Hit The Bitch?
Chris’ opinion:
I appreciate and understand the value of shocking an audience. Our society thrives on keeping us ignorant, passive, and docile. It doesn’t like change, and a lot of that attitude has rubbed off on many of us. So every so often we need to be outraged into action. But not all shock is beneficial, even if intentions are good.
Take for example this Danish campaign’s, Children Exposed To Violence At Home, latest offering that seeks to educate us on the issue of gender violence. They created a video game called Hit The Bitch. It depicts a young woman making several comments to the computer screen. Your task is to use a floating hand to smack her in the face. On the top of the screen are two meters. One is for Pussy, which sits at 100%. The other is Gangsta, which sits at 0%. The more you smack the woman, the more your Pussy meter decreases and your Gangsta meter increases. It works to men’s perceived insecurities because we all want to be gangsta’s right?
As the woman’s face becomes more visibly bloodied and bruised, and your Gangsta meter reaches 100%, it is then replaced by 100% Idiot. Then we hear a short public service announcement of the dangers of violence. This is the message of this game.
I don’t question the intent of the game. I just wonder how helpful something like this really is. As a man, I can’t help but be offended by the depiction of men. You are only given the option to smack the woman. There are no options to avoid confrontation, only to hit.
The only benefit to this game is for those who finish it.
If for some reason I begin the game and find it too offensive to continue, I am left with no public service message. Just the idea that men can only deal with conflict by committing violence. Or that refusing to hit a woman equates to being a complete pussy. It’s an incredibly misguided and false depiction of men and how we behave when confronted.
So the men who need to learn a lesson finish the game presumably and are treated with the designation of 100% idiot (which is questionably constructive in it’s own right) and are treated to the violence awareness message. The men who don’t finish the game come away feeling marginalized and alienated. This is a great shame because it’s the men who would refuse to finish a game like this that would be most likely to want to help in a cause like this.
The end result simply leaves our greatest potential allies disempowered by reinforcing false stereotypes. Shock value can be useful given care. When applied haphazardly it can be potentially devastating. The message itself being entirely lost in the process of shock. Make no mistake. It is lost, or at the least overshadowed and easily misinterpreted. Just for the sake of delivery.
Hit The Bitch?
Sorry. That’s just no game to me.
Ophelia’s opinion:
As a survivor of intimate partner violence, I am extremely sensitive to this particular issue. As an advocate, I come into contact every day with victims who are still in abusive relationships. I have seen many different campaigns to end domestic violence. There are different schools of thought in the trauma community surrounding campaigns that should and should not be used to promote awareness. A virtual line of sorts, that must be tread carefully to ensure that public awareness will not in contrast affect victims and survivors of violence more negatively. Oftentimes, people who have no personal experience with the issue are the same people creating these campaigns.
After learning of the game, Hit The Bitch, I became interested in seeing what kind of reception it received amongst the public. I’ve spent some time searching on the internet for blogs discussing the game and comments left by people familiar with it. The vast majority of comments endorsed abuse and violence against women. Obviously, the message meant to deter violence has potentially encouraged it.
As a female survivor, I can tell you that I felt the impact of those face-slaps. It is a very raw and triggering reminder that abuse is a very serious issue and one that, to this day, isn’t be adequately addressed. The woman in this video is not a pixilated computer character but rather video footage of an actual woman. Her bruises, facial expressions and responses are very real. Watching her being abused was a flashback into a very personal and demoralizing act of violence. It brought back the feelings of helplessness, isolation and fear that accompany domestic violence.
It sets a dangerous precedent when you put those experiences in a gaming format, which is designed for fun and enjoyment. The often subliminal, unspoken conflict here is that if something is put in a game then it must be okay and acceptable. It could equally be fine to laugh and make light of this virtual woman because it’s just a game right? So one wonders if this game educates our communities or simply reinforces negative stereotypes.
