WEBVTT - A Conversation About Sexual Violence 0:00:04.040 --> 0:00:06.080 What do you do when life doesn't go according to 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:09.680 plan that moment you lose a job, or a loved one, 0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:14.040 or even a piece of yourself. I'm Brookshields and this 0:00:14.560 --> 0:00:18.720 is now What, a podcast about pivotal moments as told 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:21.520 by people who lived them. Each week, I sit down 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:23.800 with a guest to talk about the times they were 0:00:23.880 --> 0:00:26.880 knocked off course and what they did to move forward. 0:00:27.840 --> 0:00:33.040 Some stories are funny, others are gut wrenching, but all 0:00:33.240 --> 0:00:38.239 are unapologetically human and remind us that every success and 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:42.840 every setback is accompanied by a choice, and that choice 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:51.200 answers one question, now, what sexual assault is an amous communication? 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:55.680 There's been research indicating that for decades. It's very very 0:00:55.720 --> 0:00:58.800 clear sexual assault happens with the knowledge of a perpetrator. 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:02.240 People do not commit rape by accident, and so to 0:01:02.280 --> 0:01:05.840 some degree, this education on no means no. It is 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:10.200 kind of missing the point because people understand already, and 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:13.480 what's more likely to happen is the perpetrators dismiss a 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:20.959 no as unimportant or being COI right. The no means yes, 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:23.679 you know, oh no, and be shy and coy about 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:26.440 you know about it when you are in fact uncomfortable 0:01:26.480 --> 0:01:29.120 and shy and right perpetrators are just looking for a 0:01:29.160 --> 0:01:32.240 way that they can rationalize, but they no means yes, 0:01:32.319 --> 0:01:34.520 if they get in trouble, that's a more accurate description 0:01:34.560 --> 0:01:36.760 of what they're thinking. Right, and so coyness is one 0:01:36.800 --> 0:01:38.480 of those examples to say, oh, she didn't mean it, 0:01:38.520 --> 0:01:41.240 she was just being blurty. But not only works because 0:01:41.240 --> 0:01:43.640 we let it work. Right. If we stop letting that 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:49.160 rationalization work, it goes away. My guest today is doctor 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:54.080 Nicole Badera. Doctor Berdera is a sociologist, an author, and 0:01:54.200 --> 0:01:59.080 a leading researcher on sexual violence, it's causes, its lasting 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:01.960 impact on sir fivers, and what we can all do 0:02:02.120 --> 0:02:05.360 to begin to address the problem. Our conversation was a 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:08.680 personal one. I was first introduced to her work after 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:12.760 I shared my personal experience with sexual assault in the 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:16.520 Hulu documentary Pretty Baby, and I found myself turning to 0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:20.360 her to continue to help me make sense of my 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:23.800 own trauma. I am so grateful for the research that 0:02:23.840 --> 0:02:28.200 women like her do to illuminate the pervasiveness of this issue. 0:02:28.760 --> 0:02:31.040 They really do remind us all that it doesn't have 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:36.240 to be this way. Speaking openly about sexual violence takes courage, 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:39.560 it took me years to do so, and healing, i 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:42.920 have to say, is a lifelong process. But our stories, 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:47.000 they all have value. They allow us to take up space, 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:50.720 heal and hopefully set the stage for a safer future. 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:55.760 So here is doctor Nicole Badera. I have to just 0:02:56.280 --> 0:03:00.280 say that your insight really helped me so much how 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:05.200 to share my story and how to continuously deal with 0:03:05.280 --> 0:03:08.920 some of my more personal feelings about my journey. So 0:03:09.400 --> 0:03:12.320 to give listeners just a little bit of context, would 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:16.520 you tell them who you are and what you do? Yeah, 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:19.800 thank you so much for having me on. I'm a sociologist. 