This is a post I wish I didn’t feel compelled to write. This is a post I hope my mother doesn’t read. This past weekend when everything happened with Harvey Weinstein, it shed a bright light on the sexual abuse and sexual harassment that is rampant in Hollywood, but most women in mainstream America could relate as well. The stories of powerful directors, producers, etc preying on child actors have been told for years. Those who spoke up were hushed, blackmailed, or black balled. Women and some men have spoken up over the years about the heinous sexual harassment and abuse taking place in Hollywood. Few listened, even fewer acted. Some thought, “Well, that’s how it is in Hollywood.” But that’s not the only place it happens. Sexual abuse happens in small towns and big cities, in churches, schools, and workplaces; it happens everywhere.
Sunday afternoon, actress Alysaa Milano spoke up, in one simple tweet.
“Suggested by a friend: If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote “Me too” as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem.”
As of the writing of this story her original post has been replied to 58,000 times, been retweeted 21,000, and been liked 43,000. I think she hit a nerve.
I saw it not on Twitter, but on Facebook, Sunday evening. I don’t usually jump on the bandwagon of stuff like this on Facebook, but as soon as I saw it, memories came rushing back and I had to stand and be counted. Since then almost every one of my female Facebook friends and some of my male friends as well, have shared Me Too or #MeToo in their status. It breaks my heart. It has to stop. It is not acceptable.
My Me Too Sexual Abuse Experiences
Youth group grades 7-10: Being groped on every trip that took us off church property. It was like it was a church sanctioned activity. We traveled in the back of pickup trucks with toppers on them. There were mattresses and blankets back there so our trip would be comfortable. We always sat guy-girl-guy-girl around the edge of the truck, huddled under blankets because it was cold in Massachusetts, and once the truck started moving to wherever we were headed…so did the hands. It was unnerving, unsettling, unwanted and uncomfortable. When I talked to a youth group leader about it, she told me it was part of growing up. She said I could choose to ride in the church van with the lame kids but if I wanted to be popular, I should ride in one of the trucks. I continued to ride in the trucks, I wanted to be popular.
Sleeping over at a friend’s house and waking up with her older brother’s hands groping my breasts. He kissed me on the cheek and told me it was our secret, then he crawled out of the room. The next time I slept over I woke up to his hands in my underwear. When I told him to stop he kissed me on the cheek and told me it was our secret, then he crawled out of the room. I told my friend the next morning, she said I was just dreaming…I wasn’t.
My senior year of high school I was date raped, though I didn’t know that term at the time. I was raped by my boyfriend who was 6 years older than me. It was several years later I was in a waiting room of a doctor’s office and an afternoon talk show was talking about date rape and statutory rape. That is when I realized that even if you are in a relationship, if you do not consent to sex, and that night I had said “NO” many times, it is rape. Since I was 17 and he was 26, it was also statutory rape and he could have gone to jail…if I had spoken up. Instead I continued to date him for 7 more months…until he hit me. Funny enough, I knew that was wrong and I broke up with him on the spot.
There are others too.
- The doctor I worked for who regularly groped and fondled all of the young ladies that worked for him.
- The co-worker who came on to me regularly and then was incredibly mean to me when I reported him. We were the only two people working in a satellite office and I left my job because of his vulgar talk.
- The old man in Walmart who grabbed my butt in line after he told me how beautiful I was.
- The “big wig” at the blogging conference that promised to take my blog to the big time if I went back to his hotel room with him.
- and many more…
Ladies, unfortunately it seems we have all experienced sexual abuse or harrassment in our lifetime. Now is the time to stand up and not just say ME TOO but NO MORE. If/When it happens we need to step up and speak out. We need to report it. We need to teach our daughters that none of this is ok and there is no shame in being the victim. We need to teach our sons that it is NEVER ok to say or do vulgar things to another person male or female. We are to be treasured and cared for, not objectified and demeaned.
We have lost our moral compass, there are no more boundaries, and the line between right and wrong seems to move from person to person. There are absolutes in this world, God gave us His Word so that we would know right from wrong and repent for the wrongs that we have done. As a nation we have strayed away from God in the name of “freedom”. True freedom is only found in the saving grace of Jesus. We need to ask God to forgive our nation and heal our land.
“if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14 NKJV.
Seek Help
If you are struggling to get past the shame or depression caused by your sexual abuse, please talk to someone. A trusted friend, a counselor, your pastor’s wife. We all process abuse differently but sharing it and re-framing it and calling it what it is, abuse that was forced on you, helps us heal and move forward and become stronger. You don’t have to carry your burden alone.
Hold your head up and shine your light bright. The world needs you!
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