The lesson of this game is presented as almost an afterthought. An acceptable “in” for gamers to act out abusive behaviors some may already believe are acceptable. Violence in the gaming world can translate to the real world. It grooms young adults to what is an acceptable standard in our society. Lacking a strong and convincing conclusion makes it easy to disregard what can be learned from engaging in violent activity, whether real or on a computer.
If Hit the Bitch is viewed by the majority as acceptable, I wonder what is next in the gaming world. A virtual rape scene or child abuse scenario where the player actively molests the victims?
Those “advocating” against violence must be very cautious to pursue campaigns that eliminate confusing messages and pay careful attention to unintended consequences. Undoubtedly, supporters of this campaign may unknowingly cause more harm than good.
My Sister Maggie
I had a dream last night. It was about my sister, Maggie. It’s been almost 9 years since my sister passed away but every now and then she comes to me in my dreams. Last night, she met up with me in a room filled with people and asked me to sing with her. I am a singer, though sadly, my sister never heard me sing.
In my dream, we sang together, a beautiful melody. She smiled and laughed with me, her face filled with happiness. I could feel her arms embracing me; I could hear her angelic voice harmonizing with mine. A dream so real, I could almost taste it. I was aglow until I awoke and realized she was gone and there would be no more singing.
To awake to the reality left me feeling empty and filled with sadness.
I wrote a song about my sister called “Maggie’s song.” It was my way of coming to terms with the immense loss of losing my sister. A sister I loved so much and knew so little about. Ours was a complicated relationship. Maggie and I shared the same father but different mothers. It was our father who abused both Maggie and myself as children and into adulthood. Though she seldom ever spoke about her experience, she did share it with me before she died. Her disclosure affirmed to me that I was not alone.
She lived a complicated life, filled with complex relationships and a continued cycle of violence. In many ways, she and I were very much alike and in many ways, very different. Those who have seen Chris and myself speak will know Maggie’s story, as I speak about her often. She has become a constant in my advocacy and holds an important place in my message to other survivors of abuse.
For many survivors of abuse there are questions that remain unanswered. Many of us are unable to speak with our abusers because they are out of our lives by design or by circumstance. For those whose abusers are still alive, there is often no conversation to be had, due to a complicated list of reasons. That list can be endless and so we go through life making sense as best we can of what happened to us and why.
When it comes to my sister Maggie, there is no answer good enough. I was tasked with going through Maggie’s things after she died. What I saw was a life of addiction and isolation. The newspaper read that she went to sleep one night and never woke up. That’s what the autopsy says and so that is what people admit. Though, most of you know that the nature of abuse is not as black and white. Far too many victims of abuse, including myself, will find themselves searching for reprieve through addiction. After years of this, Maggie lost the fight and with it her voice.
Many people have asked me why I continue to talk about an experience that brings up such upsetting emotions. My answer is always the same. I tell Maggie’s story because her life had meaning, more than I think she even realized. Through her story, others will know that they are not alone and that there can be life after abuse.
We must fight for each other and ourselves and never stop believing that change is possible. We must do the work and break free of our addictions, tell our stories and allow healing to take place. I believe that this is what Maggie would have wanted. I believe that she is up there looking down on me, joyous in knowing that people will learn from her life and that she will never be forgotten.
The Anti-Rape Amendment
I have thought long and hard about Al Franken’s Anti-Rape Amendment. When 30 senators voted against the amendment I thought to myself that there had to be an acceptable reason why. I wanted to do my research before simply reacting to this seemingly incomprehensible choice on the part of these senators. Was there something in the language of the amendment that may be objectionable or unfair? Was there some detail we all may have missed?
Let’s look at the Anti-Rape Amendment:
None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used for any existing or new Federal contract if the contractor or a subcontractor at any tier requires that an employee or independent contractor, as a condition of employment, sign a contract that mandates that the employee or independent contractor performing work under the contract or subcontract resolve through arbitration any claim under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or any tort related to or arising out of sexual assault or harassment, including assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, false imprisonment, or negligent hiring, supervision, or retention.
