I'm boring.
I watch too many movies. (Although I haven't been doing much of that these days.)
I'm a survivor of sexual abuse.
I also have brown hair, if you want to know more details about me.
This doesn't change who I am. Because if my hair color really affects who I am... then that's sad. And the fact that I was raped, molested, and assaulted by three different people over the course of my life should not change much about me, either. Except... you know... I get mad about injustice, particularily injustice and stupidity surrounding sexual abuse. I get infuriated. I feel the injustice pumping through me and I do something. I am silent no longer. I am a whistleblower. Along with the rest of the survivors and advocates and supporters out there... I am standing up and saying, this has finally become enough.
I'm saying there shouldn't be any more silence.
I'm saying we should be free.
Hey Kaylie. Here is an excerpt from a letter I sent to your college, after reading about this situation:
ReplyDelete"I was very saddened to see the letter you recently wrote to a young student who identified herself as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse on her social media, admonishing her that she had been reduced to "a pathology"; it is somewhat akin to suggesting that survivors of the Holocaust or those who commemorate Yom Ho Shoah each year are reducing Judaism to a definition of victim (or a "pathology") and would be better off remaining silent on the matter -- and that simply isn't true, as we both know and can, hopefully, agree.
To speak the truth is to bring forth healing, acknowledgment, strength and resolve and, hopefully, to make that step towards "never again." To give strength to others, and bear witness to the suffering inflicted by others.
To stand in the face of adversity, of abuse perpetrated by others, and to say "yes this was done to me in my innocence and my humanity and my vulnerability but it does not define me as anything other than a survivor of atrocity, someone who has faced the inhumanity of humanity" -- is to remind all of us to do what we can to stop abuse, to stop violence, from the littlest among us to those fully grown and in need of our love and our protection and, G-d only knows:
our understanding love, our merciful compassion, and our non-judgmental acceptance.
I wish you well, but I wish even more that this young woman would instead be acknowledged as a hero, and given what supports she needs, and be met with compassion and love and kindness.
Shavuah Tov."
And then after I sent it I saw this webpage, and thought, yay. I can acknowledge her as a hero. You are a hero. Wishing you all the good things.