didn't. But the sparkle had gone out, and I had resigned to that being my lot. I was wrong.
I have so much work to do. No buffer is an absolutely enormous issue, but for the first time in very, very long time I am able to actually capitalize on opportunities rather than automatically sabotage them. I know my own needs well enough to actually craft positions around them. Many things seem suddenly, extremely obvious, and my little 7 year old brain is playing legos with some very adult tools and uh, some of this shit looks like it could work. I have a hypothesis for how cooperation can outcompete competition. I believe collective ownership will become a more and more attractive deal as wealth stratifies, employment becomes increasingly unstable, and nations cede responsibilities to corporations and other warlords. I think I need to move out of Oakland immediately; I need so much help and I don't think Web3land is where the dreamers are anymore.
I wanted to share this just in case anyone needed it. IT CAN ACTUALLY GET BETTER. Please please please don't lose hope, I cannot give anyone guarantees, I only know that it is actually 100% possible on the table to turn something like this around. Not healed exactly. But fuck, I have not felt this drive or purpose for so long. I have more energy in any given day then I've had in previous weeks. My senses have come alive, I have never been so grateful to be alive.
One of the very first things I learned as a very, very, very young practically non-verbal child was that insofar as I had wants or needs outside of my parents's wants or needs, I was bad or wrong. I remember not being allowed to move from a chair as my mother dragged electric clipping shears through my ear, yelling at me not to scream, it shouldn't hurt, and thinking oh, I wasn't a real boy. She did relent when the clipper gumed up with my blood. I didn't wake up until high school, when a creative writing teacher expressed interest in a story of mine that was not just a reflection of someone else. I had to go back into workhorse mode when I dropped out of college. It has been a long, long ride.
Life is worth it. It is all worth it. I know it didn't feel that way. I remember that, so vividly, so many days.
But I get to be alive again
If anyone tells you differently, ignore that asshole! Especially if it's yourself, do you have any idea what a dick you are to you?
love got me out all of this. If you could use some, my DMs are open
posted by 1024 at 11:20 PM on September 26, 2024 [38 favorites]
For some reason, I read a reddit thread asking for men to write about having been sexually abused by women. I think the entries were in the low thousands. I don't know if I can find it again, but there was immense variety and lack of inhibition from the women.
At least men are told that sexual assault is wrong, even if a lot of them don't want to hear it. Women have nothing but their own emotional competence or lack of same to decide on whether to commit sexual assault.
This isn't the same thread, but it's something of the sort: https://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/wahaup/askreddit_men_of_reddit_who_have_been_raped_by_a/
This probably isn't the same thread, either.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/khfdb1/serious_men_of_reddit_who_have_been_raped_by/
One thing I've heard about from men I know is that it isn't safe to wear a kilt.
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 12:48 AM on September 27, 2024 [8 favorites]
At least men are told that sexual assault is wrong, even if a lot of them don't want to hear it. Women have nothing but their own emotional competence or lack of same to decide on whether to commit sexual assault.
This isn't the same thread, but it's something of the sort: https://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/wahaup/askreddit_men_of_reddit_who_have_been_raped_by_a/
This probably isn't the same thread, either.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/khfdb1/serious_men_of_reddit_who_have_been_raped_by/
One thing I've heard about from men I know is that it isn't safe to wear a kilt.
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 12:48 AM on September 27, 2024 [8 favorites]
"I haven't even watched Baby Reindeer (but I'm going to now!)"
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS BABY REINDEER IS SO GOOD. It was so gripping that my husband and I just binged the whole thing in a single sitting.
Highly recommend, both because it's amazingly well-done and because lots of male rape survivors have been posting on social media about how watching it helped them finally start processing and talking about their own trauma.
Content warnings for excruciating secondhand embarrassment, sexual harassment, severe mental illness, stalking, internalized homophobia, drug abuse, grooming, and rape with a male victim.
It's a hell of an emotional ride with a lot to process -- I cried my eyes out for what he went through -- so if you're personally affected by this issue then I advise making sure it's a good time and space for you to watch something like this.
Allow four hours for watching and another couple of hours for decompressing after. I'm regretting starting it at 10pm the night before a 9am appointment because now it's 3am and I'm still too wired to sleep.
posted by Jacqueline at 3:25 AM on September 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS BABY REINDEER IS SO GOOD. It was so gripping that my husband and I just binged the whole thing in a single sitting.