Seems pretty fair right? It’s not a far stretch to hold any company accountable if they should expect to receive billions of our tax dollars. I heard one opposing Senator remark how this unfairly singles out Haliburton? Singles out yes. Unfairly no. Not in light of how they treated the gang rape of one of their employees, Jamie Leigh Jones. We don’t want to do business, much less protect any business that falsely imprisons and threatens termination to an employee that was just gang raped while working on their jobsite. These Senators are condoning this behavior and providing no protection for us, the people they apparently don’t represent anymore.
Recently Senator David Vitter was confronted by one of his constituents, a survivor of rape, on why he chose to inexplicably oppose this piece of legislation.
First Vitter told the woman how supportive he was of rape cases getting prosecuted “to the fullest extent of the law.” Then he assumed the woman was simply an Obama supporter as he tried to deflect her question into an attack on Obama. But of course the woman told him simply, “But i’m not asking Obama. I’m asking you.” As she should have considering Senator Vitter is her representative in government. Then towards the end, Vitter simply walks away. I personally have become a little bit burned out on Town Hall Meeting dramatics of late, but in this case I can see why the woman got upset by his behavior.
He didn’t have an explanation. He didn’t want to answer her question. So he did the most self-serving thing a politician can do. Walk away.
When you walk away from a constituent who was calmly asking you a question that pretty much indicates that you are more worried about looking bad politically in front of a video camera than any concern for your responsibility as an elected Senator.
We are still waiting for an real explanation for why these representatives of ours voted to continue to allow our government to do business with companies that force their employees to sign away their rights IF they are raped and/or assaulted as their employees.
So imagine just for a second, that you were gang raped by your coworkers, then you are imprisoned in a shipping container. Denied food, water, or medical treatment. You are only released after slipping a message to your local Senator. Then you are threatened with termination by your boss if you decide to receive medical treatment afterwards. On top of all of this, your assailants are never taken to justice and you have no recourse whatsoever. Oh, and when someone tries to change the law to make sure something like this doesn’t happen to anyone else, 30 Senators vote it down because it doesn’t give Haliburton a fair shake.
These representatives were playing politics when they should have done the right thing. Now the next time an employee of a government contractor is raped and assaulted and is given no recourse, we’ll remember who walked away.
Tyler Perry Breaks The Silence
You may know Tyler Perry from many of the films he’s produced, directed, and starred in over the years. It seemed like every year I would see a new Tyler Perry movie coming out of the box office. I can’t say that I have seen any of them, though he is a clear success story being one of the highest paid men in Hollywood.
Tyler Perry - Survivor
What I did see on 60 Minutes recently was the startling admission that, like myself, he is a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. The reason why this is shocking isn’t that he IS a survivor of abuse. The statistics show indeed how common abuse is in our culture, with 1 in 4 women being victims of abuse before the age of 16 and 1 in 6 men.
What is of note is that Tyler Perry is a high profile black man admitting that he was abused as a child. It’s the coming out that has always been hardest for us men. One of the basic virtures of early manhood is being able to successfully defend yourself from harm. For male victims it is this perceived failure that is sometimes the hardest thing to come to terms with.
Tyler is coming to terms with this specter that has hovered over his life for so long. He spoke of a friends mother who molested him as a child. She locked him in their house and only provided the key to leave if he ‘had sex’ with her. Tyler later shared additional details about living with a physically abusive father. After his admission, his father passed along the message to Tyler that “…If I had beat your ass one more time you probably would have been Barack Obama.”
You may be horrified by that comment. Yet, its so telling of how parents so often confuse discipline with outright abuse. Or maybe it’s just his fathers way of rationalizing the abuse and suffering he inflicted on his defenseless children.
These admissions from public figures are inspiring and courageous but to people who want to make real change in our society we can’t leave it at that. We have to explore the questions raised by the personal accounts from survivors of abuse.
