An erection is not consent, his “no” is not a challenge, men get raped too.

“If rape is inevitable, lie back and enjoy it”

That was a comment a TV weatherman made on air following a news report about a eight year old girl who had been raped. He made a joke of it. That was what 1976 was like, a man thought he could say that on TV. I don’t know if he would have lost his job if he said it about a 28 year old woman, but a few days later, he did.

I saw him say this, it was a few months after I was raped at 13, so it’s stayed with me all of these years.

Women have fought against this attitude about rape for decades, centuries, millennium, but the same thinking exists today when it comes to men and it still needs to be fought.

Men are the forgotten rape victims.

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month so let’s not forget that men are raped too.

If a man becomes physically capable of sex through stimulation, they must be interested in it. That’s the belief. An erection is considered consent. But men can be stimulated against their will and this can be a great source of shame. If they are given oral sex when they don’t want it — the attitude is — he’s a lucky guy — just lie back and enjoy it.

But men should be able to say “no” and have “no” mean “no” too.

Both men and women need to be able to hear a “no” as a “no” — not as a challenge.

We cannot end the rape culture by focusing only on the rapes of one gender of humans.

Men are date raped, friend raped and stranger raped just like women. It is harder for them to speak up about date rape, no one would believe them — they’d be laughed at — they would likely be congratulated for getting laid.

According to RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network)

About 3% of American men — or 1 in 33 — have experienced an attempted or completed rape in their lifetime. In 2003, one in every ten rape victims were male. The estimate is that 2.78 million men in the U.S. have been victims of sexual assault or rape.

I have known men who have been raped.

I can use his real name, it’s a common name, and he’s dead now. Bob was in his late 20’s when it happened. He was in a hot tub with a trusted friend. They were drinking and doing drugs. Bob’s friend started touching him. He kissed him and helped him out of the tub, he laid Bob down beside the tub and went down on him. This wasn’t what Bob wanted, but he orgasmed, so he thought he must have wanted it.

This incident affected Bob for the rest of his life. It affected his trust in people and it led him to question his sexuality. At times he was repulsed by sex and his sexual desires. Often in fact. This incident put true intimacy out of his reach. I know because we could share intimacy everywhere but bed. I don’t know if his rape is what led him to alcoholism, but I believe it was a contributing factor and he drank really hard. I was surprised he lived as long as he did.

The first man I consented to have sex with was also raped. I told him my story first. Then he told me his. I was surprised. I suppose it was our shared secrets that made it feel right to have my first consensual sex with him. John was raped in a juvenile detention center when he got caught up with the wrong kids in a joyride. He was only 16.

I was the only person he ever told about it and he could only tell me because I told him about my experience. I was able to testify against my rapist (well, to the grand jury anyway) and did know that he got convicted, but my boyfriend was too ashamed to report the violation that he experienced. He could bump into the guys who raped him anywhere, and sometimes he did.

Both of these men were violated by other men. Being violated by a man was something we shared and it was easier for me to identify with them and their stories. It was easy to think of men as being violent perpetrators. That fits into the cultural narrative so easily.

The first time a male friend told me he was violated by a woman, I didn’t get it right away. Despite all of the sensitivity I should have had, I didn’t have it immediately. I had to really listen to him to get it and I had to pause to really witness the pain in his eyes.

I had to confront my own feeling that as a man, he could have just lied back and enjoyed it — I would have expected any man would have before he spoke to me about his experience. When I saw I thought that way, I hated myself. In that moment I was full of shame. I remembered that TV weatherman and I saw myself in him. I was humiliated.

I gave my friend a hug and I told him I understood — he made me understand. He made me see there are so many less differences between men and women than we come to believe living in this culture.

There is no enjoyment in unwanted sex — it is a violation.

You cannot lie back and enjoy it.

You can really only dissociate and that’s not a skill you want to cultivate.

We must allow men to say “no” too.