0:03:19.919 --> 0:03:22.800 I've been studying sexual violence for the better part of 0:03:22.800 --> 0:03:27.480 a decade, especially how organizations and our friends and family members, 0:03:27.600 --> 0:03:29.600 the people that were around in society can make it 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:33.440 seem normal when really sexual violence is very traumatic and 0:03:33.440 --> 0:03:37.040 it shouldn't be normal in our society. And these days, 0:03:37.080 --> 0:03:39.320 I've been dedicating as much of my time as possible 0:03:39.320 --> 0:03:43.040 to putting that research into action and helping people find 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:44.960 the power that they do have and use it to 0:03:45.120 --> 0:03:49.320 end sexual violence. Well, it's very very important work, and 0:03:49.680 --> 0:03:54.440 doing this documentary was obviously it entailed a great deal, 0:03:55.160 --> 0:03:57.560 but it was the first time I ever spoke publicly, 0:03:57.880 --> 0:04:02.360 you know, about my experience, and as I say it, 0:04:02.720 --> 0:04:07.560 I'm interested that I say my experience because I still 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:11.440 find it hard to say my experience with sexual assault 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:16.400 or my experience with rape. That's a really common experience. 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:20.320 A lot of survivors are uncomfortable with words like rape 0:04:20.400 --> 0:04:23.000 or sexual assault, and part of that has to do 0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:26.400 with we've gotten a lot of misinformation for I mean 0:04:26.440 --> 0:04:29.560 really all of American history about what sexual assault is. 0:04:30.120 --> 0:04:31.960 For example, most of us were taught that it's a 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.479 stranger jumping out of the bushes, which is actually a 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:37.320 racialized myth that was used to justify lynching, and it 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:41.160 has absolutely no connection to what sexual assault looks like. 0:04:41.520 --> 0:04:43.960 The most sexual assault is perpetrated by people we know 0:04:44.160 --> 0:04:48.280 and trust who just treated us differently. Usually perpetrators are 0:04:48.279 --> 0:04:51.080 people that we never expected would treat us that way, 0:04:51.080 --> 0:04:52.360 and that can make it really hard for a lot 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:56.680 of survivors to recognize their experience as violent and as traumatic, 0:04:56.880 --> 0:04:58.720 and it leads a lot of people to blame themselves. 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:03.880 Can you talk about the word violence, what that can 0:05:04.000 --> 0:05:07.440 look like? Yeah. Absolutely. When we think about sexual assault, 0:05:07.600 --> 0:05:09.719 most people think about it as having sex you don't 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:12.640 want to have, which is one piece. The more accurate 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:17.159 definition is losing control over your own body, losing autonomy, 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:19.840 and that can happen in a lot of different ways. 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:21.640 One of the ones that people don't know very much 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:26.760 about is through coercion. So for example, if a perpetrator 0:05:26.839 --> 0:05:29.520 uses their position of power to get you to agree 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:32.080 to do something that you wouldn't have otherwise, if they're 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:35.839 maybe suggesting you might get a job if you perform 0:05:35.880 --> 0:05:39.720 a sexual act, or even smaller things like if they 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:41.800 bring you into a place that you're not familiar with 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:43.920 and you don't know how to leave that building without 0:05:43.920 --> 0:05:46.760 someone escorting you out, and they make it seem like 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.320 they're not going to let you leave until after you 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:51.600 have done what they want you to do. That's something 0:05:51.640 --> 0:05:53.640 I hear a lot of my work is on college campuses, 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:55.880 and you hear that with dorms a lot a sense 0:05:55.880 --> 0:05:58.280 of I actually can't leave this dorm unless someone has 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:00.360 a key card to let me out, and seemed like 0:06:00.360 --> 0:06:02.200 the fastest way out was to do what they wanted. 0:06:02.640 --> 0:06:05.839 And in those scenarios, it's kind of what you're describing 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:08.600 where people say, you know it was violent, but it 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:12.120 wasn't what I thought violence would feel like. It's hard 0:06:12.120 --> 0:06:17.520 to interpret the situation, but the violence, it may not 0:06:17.800 --> 0:06:20.880 seem violent because you're not being punched or something is 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:24.080 that's what we learned, or your hands aren't necessarily tied 0:06:24.200 --> 0:06:28.080 or whatever we've been told, But the violation is still there. 