I was always a big fan of the comedian Richard Pryor growing up. He would often compare men with women, and how black culture differed from white culture. He once mentioned quite fondly about the time his father gave him an especially violent physical beating because he came home after his curfew. The audience laughed. Pryor’s genius was in being able to make his misery funny. I have all of Pryors tapes. I think he’s the most gifted comedian, yet I never laughed at those jokes. Pryor joked on how it taught him character and professed his admiration to his father for making him hard.
It made me wonder. How can any physical beating ever be a point of pride in any culture, any society? What extremes and rationalizations are parents willing to employ to make sure they have well behaved children? What should our response be when this is too often the message we are sending in our society?
I may have not known about Tyler Perry’s admission if I had not known about his work with a new movie coming out called Precious. It’s about the struggle of a 16-year-old survivor of abuse. You don’t see too many films about abuse streaming out of the Hollywood lot. This is one of them. Go see it on November 6th.
And remember, there is courage in breaking the silence, but change only comes when we decide to respond to the brave stories of those like Tyler Perry. How do you plan on responding?
Rape Victims Are To Blame For The Continuance Of Rape
When someone goes out of their way to make a public service announcement about rape and reporting, we would assume that they would have a basic understanding of the mentality of a rape victim. Sadly though, this is not always the case and information then becomes available that can further damage and silence victims.
Recently on youtube, a user posted a video called Rape Scot-Free depicting a short monologue by a young man, blaming rape victims for the continuance of rape in their communities. His argument being that victims who do not come forward and report their rape are selfish and in turn aiding the perpetrator, enabling him/her to continue their acts of violence.
As a survivor of rape, I have to say that I was extremely disturbed by the video. The lack of basic insight into the mind of a survivor is appalling and in my opinion, highly ineffective. What this video has done however is further strengthen victim blaming in a society that already holds such fascist opinions.
I am one of the survivors that he is addressing in his video. Like many, I was raped and did not report the incident to the police. If I were to believe this video, I would be the victim who should be ashamed of not doing anything to stop the acts of violence from continuing. I would believe that I am the “good girl who keeps her mouth shut” and helped the man that raped me. I would believe that it is my fault that society doubts my rape because someone who is really raped would report it. I would believe that speaking out about my rape is simply “complaining” and not preventing. I would believe that I have no voice, that I have no right to talk about a faulty system because I am the fault in the system. I would believe that I am to blame for any acts of rape after me, because I am the only one who can change anything.
Create a video in black and white; speak sarcastically and angrily towards me. Tell me what I have done wrong and question my rape. Make me doubt myself and introduce more shame to the act of violence; blame me, again. If the motive of this video was merely shock response, then congratulations because I am shocked. However, if the hope of this video was to get victims like me to report, you failed miserably. As shame and fear are the primary tools of rapists to keep their victims silenced, I would ask how someone using shame against me now is any better?
As a survivor of rape, I can say that this video did not make me want to report, but rather strengthened my belief that we still have so much work left to do in educating people about the act and aftermath of rape. What happened to me is not my fault. I am not to blame. It’s time to put the blame where it belongs; the rapist not the raped.
Polanski Raped Her
Each morning on my drive into work I would hear the latest radio report on the apprehension of Roman Polanski recently in Switzerland. Each morning for the past week it was reported that “Polanski pleaded guilty for having sex with a minor…” I guess a part of me accepted what I was hearing reported even as I knew it wasn’t accurate.
This morning I heard the much needed correction. A listener called in to express how disappointed she was in the reporting of what Polanski did. She was under the impression that when you drug and liquor up a 13-year-old then have sex with her throughout the evening that what we may be talking about isn’t “sex with a minor”.
It may be rape.
The case of Roman Polanski is not one blurred by ambiguity. We know what happened. We know how the guilty ran. We know his celebrated career for the ensuing three decades afterward. Yet, we still don’t know if we should call it rape?
