I've been thinking about that statement a lot recently after hearing on the news that after more than a decade, Alaska is no longer number one in the nation for suicide, but still holds the top spot for domestic violence and sexual assault. Having lived through both, I started wondering what it is exactly that encourages those rates to be so damn high. Is it our isolation? Our low populations, and rural communities? Limited law enforcement, and related services? All of those are excellent factors that contribute to the problem, but they aren't the whole answer. Instead, it's much more insidious.
We're told not to tell.
Yes, I said "we", because I am a survivor of both domestic violence and sexual assault. The latter in the form of predation by a male neighbor in 2007. For many years, I've been relatively quiet about my experiences, but after three years I finally have the courage to speak out about what happened to me in order to raise awareness of an issue that is extremely prevalent in this state. An issue where everyone is told to sit down, shut up, and act as if it never happened. I know this firsthand, and from research conducted on the subject. Negative social reactions and judgments towards rape victims are more common than positive ones regardless of situation and circumstance, and it doesn't just come from friends, it also comes from family.
To this day, my mother believes that my assault was my own fault. A sexual assault survivor herself, she claims that if I had moved "when she told me to", and if I had done "everything I was told to" then none of it would have ever happened. It doesn't matter that financially at that time moving was impossible, it doesn't matter that I did nothing to provoke or invite the attentions of my neighbor, it doesn't matter that he used power and intimidation to coerce my silence, and placed so much emotional strain on me that I suffered a life-altering nervous breakdown in 2008. All that matters, is that somehow I did something wrong, and therefore bought this all on myself.
Unfortunately, that perspective is not uncommon, and it is part of the reason why so many victims refuse to come forward. The problem with that is not only unresolved physical and emotional damage, but social because it allows the perpetrator to continue in society unchecked especially if the woman doesn't have a support network that can also provide protection. My attacker is still at large, why? Because he threatened to end the lives of my then-employer and my younger sister, going into detail of what he would do to them if I continued to try to bring him to justice. If that wasn't bad enough, he then continued to stalk me for months, randomly popping up, and asking me to describe to him the look that would be on my boss' face when he shot him in the back through the window of his office.
Yeah.
The only real support I've had during during my recovery has come from my pastor, one of my close friends, and my sister since both women are survivors of sexual assault. They also know what it is like to be blamed for your own attack, or be ostracized for coming forward which is why, for the most part, they haven't. Since going public, not only have I faced ridicule and accusations from friends and family, but from colleagues, and social acquaintances. Also, I've effectively removed myself from the dating "pool", because men are disinclined to date or associate with women who claim to have been sexually assaulted, and do so often.
Basically, more reasons not to tell.
Yet, this has to change. If Alaska wants to stop being number one in the nation for sexual assault, then we need to make our communities a place where a victim can come forward, and do so without fear of sanction or blame. We need to learn to withhold our judgments, and instead offer compassion and support. If we will not tolerate a child being silent about an encounter with a pedophile, less and only allow that person to remain anonymous and at large within our towns and cities then why isn't our reaction in kind when the victim is an adult?
Think about it.
***
Society vs. Rape Survivors
http://www.ria.buffalo.edu/pdf/RIB08-4.pdf
Rape and Incest National Network (RAINN)
http://www.rainn.org/
Weidner's Article on the Stigmatization of Rape Victims (subscription needed)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-6494.1983.tb00859.x/abstract
Northern Kentucky Law Review (Stigmatization/Rape)
http://chaselaw.nku.edu/documents/law_review/v35/nklr_v35n4_pp347-369.pdf
We're told not to tell.
Yes, I said "we", because I am a survivor of both domestic violence and sexual assault. The latter in the form of predation by a male neighbor in 2007. For many years, I've been relatively quiet about my experiences, but after three years I finally have the courage to speak out about what happened to me in order to raise awareness of an issue that is extremely prevalent in this state. An issue where everyone is told to sit down, shut up, and act as if it never happened. I know this firsthand, and from research conducted on the subject. Negative social reactions and judgments towards rape victims are more common than positive ones regardless of situation and circumstance, and it doesn't just come from friends, it also comes from family.
To this day, my mother believes that my assault was my own fault. A sexual assault survivor herself, she claims that if I had moved "when she told me to", and if I had done "everything I was told to" then none of it would have ever happened. It doesn't matter that financially at that time moving was impossible, it doesn't matter that I did nothing to provoke or invite the attentions of my neighbor, it doesn't matter that he used power and intimidation to coerce my silence, and placed so much emotional strain on me that I suffered a life-altering nervous breakdown in 2008. All that matters, is that somehow I did something wrong, and therefore bought this all on myself.
Unfortunately, that perspective is not uncommon, and it is part of the reason why so many victims refuse to come forward. The problem with that is not only unresolved physical and emotional damage, but social because it allows the perpetrator to continue in society unchecked especially if the woman doesn't have a support network that can also provide protection. My attacker is still at large, why? Because he threatened to end the lives of my then-employer and my younger sister, going into detail of what he would do to them if I continued to try to bring him to justice. If that wasn't bad enough, he then continued to stalk me for months, randomly popping up, and asking me to describe to him the look that would be on my boss' face when he shot him in the back through the window of his office.
Yeah.
The only real support I've had during during my recovery has come from my pastor, one of my close friends, and my sister since both women are survivors of sexual assault. They also know what it is like to be blamed for your own attack, or be ostracized for coming forward which is why, for the most part, they haven't. Since going public, not only have I faced ridicule and accusations from friends and family, but from colleagues, and social acquaintances. Also, I've effectively removed myself from the dating "pool", because men are disinclined to date or associate with women who claim to have been sexually assaulted, and do so often.
Basically, more reasons not to tell.
Yet, this has to change. If Alaska wants to stop being number one in the nation for sexual assault, then we need to make our communities a place where a victim can come forward, and do so without fear of sanction or blame. We need to learn to withhold our judgments, and instead offer compassion and support. If we will not tolerate a child being silent about an encounter with a pedophile, less and only allow that person to remain anonymous and at large within our towns and cities then why isn't our reaction in kind when the victim is an adult?
Think about it.
***
Society vs. Rape Survivors
http://www.ria.buffalo.edu/pdf/RIB08-4.pdf
Rape and Incest National Network (RAINN)
http://www.rainn.org/
Weidner's Article on the Stigmatization of Rape Victims (subscription needed)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-6494.1983.tb00859.x/abstract
Northern Kentucky Law Review (Stigmatization/Rape)
http://chaselaw.nku.edu/documents/law_review/v35/nklr_v35n4_pp347-369.pdf