0:06:28.440 --> 0:06:33.479 And I think that that's where I definitely struggled is 0:06:33.640 --> 0:06:36.400 admitting that it was a violation. So how do you 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:42.560 help people recognize what happened is in fact violation if 0:06:42.560 --> 0:06:45.320 they don't scream No. One of the ways I do 0:06:45.400 --> 0:06:47.000 that in my work is to just think about what 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:50.880 was the impact of that interaction on you. If you 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:53.320 did have enough control to just be able to walk, 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:55.040 you know, stand up and walk out of a room, 0:06:55.480 --> 0:06:58.400 then you wouldn't have experienced that loss of autonomy and 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:01.320 you wouldn't experience the trauma that comes with that. And 0:07:01.400 --> 0:07:04.640 so often it can be identifying those traumatic symptoms if 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.880 I'm now more anxious, I'm not comfortable around this person 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:10.440 in the way I used to be anymore. Something that 0:07:10.480 --> 0:07:12.600 comes up a lot for a traumatic symptom is changes 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:17.040 in memory or being able to access memories differently, not 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:20.640 not having complete control over remembering what happened, maybe dissociating 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:22.920 in the moment, so recognizing some of those traumatic symptoms 0:07:22.960 --> 0:07:26.160 to say, regardless of how you wanted to believe you 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:28.920 would react, your body is reacting in such a way 0:07:29.160 --> 0:07:32.440 that it's in fight, flight or freeze mode, which a 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:34.320 lot of people don't know. That's the most common way 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:36.320 women react as sexual assault is just to freeze and 0:07:36.360 --> 0:07:38.800 lose the ability to fight back or to stand up 0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:41.720 and walk out of a room. And recognizing that your 0:07:41.760 --> 0:07:45.080 body is reacting that way can help you understand, Oh, 0:07:45.120 --> 0:07:47.440 that actually was upsetting to me, That actually was traumatic 0:07:47.480 --> 0:07:50.800 for me. And the fight or freeze instead of fight 0:07:50.920 --> 0:07:55.680 or flight, you don't have the ability to flight, to fly, No, 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:58.480 you're totally frozen, and that can lead a lot of 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:01.280 survivors to self blame, to say why did I stay? 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:03.800 Why didn't I get up and leave? I once interviewed 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:05.880 a survivor who assumes that she must have had way 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:07.680 more to drink than she thought, because she said, I 0:08:07.720 --> 0:08:09.160 always thought I would have been someone who would have 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.600 fought back. You don't think about it. You think of 0:08:11.640 --> 0:08:17.080 yourself as being inept or weak, or somehow not capable 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:20.160 of taking care of yourself, and you know, I think 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:23.080 people do focus a lot on the emotional effects, but 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:28.160 there's tremendous physical effects, which I think is so interesting 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:32.680 because I don't even think I connected with that. I 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:35.400 was too busy blaming myself. But can you talk about 0:08:35.440 --> 0:08:39.440 some of those more physical effects. Yeah, So in the moment, 0:08:39.960 --> 0:08:41.800 like we've been kind of talking around, the most common 0:08:41.840 --> 0:08:46.199 response for specifically women, queer and transurvivors is to freeze, 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:49.560 is to lose the ability to respond until the act 0:08:49.559 --> 0:08:53.480 of violence is over. And then during that period of time, 0:08:53.600 --> 0:08:55.719 since your body is having a trauma response, it's going 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.200 to do things like store memories differently, so you might 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:01.320 not have a clear memory of what happened, or you 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:04.280 might have to restore those memories in a different way. 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:07.480 For a lot of victim's sense of smell will be heightened. 