Delivering Justice on Heaven's Behalf

I just came across Cereta's excellent post on men and rape by way of Coffeeandink's links and post.

The first rule of abuse is that we don't name it. And when we have to deal with it, we rename it, we call it something else, point the finger at someone else, or anything else than call it what it is. The abuser renames things because it serves to hide what is being done. The abused renames things, for survival. Speaking truth has consequences. Speaking truth might mean having to admit someone you love, someone you trust, even blood relatives JUST RAPED YOU.

And those of us men who might not have committed such acts? We benefit in renaming it because we don't want to have to admit that our teachers, our fathers, our friends, our family members, have raped either.

For the rapist, it's a chain of rationalizations. About how he's not responsible, how she did this or that to make it happen, or how she didn't say no, or she didn't say no in the right way, or enough times, or a thousand other excuses that in the end, are about him getting his.

For the rest of us? The chain of rationalizations are "Well, I don't know the full story!", "Oh, she's kind of dramatic!", "Maybe they're exaggerating!" "People say a lot of things when they're angry.", "I'm sure if it was really a problem, someone would press charges!"

You know what? Fuck rapists. And fuck every goddamn man who makes excuses for it.

See, this shit happens because fuckfaces, like you, like me, like us, don't step up and stop this shit. To be sure- there's 51% of the population who suffer and have an interest in stopping it, but let's be real, we are the ones with power, and privilege and we're either raping or standing by while rape is happening. Worse yet, we're standing by silently while it's happening. We're even defending it.

Every time you do that, you're saying to your mother, sister, daughter, friends, girlfriends, cousins, teachers, students, coworkers, anyone who happens to have that other chromosome? You're saying "Hey, I'd feel -bad- if you got raped, but I wouldn't do shit about it."

Maybe that's not what you mean, but that IS what you're saying. And, because you are encouraging that environment, you're making it more likely to happen. ("I hate me some of THOSE PEOPLE, they can all hang from trees, but you, you're different, I wouldn't do that TO YOU", "Ah thanks!")

This is a rape culture.

This is the culture where we make heroes out of troops while we ignore the fact that they rape the people they're suppose to protect. They rape their fellow troops who are risking their lives to protect them. We ignore our clergy who rape our kids and fellow believers. We ignore our bosses. We ignore our activist leaders who rape the very people they're supposed to protect. We ignore our cousins, uncles, fathers, friends who do this to other people we love.

And to flip it and look at the other side? At the women? That means we ignore the fact that all these people we care about, know, and work with- we ignore that they're being raped.

What kind of fucking love is that?

Stop worrying about calling yourself a man. Try being human for once.

Like most hetero guys, I grew up with a solid dose of fucked up ideas, and perpetuated them.

Something like 10 years back, one of my closest friends came out as bisexual, and I was at a loss "what to do". I asked some dumb questions, like, "Are you sure?" and freaked out a bit on the inside with my own hetero-ness threatened with equally dumb worries like, "What if he likes -me-?"

Luckily, I didn't do anything too stupid, and instead of going, "Oh, you're one of -them- but you're 'different'", I was able to go, "Oh, I'm the one tripping here. People are people and this really isn't that big a deal, and I need to get the stupid out of my head."

Instead of making him an exception to my heterosupremacist world view, I changed it.

Working through all that, took a few years. But here's the thing... I didn't tell him I was doing this, I didn't tell anyone. It wasn't about making a show or needing approval that I was trying to do the right thing.

It was about me becoming worthy of the friendship and trust he gave me in coming out to me, when he hasn't to so many others..

Really, just like 2 years ago, I came to him and apologized for the stupid questions. It weighed heavy on me for a few years, because as I became more and more aware of what a dickhead I was, I was more and more afraid I had hurt him in my ignorance.

He wasn't even tripping off it, but the fact was for me to even get to making an apology, I had to change myself first, to make sure I wouldn't do the same thing again, so that the apology could have meaning.

I keep watching people do racist, sexist, and heterosexist stuff, and then turn around "Oh, I learned my lesson! I'm sorry!" the next day, as if the years of stupid that you've been indoctrinated with that let you even treat your fellow humans as less than human, could be so easily unlearned. And, those of us on the receiving end know you'll do the same damn thing again, because you've shown no desire or effort towards changing your thinking or your behavior.

Those of us who want to kick the kyriarchy always find ourselves digging out old programming, sadly finding we're not as far as we want to be. But the difference is, we keep fighting to overcome it, because it's worth it.

I struggled 8 years to even be worthy to attempt a single apology.

If you imagine you can learn to overcome a lifetime of programming overnight, you're lying and you're not apologizing- you're insulting people - as much as if you stabbed someone 102 times and then testified at the trial, "It was an accident".

And that's the opposite of being an ally.