Have I raped?

This discussion is brought to you from two people discussing the latest YouTube rape and abuse allegations surrounding Tobuscus, but in no way relates to those allegations.

Today I was talking to a good friend: the same good friend with whom I exhaustively deride and unpack every social taboo with irony, contempt, confusion and respect, in various, ever changing ratios; the same friend with whom I have a contract to never publish our private messages, no matter what happens, for fear the wrath of mistaken Tumblr anons will rain down upon us indefinitely; the same friend who lovingly told me ‘I hope you go to hell’ when I talked about suicide because he knows exactly what to say… and our conversation went like this:

Him: I’m not even confident I haven’t raped anyone any more.

Me: Neither am I.

And whilst we both said it with irony, there was a loud truth we couldn’t ignore and didn’t have an answer for.

Am I nervous to discuss an issue so sensitive and personal for people in broad strokes? No. Because I’m genuinely intrigued as to whether there are any answers/solutions to these disgustingly frequent stories of rape and manipulation, the way in which they examine various levels of abuse, and how to highlight the truth.

Until I became more educated on the topic of rape, I would have said I had never been raped. But over the last couple of years with the conversations happening by brave and educated men and women online, I’ve reconsidered my answer. I’ve reconsidered it privately, within my own experiences, within my own life, with my own comparisons.

Have I been raped? Based on the current, online, understood and accepted definition of the word, yes.

Have I been raped? Based on the basic understanding I had of the horrific physical ordeal of rape growing up, no.

I would never say that I had been raped. I would never tell someone with bruises and trauma that I had been raped. I would never tell someone crying, who felt their body was no longer theirs, that I had been raped.

Has my life been negatively impacted by a non-consensual sexual experience? Not that I know of. Maybe. Maybe for a few hours that day. Maybe for a week. But nothing worth mentioning.

I was with an ex-boyfriend. He had slept with another girl the night before. I was kind of upset, but mostly it was just a shrug and another layer of sadness about what had been happening.

So we’re chatting and he tries to kiss me. I say no. He keeps trying. I don’t kiss him back. He gets up, and I watch him as he goes over and turns a camera on, aiming it at the bed. He comes back and starts trying to kiss me whilst the camera films us. We had never filmed ourselves having sex when we were together, this wasn’t something we had ever talked about, this wasn’t something I ever wanted to do. I looked at the camera and looked at him, and asked him what the fuck he was doing, and then he got on top of me and tried to kiss me. I didn’t kiss him back. He got his dick out. I started crying. He pulled my shorts down. I was still crying. He started fucking me. I didn’t move. I didn’t respond. I didn’t kiss him or touch him. I just kept really still and wept whilst he filmed himself fucking me.

And I think that’s rape. I’ve realised now that it is rape. But it didn’t feel like rape rape. And it was just me, you know? It was just something that was happening to me, and he had always been so sweet and innocent, so it wasn’t rape. But it was.

It was rape, in the sense that I didn’t consent and said no and also clearly didn’t want to, but I would never say I’m a victim of rape. It made me feel weird for a bit. Unsure for a bit. Unable to process the situation for a bit. But he was my ex. But I had been attracted to him. But he was a nice guy. But I was fine. But I really was fine.

And the thing is, I’m sure he didn’t consider it rape either.

There should never be any blurred lines. If you are unsure as to whether or not the other person is consenting, ask.

But, as dangerous as it is to question, what about the people who think they have consent? What about friends fooling around? One time, years ago, I woke up and a friend had his hand in my pants, touching me. I guess he didn’t know I was asleep. When I noticed I left immediately. I really don’t think he had any idea that what he was doing wasn’t right. He was just trying it on; he’d never sexually abuse anyone. I felt violated, sure, but it was an innocent mistake.

So with everything that has been happening online in the last few years, I started thinking. I started thinking, shit, have I raped anybody? Did I rape somebody but neither of us knew? And I am pretty sure I haven’t. I can think of absolutely no instances in my past that could be construed as grey areas from the perspective of any sexual partner.

But my friend from the beginning of this post, he has a harder time and, despite the fact that absolutely anyone can be a victim of sexual abuse, part of that is inevitably because he has a dick. He’s never raped anyone. He can’t think of a time when there has been a grey area. But he also knows he’s done a lot of drugs, been to a lot of parties, fucked people who were similarly messed up. And he has no idea how they would tell the story.

We live in a very strange time of witch hunts, scorned exes, victim blaming, shaming, playing favourites, public ignorance, and interconnectedness. Anyone can have an audience. Anyone can manipulate that audience. Everyone can be different behind closed doors. People are built up online and they can be destroyed online. And it’s scary. It must be scary for anyone with an audience to know that an accusation can turn the tide against them. Just as it is terrifying for a victim to speak up against that tide, that so-often blinkered tide.

And the answer is simple, if they didn’t consent it is rape.

And that makes me feel safer in many, many important ways, yet for some reason it also makes me feel vulnerable. I’ve never explicitly asked someone if they want to have sex… well, 99.9% of the time I haven’t explicitly asked. And 99.9% of the time I haven’t been asked. It’s very much something that is assumed in the moment, or within a relationship, or suggested.

And what does that mean? What are the potential ramifications of this? Honestly. What does the discussion surrounding this look like? There’s no rational jury in the masses. Whether it be for or against the victim. Whether it be for or against the alleged victim. Whether it be for or against the innocent, whichever side they are.

This is one of the few areas where I genuinely don’t know what my own opinion is. I’m not even sure what the question is. It just feels like there’s an overwhelming ambiguity in the process, from inception to misguided public trial.

I believe rapists and abusers should be outed online if they have an audience. I believe if thousands of people can be warned of problematic behaviour from someone they admire and could be manipulated by, then they should be.

But then there’s the other side. There’s the public attacks, when there’s the already in place, albeit highly fallible, justice system. That’s where the real, legitimate difference can be made and an authoritative punishment given.

Ultimately, I think there are two separate necessities: warning and punishment. And I think these are too often intrinsically linked on social media.

Warnings can be taken into our own hands: tentative, cautious warnings.

Investigation and punishment should be left to the professional systems already established to do so.

… but we’re never going to tame the beast of delicious outrage.