Yes All Women
TW: rape, sexual assault, violence against women
People may see the feminist things I write about, and be turned off by how angry I am. I am angry. A lot.
The truth of the matter is, that anger comes from a much more fragile and vulnerable place.
I’m scared. All of the damn time.
I wonder if and/or when I will ever be raped.
I think about hypothetical rape scenarios, and how I would react to them. Like, for example, if a guy pulled a gun to my head, I know exactly how I’d respond. I’d respond by flirting, by assuring him that I wanted it all along and that there was no need to use force. I’d emotionally disarm him, string him along, and when the moment was right, I’d pepper spray him and run for my life. I trick myself into thinking that if I prepare enough, I will be ok, when I know that nothing could ever prepare me for a moment like that.
(It’s important to note that most rapes are not as “movie dramatic” as the rape scenario above, but are nonetheless just as violent and just as damaging).
It sounds morbid, thinking of potential rape scenarios, but it’s a way of feeling like I have some control over my life, in a world that feels very much out of control for me as a woman.
I think about all the other ways I’ve tried to enact control in my life. Dressing down. Carrying pepper spray with me at all times. Changing walking routes.
Even with all that “control,” it never stops men from talking at me. Touching me. Looking me up and down like an animal at a meat market. Following me.
I am scared. All the time. I wonder how that affects my physical health, to be in such constant survival mode. To be fight or flight at the drop of a hat. I wonder how many women with high blood pressure or heart problems develop these conditions in part because of the constant state of fear they live in.
I feel “lucky,” because I am a woman who has up to this point in her life not been raped. But there are two instances where that possibility didn’t feel too far off:
- Santiago, Chile. 2009
My semester abroad. I had become accustomed to, when taking taxis, telling the drivers I had a boyfriend, because it was the quickest and most effective way to “ensure” (I put this in quotes because nothing is ever guaranteed when it comes to rape culture) they wouldn’t try anything with me. At the end of one taxi ride, the driver says to me, “Si no me hubieras dicho que tenías pololo, te habria violado.” If you hadn’t told me you had a boyfriend, I would have raped you. He starts laughing. I nervously laugh along, partly because I couldn’t believe what he just said, partly to not let on that I am scared. He pulls up to my destination. I get out of the car. I shake, trying not to imagine what would have happened had I not said I was “taken.” That taxi ride still haunts me to this day.
2. Buenos Aires, Argentina. 2010
I had been interning at the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires. I was 23 at the time. I spent a lot of my time playing soccer with the guys in the Embassy yard. Every other day, I would get calls to the desk from the head guy confirming that the game was on. We would joke and laugh for a couple of minutes on the phone; it became part of my routine. I considered him like a father figure to me. At some point during my internship, there was a house party at a fellow Embassy worker’s house. It was a 40 minute drive out of the city. The Father Figure had offered to pick me up. Not long into the drive, he started to flirt with me. I was immediately on edge. We’re at the party. He’s getting drunk. He’s flirting with me more. He’s touching me. He’s invading my space. I remember that one time at work he had told me to “darle una vuelta,” to spin around for him, so he could get a 360 of my outfit. I was so damn naive; I had no idea he was sexualizing me at the time. It all suddenly clicks. I feel disgusted inside.
I tell him, multiple times, angrily, to stop. No one stands up for me. No one tells him to stop. They all just laugh, telling me not to “mind him” because “he’s just drunk.” I sit on the couch, to get away from him. He follows me, plops down next to me, and forcefully puts his arm around me. “STOP!” I tell him. He laughs. Others laugh. I’m sick of his casual sexual harassment and of no one taking it seriously. Because violence against women is so damn normalized and no one ever takes it seriously. I wonder how seriously they would take it if they saw this happening to their own daughter.
I decide it’s time to go. I get up. I start to leave. He offers to give me a ride home. I say no. He keeps offering. I say no. He really wants to take me home. I say NO. I walk 8 blocks alone in the dark to a bus stop to take the 1+ hour bus ride back to the city. I’d rather risk a potential mugging then a potential rape. I think of all the rides I’d taken solo with male acquaintances in the past, and what could have transpired. I shudder. I vow never to get into a car with a man I wouldn’t absolutely trust with my life ever again.
I tell you these stories because I promise you that EVERY woman has them. If it’s not a story about rape, it’s a story about being afraid of getting raped. The stories some of my friends have told me are blood-curdling and the stuff that nightmares are made out of. Every woman has a story.
When I tell men to get involved, to fight alongside us, I am literally pleading with you. PLEASE. Be part of the solution. Fight for a better world. Because this is the world so many of us women have to live in. EVERY SINGLE DAY.
I am angry. I am tired. But mostly, I am just scared.