Highly recommend, both because it's amazingly well-done and because lots of male rape survivors have been posting on social media about how watching it helped them finally start processing and talking about their own trauma.
Content warnings for excruciating secondhand embarrassment, sexual harassment, severe mental illness, stalking, internalized homophobia, drug abuse, grooming, and rape with a male victim.
It's a hell of an emotional ride with a lot to process -- I cried my eyes out for what he went through -- so if you're personally affected by this issue then I advise making sure it's a good time and space for you to watch something like this.
Allow four hours for watching and another couple of hours for decompressing after. I'm regretting starting it at 10pm the night before a 9am appointment because now it's 3am and I'm still too wired to sleep.
posted by Jacqueline at 3:25 AM on September 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
For some reason, I read a reddit thread asking for men to write about having been sexually abused by women. I think the entries were in the low thousands. I don't know if I can find it again, but there was immense variety and lack of inhibition from the women.
This happened to Jessica Simpson and IIRC made a pretty big splash when it came out in her memoir---not many people knew how to categorize or process it.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:54 AM on September 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
This happened to Jessica Simpson and IIRC made a pretty big splash when it came out in her memoir---not many people knew how to categorize or process it.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:54 AM on September 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
My late husband only finally realized he had been abused as a kid when he was working with a counselor, because as far as my husband had been concerned, his abuser (who was not a family member) was the only person who gave him any affection.
posted by Peach at 6:57 AM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
posted by Peach at 6:57 AM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
I don’t know if I’ll have the emotional bandwidth to get out all the research on this after being repeatedly berated for daring to say “the idea that the vast majority of sexual assault happens to women is false” but the one in six number is very outdated (you can see in their statistics page the latest research is 2005). The CDC study that was linked in the other thread puts the number at 1 in 4 have had unwanted sexual contact. Crucially, that’s the lifetime number. When they changed their questions in 2012 to finally include men who had been forced to penetrate someone (as these men are excluded from the definition of rape and sexual coercion) they found that in the 12 months before the survey, approximately the same number of men reported being forced to penetrate someone as women reported being raped. So if you consider forcing someone to penetrate rape, then the number of victims is roughly equally across these two genders; unfortunately the CDC does not consider this to be rape. There are other studies on college campuses that have also shown similar numbers of men and women reporting experiencing sexual assault or abuse.
The idea that the vast majority of sexual assault happens to women is false by a wide margin and is causing incalculable harm to ALL sexual assault survivors. I will try and pull the sources together later.
posted by brook horse at 7:17 AM on September 27, 2024 [11 favorites]
The idea that the vast majority of sexual assault happens to women is false by a wide margin and is causing incalculable harm to ALL sexual assault survivors. I will try and pull the sources together later.
posted by brook horse at 7:17 AM on September 27, 2024 [11 favorites]
brook horse may be referring to The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey.
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 7:42 AM on September 27, 2024
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 7:42 AM on September 27, 2024
When I was a child I had a scoutmaster who was quite a slick groomer. In my case it was easy enough to remove myself from the situation once his behavior became inappropriate by simply leaving the Boy Scouts (which I was kind of getting tired of at that point in my life anyway). But I have always felt horrible for his step-son who was my age and went to school with me. Before his step-father’s behavior came to light and his mother kicked the accuser out, his personality took a dark turn and he began engaging in a variety of self-destructive behaviors. He had previously been a really funny, smart, happy-go-lucky type of kid. I can only imagine what living with such a horrible person did to him. I have to wonder if the abuser married his mother in order to have access to him. This was about 45 years ago and I have often wondered what ever became of him. I do know the abuser suffered a blood clot in his spine that left him paralyzed; can’t say I felt sorry for him. As far as I know he was never charged with any crimes.
I also had a childhood friend who when he grew up went on to become a notorious child molester in Greenville, SC in the early 1990s. He fled to Mexico when he was caught but was found and extradited back to South Carolina where he was convicted and served 10 years in prison. It was big news at the time. After his release he apparently went back to his old habits and was arrested again after abusing a teenager who worked for him. Apparently there were some things that made an aggressive prosecution difficult and he ended up serving his time in house arrest; have no idea what happened to him next. I also have no idea how he ended up becoming an abuser; when he was younger h seemed so normal; I also knew a lot of his family and had no reason to believe he had anything other than a normal, upper middle-class childhood.