We are afraid of that word aren’t we? It was just a year ago that Tory Bowen wasn’t allowed to use the word ‘rape’ by a judge in court when describing how she was raped by her perpetrator.
Even Whoopi Goldberg, this morning on The View had to inform us that what Polanski did wasn’t “rape-rape.” Going so far as to tell the rest of the panel that she wanted to talk about “what he did” and not to speak out of a sense of “passion…when we don’t have all the facts.” That’s interesting Whoopi. Here are the facts.
From a legal standpoint, we know that Mr. Polanski plead down to a lesser charge. He raped the victim, but he got a break. This happens all the time. Regardless of what he did, our legal system watered down the charge to the puzzling and much more friendly ’sex with a minor’. You can certainly water down what is, but does that ever change what is?
It seems there is a bit of confusion among society at large as to what exactly rape is. I guess the only way to clear this up is to take our case straight to the most agreed upon definition we can find, courtesy of Funk and Wagnalls.
Rape – any act of sexual intercourse that is forced upon a person.
If your one and only idea of what ‘force’ constitutes is violent, physical brutality than we really need to have a discussion about the nature of abuse. Quaaludes and alcohol in a 13-year-old girl functions in quite the same way that Rohyphol, known commonly as the date-rape drug, works in adults. It makes it easier for a perpetrator to rape their chosen victim. The more altered she is, the less force that is needed to apply. Sometimes it takes such little force that it can almost seem like it’s not rape. But it is.
There is a greater awareness in our communities about the dangers of date-rape drugs. Yet, we still fail to apply what we know to Mr. Polanski’s case. I understand the delicate nature of rape. It is a serious charge. It is equally a serious offense. If Roman Polanski ‘raped’ a 13-year-old would we be so worried about his well-being? Would we be less likely to ‘cut him a break?’
If you want to make excuses for poor Mr. Polanski you are entitled. If you think it’s been 30 years and he needs to be cut that break, then go ahead. But there can be no question about what we are talking about in the first place.
In 1977, Polanski got what he wanted. He raped and sodomized a girl and pleaded down to the lesser charge of ’sex with a minor’. Then he ran.
Now three decades later we are still struggling with what to call his offense. Some call it sex with a minor. I call it astonishing.
What Your Gut Tells You
In your minds eye, how does a perpetrator look? Would they appear disheveled and transient? Maybe have a evil snarl with lined faces and bloodshot eyes? We’ve all seen the mugshots in the paper or on the television, from those perpetrators that LOOK like they are capable of violence. The newsreel confirming their guilt, we imagine we could clearly see it in them. It oozes out of them.
Then we read about Jon Pomeroy and his wife, Rebecca Long. Mr. Pomeroy recently pleaded guilty to ‘mistreating’ his daughter. He was accused of sitting passively by while his wife ‘disciplined’ his daughter. At 4 ft 7 inches and weighing 48 lbs, this severely starved girl was taken from their Carnation home. The trauma most probably stunting her growth permanently and the rotting of all her teeth, not to mention the irreparable emotional and physical harm she will have to come to terms with for the rest of her life.
When I first read the story I imagined Pomeroy and Long as the seedy character I always stereotyped abusers to be. Recently the Seattle Times posted a picture of Jon and Rebecca walking to the courtroom and I was shocked. They looked so… normal. I couldn’t reconcile this outdated image of what an abuser is ’supposed to look like’ with how they appeared in the
Jon Pomeroy and his wife, Rebecca Long, were arraigned last fall in King County Superior Court on charges of mistreating Pomeroy's teen daughter.
photo. Not visibly someone you would think capable of these atrocities. They could easily be someone living next door in some residential area , saying hello and being neighborly.
But isn’t it so often how a perpetrator either fits or doesn’t fit our expectation of what an abuser should look like that determines whether we follow our gut instinct? Obviously there is no such thing as ’should’ when it comes to abuse.
