How do you explain to the man who sexually assaulted you what consent means?
This isn't a rhetorical question: I'm in this position. This weekend, I saw a friend of mine who sexually assaulted me about a year and a half ago. We got into a drunken shouting match, one thing lead to another, and the incident got brought up. He told me then that I was the reason that all women in tech get a bad rep for calling 'rape'. He told me again, just now in a Facebook message, that I, by implying that making out wasn't consensual when I was unconscious, made him lose all trust in and respect for me.
So here's my conundrum: how do I inform this particular individual that the definition of consent includes a part where you have to be conscious to make a decision about what activities you engage in? That someone who is under the influence of alcohol, or concussed (like I was), does not have those mental capacities engaged at that point in time, therefore can't give affirmative consent? How do I tell him that I'm not just crying 'rape', that I put myself back in counseling because of his abuse, that it seriously fucked me up inside, and that it wasn't just a consequence of me being unconscious?
I can't. I'm not in the position to inform him of these things. Because it would be so difficult to even have the conversation with him, because it wouldn't be healthy for me, and because quite frankly, he wouldn't listen to me at this point.
I know so many women in my life who have been raped and sexually assaulted. Until this weekend, I didn't fully understand how difficult it is to navigate the waters of being a victim/survivor of sexual assault, especially around your assaulter. And I don't know where to go from here.
No comments:
Post a Comment