But these stories and others make me wonder if even when men are the victims of sexual abuse, the perpetrators are still typically men. And given that a number of abusers victimize both boys and girls, it really does seem to come across as being about power and control over your victims.
posted by TedW at 8:10 AM on September 27, 2024 [4 favorites]
I also had a childhood friend who when he grew up went on to become a notorious child molester in Greenville, SC in the early 1990s. He fled to Mexico when he was caught but was found and extradited back to South Carolina where he was convicted and served 10 years in prison. It was big news at the time. After his release he apparently went back to his old habits and was arrested again after abusing a teenager who worked for him. Apparently there were some things that made an aggressive prosecution difficult and he ended up serving his time in house arrest; have no idea what happened to him next. I also have no idea how he ended up becoming an abuser; when he was younger h seemed so normal; I also knew a lot of his family and had no reason to believe he had anything other than a normal, upper middle-class childhood.
But these stories and others make me wonder if even when men are the victims of sexual abuse, the perpetrators are still typically men. And given that a number of abusers victimize both boys and girls, it really does seem to come across as being about power and control over your victims.
posted by TedW at 8:10 AM on September 27, 2024 [4 favorites]
My dad did a couple fairly inappropriate things but I don’t feel the worse for it. I think back on those events and I guess what didn’t fuck me up long term was that he didn’t make a big deal about it or threaten me to stay quiet, or make a habit of what he did. In decades of hindsight I just feel mostly, “that’s not a thing a parent should be doing with a child.” I had and have no interest in perpetuating those activities myself. I never asked him about it when he was alive and I was older; he had gotten the brain worms and keeping conversation light was for the best.
In retrospect though, one of the kids I hung out with as a preteen was asking some wierd questions and asking for some strange things to “be his best friend” and that kid was probably getting some serious damage from his father. I wasn’t really into the relationship so it never went too far.
Back in the 70s we never got the “report all inappropriate touching” lectures from our parents or in school and I had no context for any of this stuff anyway.
Anyway, yeah, count me into the “club” of parent and peer abused AMAB kids. I’m lucky it wasn’t a big deal ultimately.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:29 AM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
In retrospect though, one of the kids I hung out with as a preteen was asking some wierd questions and asking for some strange things to “be his best friend” and that kid was probably getting some serious damage from his father. I wasn’t really into the relationship so it never went too far.
Back in the 70s we never got the “report all inappropriate touching” lectures from our parents or in school and I had no context for any of this stuff anyway.
Anyway, yeah, count me into the “club” of parent and peer abused AMAB kids. I’m lucky it wasn’t a big deal ultimately.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:29 AM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
A surprising amount of my male friends have in passing alluded to childhood molestation it’s astounding. It ranges from vague allusions of inappropriate situations at school to “that motherfucker.” I reply in a way that shows I’m completely catching their drift and let them take the lead. I believe everyone completely.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 12:34 PM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
posted by St. Peepsburg at 12:34 PM on September 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
Where I grew up, a prominent male member of the community became known as a groomer of young males--that is, he "became known" amongst us kids, not the adults. Because of his position of respect and authority, it was clear to us that the grown-ups would take his word over ours if we reported his behavior. So we sort of organically formed a conspiracy of children to keep each other safe from him. We spread information between us, kept tabs on his activities, shared our experiences with each other, and intervened where we could. We did our best. But as far as I know, none of us ever felt comfortable telling the adults.
Looking back, I do wish we/I could have done more, but we were so young and so afraid. And, yes, ashamed. He later died of a rather aggressive adult-onset disease that took him piece by piece, and when I heard the news, I felt that cosmic justice had finally caught up. Decades have since passed, but many of the memories remain vivid. There have been times I've wanted to reach out to the other kids (who are much older, some are grandparents) and maybe get the chance to finally talk it all out, but a lot of time has passed and I'm sure a lot of experiences are long buried.
posted by Quaversalis at 8:37 PM on September 27, 2024 [2 favorites]
Looking back, I do wish we/I could have done more, but we were so young and so afraid. And, yes, ashamed. He later died of a rather aggressive adult-onset disease that took him piece by piece, and when I heard the news, I felt that cosmic justice had finally caught up. Decades have since passed, but many of the memories remain vivid. There have been times I've wanted to reach out to the other kids (who are much older, some are grandparents) and maybe get the chance to finally talk it all out, but a lot of time has passed and I'm sure a lot of experiences are long buried.