For Jon and Rebecca, we may completely ignore our instinct.
In this busy modern world, we have become good at dismissing, delaying, or debating our core instinct into submission. It’s the reason why we stay up an extra hour when our body is telilng us to go to sleep. Or when we have that extra donut as our stomach protests.
Looking at Jon and Rebecca, it didn’t surprise us to read the testimony of neighbors and people who knew them. Friends and family were ’shocked’. Neighbors thought they were ‘always such a nice couple.’ Some even now indicating that they ‘aren’t capable of this.’ Ignoring our instinct when we need it least has caused us to second-guess it when we need it the most.
Pomeroy is looking at 2.5-3 years behind bars. His daughter doesn’t get her life back in 3 years. She also doesn’t have a parent anymore. Mr. Pomeroy sat idly by as Rebecca Long starved his daughter nearly to death. All too often we are content to sit idly by, ignoring the twisting of our gut, while the people we know as ‘nice folks’ abuse and torture defenseless victims.
It’s interesting. I look back at my life and when it comes to gut instinct I can look at the worst mistakes I have ever made and it almost always was a result of ignoring my own gut feeling. Follow yours and speak up when you see something that isn’t quite right. We can always judge wrongly, but wouldn’t you rather be wrong than right and not say anything?
Understanding Patterns Of Abuse
Often, we hear of men who molest young girls and women and receive too little jail time or often, no penalty at all for their crimes. Tonight, on television was a story of a mother who was the co-abuser to her daughter of seven years old. The reason for her decision, she wanted to “prove her love” to her husband. The ultimate sacrifice, in her mind would surely win over his commitment and perhaps allow some sense of normalcy to their lives. Normalcy stemmed from incest, an interesting and obviously distorted reasoning, an excuse to commitment the ultimate betrayal.
These stories are not new to me, having read hundreds of thousands of emails over the years depicting torturous and unbelievable acts of abuse. However, it always takes a moment longer for me to come to terms with mothers who turn on their own children, in order to gain the “love” of a man in their life. They themselves, abuse victims in the hell that is intimate partner violence. Part of me feels torn by the understanding that they face their own fear and pain and yet, I cannot condone the line that is crossed from victim to abuser. There were so many levels to this particular case, but what I was struck by was an issue that screams true for so many women; needing a man in order to feel validated, worthy, loved. Often, women (and men) who are survivors of abuse will do find themselves doing things and allowing things to be done without questioning the impact of their decision. There is a laundry list of reason why such things happen, but one very important factor is conditioning.
If you are told that you are useless and unworthy each and every day of your life, parts of you, if not all of you will begin to believe it. There is truth behind the saying “thoughts are things” in that what you believe you become. If you are a vulnerable child your choice and sense of reality outside of your caregivers is drastically reduced and the name and expectations placed upon you will be your burden until you are old enough or fortunate enough to learn otherwise. For all of us, I believe this means being our own teachers.
A few years ago, I found myself in a relationship with a man twenty years my elder. I didn’t realize at that time, that a large part of my connection to him was based on my relationship with my father. An odd and somewhat disconcerting realization. However, one that looking back and being a survivor of incest, makes a lot of sense to me now. To make a long story short, I allowed myself to stay in this relationship and undergo behavior that I now see as abusive on many levels.
I fell in love with this man, and allowed him to control me in order to gain his affection and approval, much like I did with my father. The difference here is that I was no longer the abused child of four years old, instead a grown woman making adult choices. The catch? On many levels, in the decisions that I made in that relationship (and others like it), my inner child, the one who learned what love was from her father, was still seeking love in the same way from men who could not give her what she needed. Self-worth, validation, self-respect, a true sense of self are all things that we must find in ourselves and that cannot be resolved by others.