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:11.040 Specific really tactile memories will be the things that will 0:09:11.080 --> 0:09:13.360 be easier to access than the type of sort of 0:09:13.600 --> 0:09:18.839 linear storytelling memories that we're more used to using. And 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:22.560 then in the aftermath, we hear a lot about stories 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:24.679 of this sort of PTSD response where you might have 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:27.240 triggers or flashbacks where all of a sudden you're feeling 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:30.040 all of those same feelings, and they can come from anything. 0:09:30.080 --> 0:09:32.520 They can come from you know, if a perpetrator was 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:35.400 chewing a certain type of gum and you smell that 0:09:35.480 --> 0:09:37.280 type of gum, that might be when you have one 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:39.000 of those flashbacks or triggers. But there are a lot 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:43.360 of other reactions to anxiety and depression, a lot of 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:47.239 again those same physical reactions where you might have difficulties 0:09:47.280 --> 0:09:50.760 storing memories or understanding what's happening around you, being able 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:53.800 to take in a lot of complex and overwhelming stimuli. 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:59.320 So it is the physical manifestations are confusing, and I 0:09:59.360 --> 0:10:01.840 think it can make really hard for survivors, especially if 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:07.000 they identify a strong, capable, independent women, to recognize what 0:10:07.160 --> 0:10:09.280 happened to them is violent, because they say, oh, that 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:11.000 version of me that was happening in the moment, I 0:10:11.000 --> 0:10:14.200 don't even know who that is. Well, there's different things 0:10:14.240 --> 0:10:18.160 at stake. You talk a lot about the victim shaming, 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:22.120 or the threat of the loss of a job, or 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:25.760 the threat of what would have been cancelation back in 0:10:25.840 --> 0:10:28.600 the day if you actually confront it, Can you talk 0:10:28.640 --> 0:10:31.960 a little bit about that? Yeah, I mean you're talking 0:10:32.000 --> 0:10:34.560 about all the kinds of things that survivors are nervous about. 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:38.439 For example, if you are a college student and your 0:10:38.480 --> 0:10:42.360 perpetrator is in classes with you, they're in your same major, 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:45.960 confronting the violence can make you have a lot of 0:10:45.960 --> 0:10:48.439 really scary decisions ahead of you, like do I need 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:50.520 to drop out of school? Do I need to get 0:10:50.520 --> 0:10:52.839 out of this class? And that has to do not 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:55.920 with the survivor, but because of our social responses that 0:10:56.040 --> 0:11:00.160 our universities don't have the resources available, don't even have 0:11:00.200 --> 0:11:03.240 a way to remove a perpetrator from an individual class 0:11:03.640 --> 0:11:06.600 so that a survivor can continue their education. It's the 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:10.439 same thing in a workplace. But one of the percentages 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:15.440 of times that the perpetrator even has any accountability on 0:11:15.559 --> 0:11:20.680 the average American college campus, one perpetrator is expelled every 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:25.120 three years. It's so incredibly rare, and that's a new statistic. 0:11:25.120 --> 0:11:27.160 It's something we didn't know until a few years ago. 0:11:27.600 --> 0:11:29.959 But it's true that even if you go through all 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:34.079 of these mechanisms of accountability, there's a good chance that 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:36.800 you're just going to end up even more hurt. And 0:11:37.080 --> 0:11:38.840 it's one of the reasons why a lot of survivors 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:42.679 choose never to name their perpetrator publicly, because it's easier 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:46.439 to get support as a survivor if people don't rush 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:49.040 to the defense of your perpetrator instead, if it doesn't 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:52.400 become kind of a circus around protecting that particular man. 