posted by Quaversalis at 8:37 PM on September 27, 2024 [2 favorites]
Mod note: One (and responses) deleted. Yes, men can be sexually assaulted / raped by women while drunk, it's right there in the post, multiple times. Please do not perpetuate the exact harmful assumptions discussed in these articles (e.g., "If it didn't include violence, it wasn't actually assault").
posted by taz (staff) at 12:52 AM on September 28, 2024 [5 favorites]
posted by taz (staff) at 12:52 AM on September 28, 2024 [5 favorites]
I am in my 7th decade, between that long exposure to life and my own personal experience as a cute boy, it would not surprise me if the majority of male children (<18yo) had been the recipient of, um, unwanted and inappropriate sexual attention. I am quite sure that the reported 'offical' sexual assault figures are substantially under-reported for all groups, including – maybe even especially – for males.
Sexual violence cuts across all lines. Age, culture, gender,.... All of them. Some get it a lot worse than others, for sure. But nobody is safe from it.
I had a GP (PCP) once who said everybody should have their sexual career and children done by 25, and then we should all be neutered. Not sterilised, neutered. Remove the biological sex drive itself. He said half his practice was dealing with the direct and indirect issues that arise from the sexual impulse. I did not take him seriously then, but 40 years later I do.
(FTR, it is quite clear the females are subject to the bulk of serious sexual abuse, but it is not a minor problem for males either, and is part of the same basic problem. Fixing it for one requires fixing it for both.)
posted by Pouteria at 1:32 AM on September 28, 2024 [1 favorite]
Sexual violence cuts across all lines. Age, culture, gender,.... All of them. Some get it a lot worse than others, for sure. But nobody is safe from it.
I had a GP (PCP) once who said everybody should have their sexual career and children done by 25, and then we should all be neutered. Not sterilised, neutered. Remove the biological sex drive itself. He said half his practice was dealing with the direct and indirect issues that arise from the sexual impulse. I did not take him seriously then, but 40 years later I do.
(FTR, it is quite clear the females are subject to the bulk of serious sexual abuse, but it is not a minor problem for males either, and is part of the same basic problem. Fixing it for one requires fixing it for both.)
posted by Pouteria at 1:32 AM on September 28, 2024 [1 favorite]
For the longest time, words didn't even exist for certain experiences. Take grooming. A man I know, let's call him B, was groomed in high school to become a sexual plaything and then to be financially exploited by the family next door. But this happened in the late 70s, so it was just something to snicker at in the neighborhood. What a lucky kid! Boy, is that woman's husband dumb!
It's how many decades later and he's still enmeshed with that family, with them taking part of his disability check. All because it was unthinkable that a boy having sex with a woman could be a bad thing for the boy.
posted by LindsayIrene at 10:18 AM on September 28, 2024 [3 favorites]
It's how many decades later and he's still enmeshed with that family, with them taking part of his disability check. All because it was unthinkable that a boy having sex with a woman could be a bad thing for the boy.
posted by LindsayIrene at 10:18 AM on September 28, 2024 [3 favorites]
I had a GP (PCP) once who said everybody should have their sexual career and children done by 25, and then we should all be neutered. Not sterilised, neutered. Remove the biological sex drive itself. He said half his practice was dealing with the direct and indirect issues that arise from the sexual impulse. I did not take him seriously then, but 40 years later I do.
This sounds (1) not like a solution to the problem at the center of the FPP and (2) well, it sounds terrible.
posted by kensington314 at 3:14 PM on September 28, 2024 [8 favorites]
This sounds (1) not like a solution to the problem at the center of the FPP and (2) well, it sounds terrible.
posted by kensington314 at 3:14 PM on September 28, 2024 [8 favorites]
Indeed, the 15 year old babysitters when we boys were 9 should have been screened a bit better. We knew it was not good at the time. But it was not the priority complaint we had.
Ok, girls were weird and gross, granted; but let's focus on the daily ass-kicking that the wrestling team was dishing out, probably because they didn't want to be seen as 'gay,' and being on the chess team, etc. did not prepare us to fight them, while they got to train every day.