I see myself as fortunate to have gotten out of that relationship before marriage or children. I can only imagine how much more complicated life would have been had my life changed even slightly to the left of where it is today. I see my mother and sister in my own experience, yet they were not as fortunate. My sister passed away several years ago and my mother spent thirty years with an abusive husband. I see the choices that they made. I try not to judge them and yet, sometimes I do, still.
I wish for all women and men to see their worth and never make choices that will endanger themselves or their children. We must break the cycle now before it is too late.
Sexual Harassment or Child’s Play?
In the 6th grade there was this boy who took it upon himself to test my boundaries. Nearly every afternoon, as the bell rung, I would find myself running for the divider doors in a sprint for home. Not being that fastest of runners, I would never fail to miss the ass slap and catcalling from him and many of my classmates. What could be argued as something as simple as boy-likes-girl or boy-teases-girl was nothing of the sort to me. In contrast, the daily barrage of bullying made me feel disempowered and embarrassed.
Eventually, I told my mother who in turn spoke with the school principal. His reply was simply “boys will be boys” with little else but a reminder of adolescent patterns. Nothing was said or done. Luckily for me my mother was never one to keep her mouth shut. She decided to speak directly with the boy’s mother and have a few words about what she deemed appropriate. I can’t tell you what his mother said or didn’t say to him, only that when I got to school on Monday everyone called me a snitch and I became the current target for ridicule. The girls were especially harsh, annoyed at the ‘attention’ I was receiving from the boys.
I’ve spoken with people over the years that argue that we, as advocates, take the issue of sexual harassment and bullying too far. They cite that such zero tolerance rules and behavioral guidelines will encourage children to act out more outside of the classroom. Or that it creates little room for experimentation with the opposite sex. But how often do we, as a community, communicate with our children and young adults to discuss issues of gender and personal boundaries?
I think that by setting rules and examples for respect, we allow these same youth to live more freely without fear of harm from their peers. I believe that a girl should be able to go to school without worrying about whether or not she will have to defend her body against unsolicited contact or that boys can walk down a hall without being thrown up against a locker simply because they don’t fit into some ridiculous social standard. If a behavior is unwanted or unwelcome, it is unacceptable in my book.
Admittedly, children have a natural curiosity toward the opposite sex. Hugging, fondling and kissing are examples of exploratory contact that, when paired with an unwanted recipient, can create problems. Simply because such acts of exploration are deemed “normal” doesn’t constitue a right to cross personal boundaries. Acts once seen as innocent rights of passage can very easily grow into more aggressive acts of violence if they are not resolved in early stages of development. For those of you who still view acts by children as child’s play I have 6 words for you: Kids grow up and become adults.
But don’t just take it from me: A survey conducted by the AAUW (2002) on 2064 students in 8th through 11th grade indicated that 83% of girls and 79% of boys have been sexually harassed. Not surprisingly, in the same survey 42% of school employees admitted to being harassed by each other.
In education, many seasoned professionals have met the issue of sexual harassment with a resistance to change. My elementary school principal being a perfect example. Talk to your kids. Talk to your school administrators. Learn more about the policies and follow-through for sexual harassment and bullying in your communities. You can be the impetus to get your school system to wake up and begin to take harrassment and bullying seriously. In the process, maybe boys will be boys and girls will be girls by showing respect for the humanity in each other.
For more information on sexual harassment in schools, check out this link: http://tinyurl.com/mqr7sd
WSO Sponsors Male Survivor Conference!
We’re proud to announce our sponsorship of The 2010 Male Survivor Conference on March 18-21, 2010. It will be held at John Jay College in New York City. This conference brings together advocates, professionals, and survivors to share new knowledge in the area of male sexual trauma.
We hear the lineup of presenters this year is going to be quite engaging. WSO plans to be a presenter in 2011!
If you are in the New York City area make sure to attend. We need to support new research in helping male survivors in their recovery process. This conference supports breaking the silence about abuse. Our men need our help more than ever.
For more information:
http://www.malesurvivor.org/conference-2010.html
Chris & Ophelia
WSO
