LADYPUNCH

CW: Rape, Survivor Identity (in the article- rape, survivor identity, gendered anatomy, str8 sex, someone else’s bed/space)

Beyond and within “triggers,” i feel like there are restructurings of what our concepts of capital R “Rape” actually is within stories like this and i think it’s rly scary to digest and see ourselves exist within that catagory- esp if yr queer and function within a “sex positive” discourse or whatever. Idk abt other ppl, but it took a long time for me to identify as a survivor of sexual assault- of rape- because of how easy it is to rationalize oneself out of it (esp within a Queer (which disgustingly fronts as meaning “consensual”) context), how simple and dangerously empowering it can feel to take accountability for something one may have found moments of agency within. The idea that a Rape can happen within and around moments of consent dissolves the security we feel around being able to distance ourselves from it and, subsequently, removing that sense of security can be traumatic- especially for ppl who have experienced trauma(s). That being said, i feel like im constantly hearing fellow survivors discounting other ppl’s accounts of Rape, abuse, assault, etc. because it isnt relatable to theirs, as if even when it comes to feeling violated, dichotemies rule- an oppressive realm where we exist in a two-dimensional vacuum of identity, experience, and mental health. I feel like it’s perhaps instinctual for Us to seperate ourselves from someone’s experience of non-agency as a way to get the fuck out of bed and perform life. Rape is a non-linear spectrum manifesting everywhere around us and that’s one of its ironic violences for survivors of all kinds of trauma(s), i think, because that means we can’t seperate ourselves from it. That we will never be able to remove it from our lives just like we cant remove the weight of our memories (or the weight of questioning them), that we too may be/become perpetrators ourselves. What if we were to think abt capital C “Consent” as something that exists within an ever shifting mode of “capacity?” As something that, for once, exists within our OWN timeframe of claiming? What does it mean when we are expected to be stagnantly “Present” in order to be validated in our experience? Isnt “Present” and “Disassociated (/surviving)” a spectrum as well? Arent yr notions of banal violence not, in itself, Rape Culture?