If you had asked us, when we were ten, to snitch on the weird babysitters, we would have asked you to kindly focus attention to the violence at school, as the scary thing that was condoned by school authorities. That was the assault. It got so much worse in high school, when these kids then had access to weight rooms and steroids.
the regular assault was from other boys, and not the girls taking liberty. I think the daily, sustained campaign of violence, what became the inevitability of it, that was the conditioning. Later we accepted those unwanted attentions from girls, older, younger, whatever, because those unwanted attentions were now always framed as "last chance" opportunities to make do, as an "inferior" person. At least in our case, being socially inferior was not established by the people doing the sexual stuff.
So were the girls criminals? Even the older ones, that seems overstated in my experience. They were confused. It seems the point of this show, that women can be manipulative and bullying criminals. Ok, that is true. But that kind of sustained weirdness and abuse from girls was not the overall force that led us, as young boys, into the bad underage sex stuff with weirdo girls, in my experience. no doubt things are a bit different now.
Those years of daily violence from boys, seems like the root, but also the breadth and the intense danger, of the assault problem. After that, the stuff girls did to us boys was weird, but we were "getting lucky" as "inferior" people in the violent context that had already been established.
Yeah, so don't send your kids to catholic school.
posted by eustatic at 11:56 AM on September 30, 2024 [2 favorites]
Ok, girls were weird and gross, granted; but let's focus on the daily ass-kicking that the wrestling team was dishing out, probably because they didn't want to be seen as 'gay,' and being on the chess team, etc. did not prepare us to fight them, while they got to train every day.
If you had asked us, when we were ten, to snitch on the weird babysitters, we would have asked you to kindly focus attention to the violence at school, as the scary thing that was condoned by school authorities. That was the assault. It got so much worse in high school, when these kids then had access to weight rooms and steroids.
the regular assault was from other boys, and not the girls taking liberty. I think the daily, sustained campaign of violence, what became the inevitability of it, that was the conditioning. Later we accepted those unwanted attentions from girls, older, younger, whatever, because those unwanted attentions were now always framed as "last chance" opportunities to make do, as an "inferior" person. At least in our case, being socially inferior was not established by the people doing the sexual stuff.
So were the girls criminals? Even the older ones, that seems overstated in my experience. They were confused. It seems the point of this show, that women can be manipulative and bullying criminals. Ok, that is true. But that kind of sustained weirdness and abuse from girls was not the overall force that led us, as young boys, into the bad underage sex stuff with weirdo girls, in my experience. no doubt things are a bit different now.
Those years of daily violence from boys, seems like the root, but also the breadth and the intense danger, of the assault problem. After that, the stuff girls did to us boys was weird, but we were "getting lucky" as "inferior" people in the violent context that had already been established.
Yeah, so don't send your kids to catholic school.
posted by eustatic at 11:56 AM on September 30, 2024 [2 favorites]
Now that the conversation has broadened I can think of other male friends who had women SA them in gross non consensual ways and yes this includes the babysitter who used to care for them turn around and come on to them as a very young teen. I realize now I have fewer male friends who haven’t had some kind of sexual trauma than those who have.
I thought the show Baby Reindeer was groundbreaking for this reason. I feel like the word “brave” is thrown around Hollywood so much (she put on 15lbs for the role and didn’t have makeup or hair, how brave) but that show was incredibly brave in showing the mess and confusion in aftermath of trauma and important in opening the honest and de stigmatizing conversation of male SA experiences.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 1:50 PM on September 30, 2024 [1 favorite]
I thought the show Baby Reindeer was groundbreaking for this reason. I feel like the word “brave” is thrown around Hollywood so much (she put on 15lbs for the role and didn’t have makeup or hair, how brave) but that show was incredibly brave in showing the mess and confusion in aftermath of trauma and important in opening the honest and de stigmatizing conversation of male SA experiences.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 1:50 PM on September 30, 2024 [1 favorite]
I can't talk about it much and haven't. I didn't even admit it to myself, consciously and with contemplation, until the "me too" movement emerged in recent years and over 50 years after it happened. But I, a male, was forcibly raped when I was 16 years old. It was by a stranger on a lonely beach, who approached a group of us high school boys drinking beer out there at night. He was a young sailor, he said, from a Navy ship docked nearby. My friends left, but since I had no parents at home at the time, I stayed behind. We went, at his suggestion, swimming in the ocean when he began touching me. He told me in the midst, that I reminded him of his girlfriend. I begged him to stop, told him what I believed to be true: that it would "make me gay." I ran away up the beach and he tackled me. I got away and ran to grab my clothes and as I did that he caught me and did it. I thought he was strangling me, going to murder me with his hands. Afterwards, I gave him a ride home rather than leave him stranded.
I never told anyone. First year of college, I joined a dorm-based "encounter group," but couldn't tell it. All of the social stigmas, I internalized them. I'm a wreck over it.
I first told anyone about this over 50 years later; an older psychologist nearing retirement I was seeing over other stresses: He shrugged it off as if HE didn't want to discuss it; no questions asked no more discussion, no revelation of my feelings and wrongful constructs. Two younger friends I told, I almost lost their friendship. I realized homophobia.
Only this very morning--I am still processing this--I remembered in detail how I was fondled as a little boy by an elderly neighbor. Back then, I had little idea what was going on until I was interviewed by the police as were some other neighborhood children... and the perp disappeared as he had been caught... and another incident in my teens when I had no parental supervision for a while.... I typed this so i am posting it... may it help me! This post has helped me a lot. I will get netflix, literally, to watch that show. I have a lot of processing to do.... and will look at the links. I don't know whether to tell anyone else... like especially my grown, adult children.... or why should I tell them other than to feel better myself. I am not asking y'all to help me process.... I am grateful for this mature, wholesome website and kind insightful post. You helped someone with it, as you intended.
posted by swlabr at 10:51 AM on October 2, 2024 [12 favorites]
I never told anyone. First year of college, I joined a dorm-based "encounter group," but couldn't tell it. All of the social stigmas, I internalized them. I'm a wreck over it.
I first told anyone about this over 50 years later; an older psychologist nearing retirement I was seeing over other stresses: He shrugged it off as if HE didn't want to discuss it; no questions asked no more discussion, no revelation of my feelings and wrongful constructs. Two younger friends I told, I almost lost their friendship. I realized homophobia.
Only this very morning--I am still processing this--I remembered in detail how I was fondled as a little boy by an elderly neighbor. Back then, I had little idea what was going on until I was interviewed by the police as were some other neighborhood children... and the perp disappeared as he had been caught... and another incident in my teens when I had no parental supervision for a while.... I typed this so i am posting it... may it help me! This post has helped me a lot. I will get netflix, literally, to watch that show. I have a lot of processing to do.... and will look at the links. I don't know whether to tell anyone else... like especially my grown, adult children.... or why should I tell them other than to feel better myself. I am not asking y'all to help me process.... I am grateful for this mature, wholesome website and kind insightful post. You helped someone with it, as you intended.
posted by swlabr at 10:51 AM on October 2, 2024 [12 favorites]
The stories I am seeing here are are stunning. Some of them shared for the first time. I am so glad people have felt free to finally speak.
posted by CynicalKnight at 6:04 PM on October 2, 2024 [4 favorites]
posted by CynicalKnight at 6:04 PM on October 2, 2024 [4 favorites]
Swlabr - thank you for your openness.
I do recommend taking to your adult kids. You don't have to go into detail - you can simply tell them that you were assaulted when your were young, and you haven't figured out yet how it affected you and your parenting. You can tell them as much or as little as you like - let their questions guide you, and tell them you welcome questions even if you have no answers.
There were things my father never talked about. Until he was dying, and then the gate opened. Dont wait. Those confidences from him are treasures to me
posted by Vigilant at 5:30 PM on October 5, 2024 [2 favorites]
I do recommend taking to your adult kids. You don't have to go into detail - you can simply tell them that you were assaulted when your were young, and you haven't figured out yet how it affected you and your parenting. You can tell them as much or as little as you like - let their questions guide you, and tell them you welcome questions even if you have no answers.
There were things my father never talked about. Until he was dying, and then the gate opened. Dont wait. Those confidences from him are treasures to me
posted by Vigilant at 5:30 PM on October 5, 2024 [2 favorites]
Looking back, I do wish we/I could have done more, but we were so young and so afraid. And, yes, ashamed.
Quaversalis, i meant to reply to this and then forgot, and i'm sorry. I just want to make sure someone tells you that this wasn't your fault, any of you; you were children and your adults failed you.
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:56 PM on October 5, 2024
Quaversalis, i meant to reply to this and then forgot, and i'm sorry. I just want to make sure someone tells you that this wasn't your fault, any of you; you were children and your adults failed you.
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:56 PM on October 5, 2024
Once again, I want to thank everyone for what they've shared. There is so much silence around these experiences that it can be difficult to know where to even start.
I don't think I'll be able to write the comprehensive post I wanted to. But here is an article that goes in depth into the statistics and the reasons why we incorrectly believe women experience much more sexual assault than men. A couple of highlights:
Taking off the research hat for a moment. I've worked with a lot of men and boys who have experienced sexual assault. One of the things I've seen, over and over again, is that many of them don't even consider that what happened to them might "count" as traumatic. This isn't specific to sexual abuse--I remember one young man saying nothing traumatic had happened to him except for a family member passing away from old age; then, later, he mentioned seeing someone get shot and killed in front of him. "Oh, does that count as traumatic?" he asked. He genuinely didn't know. (Incidentally, this was also someone who had experienced sexual abuse as a child.) But I think it's reinforced even more strongly in instances of sexual assault.
The word "trauma" has become so much a part of our vocabulary that this may seem absurd, but when Judith Butler published Trauma & Recovery in 1992, the idea that women could be traumatized by sexual assault was not widespread. It took a lot of research and a lot of work by feminist activists to broaden the idea of trauma beyond combat trauma and to include female sexual assault victims as people at higher risk for PTSD. I think that we conceptually know that male sexual assault victims can also be traumatized, but as a society the way we treat them is not much different than how we treated female sexual assault victims back in the 90s.
And while everyone has the right to decide an experience they had was not traumatic, to not use that word, I think that men are often widely discouraged by many sources and factors from applying that label to their experiences, and further have learned not to consider themselves any kind of victim. And, crucially, not simply because they don't want to appear "weak" or "unmasculine" though sometimes that's part of it. But many men who are perfectly fine with "failing" at emulating the patriarchal idea of masculinity have simply not been taught to acknowledge these kinds of experiences or try to get support from them. So, like female survivors had to back before we acknowledged sexual assault as traumatizing, many male survivors learn to simply "move on" and not dwell on or acknowledge it.
Which is honestly a valid coping strategy in a world that makes no space for those survivors. I don't begrudge anyone how they handle their history. But I dearly wish we lived in a world that gave people other options. You don't have to talk about it, but you should be able to if you choose to, and get the same support and resources that we have rightfully demanded--and continue to demand, as many of these demands have not been met--for women with the same experiences. I'm sorry we've failed you so much.
As I think I've said before, my inbox is open if anyone wants a less public place to simply acknowledge those experiences as part of their processing/journey.
posted by brook horse at 2:42 PM on October 6, 2024 [4 favorites]
I don't think I'll be able to write the comprehensive post I wanted to. But here is an article that goes in depth into the statistics and the reasons why we incorrectly believe women experience much more sexual assault than men. A couple of highlights:
Until 2012, the UCR, through which the FBI collects annual crime data, defined “forcible rape” as “the carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will” [...] In 2012 the FBI revised its 80-year-old definition of rape to the following: “the penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” Although the new definition reflects a more inclusive understanding of sexual victimization, it appears to still focus on the penetration of the victim, which excludes victims who were made to penetrate. This likely undercounts male victimization for reasons we now detail.Feminist activists have done amazing, incredible work to bring the issue of sexual assault into the spotlight, and to open many doors for women to speak up about their experiences. A good portion of that work was redefining the law (spousal rape, for example) and how we defined and understood sexual assault. We couldn't have accurate sexual assault statistics if forcing your spouse to have sex wasn't considered sexual assault. And we can't have accurate sexual assault statistics if we only define sexual assault using a definition of rape that excludes a huge portion of sexual assault victims. Especially when it's then being used to perpetuate the idea that men rarely experience sexual assault. Because I think it's quite clear that this idea makes it difficult for any male victim to speak up, to receive support, or to even have their existence seen and validated.
The NISVS’s 12-month prevalence estimates of sexual victimization show that male victimization is underrepresented when victim penetration is the only form of nonconsensual sex included in the definition of rape. The number of women who have been raped (1 270 000) is nearly equivalent to the number of men who were “made to penetrate” (1 267 000).5 As Figure 1 also shows, both men and women experienced “sexual coercion” and “unwanted sexual contact,” with women more likely than men to report the former and men slightly more likely to report the latter.
This striking finding—that men and women reported similar rates of nonconsensual sex in a 12-month period—might have made for a newsworthy finding. Instead, the CDC’s public presentation of these data emphasized female sexual victimization, thereby (perhaps inadvertently) confirming gender stereotypes about victimization. For example, in the first headline of the fact sheet aiming to summarize the NISVS findings the CDC asserted, “Women are disproportionally affected by sexual violence.” Similarly, the fact sheet’s first bullet point stated, “1.3 million women were raped during the year preceding the survey.” Because of the prioritization of rape, the fact sheet failed to note that a similar number of men reported nonconsensual sex (they were “made to penetrate”).
[...]
In addition, the full NISVS report presents data on sexual victimization in 2 main categories: rape and other sexual violence. “Rape,” the category of nonconsensual sex that disproportionately affects women, is given its own table, whereas “made to penetrate,” the category that disproportionately affects men, is treated as a subcategory, placed under and tabulated as “other sexual violence” alongside lesser-harm categories, such as “noncontact unwanted sexual experiences,” which are experiences involving no touching.
[...]
We recognize that when it comes to the impact of sexual victimization, men and women may indeed experience it differently. But categorizing the forms of sexual victimization that men typically experience as different and lesser than the forms of victimization that women typically experience would require considered justification. The reasons for continuing such practices would need to outweigh the drawbacks we have enumerated. We do not believe that such justification has been offered in the literature.
[...]
While recognizing and lamenting the threat that sexual victimization continues to pose for women and girls, we aim to bring into the fold the vast cohort of male victims who have been overlooked in research, media, and governmental responses. In so doing, we first argue that it is time to move past the male perpetrator and female victim paradigm. Overreliance on it stigmatizes men who are victimized, risks portraying women as victims, and discourages discussion of abuse that runs counter to the paradigm, such as same-sex abuse and female perpetration of sexual victimization.
Taking off the research hat for a moment. I've worked with a lot of men and boys who have experienced sexual assault. One of the things I've seen, over and over again, is that many of them don't even consider that what happened to them might "count" as traumatic. This isn't specific to sexual abuse--I remember one young man saying nothing traumatic had happened to him except for a family member passing away from old age; then, later, he mentioned seeing someone get shot and killed in front of him. "Oh, does that count as traumatic?" he asked. He genuinely didn't know. (Incidentally, this was also someone who had experienced sexual abuse as a child.) But I think it's reinforced even more strongly in instances of sexual assault.
The word "trauma" has become so much a part of our vocabulary that this may seem absurd, but when Judith Butler published Trauma & Recovery in 1992, the idea that women could be traumatized by sexual assault was not widespread. It took a lot of research and a lot of work by feminist activists to broaden the idea of trauma beyond combat trauma and to include female sexual assault victims as people at higher risk for PTSD. I think that we conceptually know that male sexual assault victims can also be traumatized, but as a society the way we treat them is not much different than how we treated female sexual assault victims back in the 90s.
And while everyone has the right to decide an experience they had was not traumatic, to not use that word, I think that men are often widely discouraged by many sources and factors from applying that label to their experiences, and further have learned not to consider themselves any kind of victim. And, crucially, not simply because they don't want to appear "weak" or "unmasculine" though sometimes that's part of it. But many men who are perfectly fine with "failing" at emulating the patriarchal idea of masculinity have simply not been taught to acknowledge these kinds of experiences or try to get support from them. So, like female survivors had to back before we acknowledged sexual assault as traumatizing, many male survivors learn to simply "move on" and not dwell on or acknowledge it.
Which is honestly a valid coping strategy in a world that makes no space for those survivors. I don't begrudge anyone how they handle their history. But I dearly wish we lived in a world that gave people other options. You don't have to talk about it, but you should be able to if you choose to, and get the same support and resources that we have rightfully demanded--and continue to demand, as many of these demands have not been met--for women with the same experiences. I'm sorry we've failed you so much.
As I think I've said before, my inbox is open if anyone wants a less public place to simply acknowledge those experiences as part of their processing/journey.
posted by brook horse at 2:42 PM on October 6, 2024 [4 favorites]
« Older The Rise of Neoliberal Public Finance | These are erotic bodies, languid frustrated bodies Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
People with relevant experience and expertise, please feel free to take it from here and make this thread helpful.
Thanks!
posted by Jacqueline at 9:11 PM on September 26, 2024 [11 favorites]