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:55.000 And we do find that when survivors share their experiences 0:11:55.040 --> 0:11:58.280 and name a perpetrator, they still tend to be deeply 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:03.120 mistreated in our society and victim shamed. And then still 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:07.280 then there is no positive outcome. I mean, do you 0:12:07.280 --> 0:12:09.439 think those people who are in college are getting out 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:14.319 and just continuing the behavior. Yeah, they definitely are, not 0:12:14.360 --> 0:12:16.720 all of them. One thing that we know about perpetrators 0:12:16.920 --> 0:12:19.360 is that there aren't a ton of them that will 0:12:19.400 --> 0:12:22.120 perpetrate in all scenarios that they tend to be responsive 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:25.479 to social context. Perpetrators perpetrate when it will be rewarded, 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:28.240 when they're in an industry where bragging about that type 0:12:28.240 --> 0:12:31.840 of violence will be seen favorably, like a badge of honor. Yeah, 0:12:31.880 --> 0:12:34.360 it's like a badge of honor. It's like a masculinity contest. 0:12:35.040 --> 0:12:37.120 And so when they're in those spaces, they're more likely 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:38.920 to perpetrate. If they're in a place where that would 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:41.520 be considered stigmatized behavior, and some want to say, Wow, 0:12:41.679 --> 0:12:43.240 I don't want to work with a guy who does that. 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:44.679 I'm not going to hire him, I'm not going to 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:46.800 promote him. Then we see a lot of men are 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:49.840 a lot less likely to perpetrate. But it's true that 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:54.880 these contexts on a college campus. They're pretty similar everywhere actually, 0:12:54.920 --> 0:12:57.840 and that's because again, perpetrators are not complete strangers. There 0:12:57.880 --> 0:13:00.679 are people who are deeply embedded in our lives, and 0:13:00.880 --> 0:13:04.360 a lot of people will rush to their defense. There's 0:13:04.400 --> 0:13:06.240 so much to unpack there, because I want to know 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:09.400 why people rush to the defense of the perpetrator. What 0:13:10.480 --> 0:13:14.600 is in our culture or in our psyche that rushes 0:13:14.640 --> 0:13:18.040 to that when you feel like it should instantly be 0:13:18.520 --> 0:13:20.880 to the victim. I think that this has been one 0:13:20.880 --> 0:13:23.840 of the really hard lessons of this me too moment, 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:27.320 that when the me too hashtagment viral, there was an 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:29.839 assumption of if everybody just knew that sexual assault was 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:32.560 so common, well, then it would end immediately, we would 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:35.640 do something about it finally, And what we found instead 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:38.680 is that a lot of the time people don't think 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:43.280 sexual violence is a good reason for a perpetrator to 0:13:43.320 --> 0:13:46.720 face any consequences, and we shift those consequences back onto 0:13:46.960 --> 0:13:49.760 the victim. Something I find in my work a lot, 0:13:49.800 --> 0:13:52.719 and I've interviewed people who are tasked with adjudicating these 0:13:52.760 --> 0:13:54.800 cases and deciding what to do and who to give 0:13:54.800 --> 0:13:57.400 consequences to. Something they'll say is, well, the damage to 0:13:57.400 --> 0:14:00.360 the victim is already done, and now the only person 0:14:00.440 --> 0:14:02.920 who matters is the perpetrator. And it's the sort of 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:08.000 twisted logic of one ruined life is inevitable, and two 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:11.000 ruined lives would be worse. So instead, there's this pushing 0:14:11.000 --> 0:14:15.160 of the consequences of the sexual assault back onto the victim, saying, well, 0:14:15.760 --> 0:14:19.600 the victim's already traumatized, they're already struggling. We'll just stop 0:14:19.640 --> 0:14:23.160 working with them, we'll stop hiring them, we'll stop keeping 0:14:23.160 --> 0:14:25.480 them in classes, whatever it might be, to focus on 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.400 keeping the perpetrator protected. And a lot of it comes 0:14:28.440 --> 0:14:31.960 from there's this fantastic concept by a philosopher called hympathy. 0:14:32.120 --> 0:14:35.680 So that's empathy but with him at the front, and 0:14:35.760 --> 0:14:42.000 it's great. And the excessive empathy that we give men, 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:46.080 particularly when they are in competition with women for who 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:49.800 will receive empathy, and so it plays a lot into 0:14:49.840 --> 0:15:00.000 sexual assault cases. How do we then go without change 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:05.200 changing those mindsets and talking about the lasting effects of 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:10.200 sexual violence and how people have to work to overcome them. Myself, 0:15:10.560 --> 0:15:15.520 it's taken me over twenty years. Yeah, where does the 0:15:15.640 --> 0:15:19.120 change start? I think we have to confront a lot 0:15:19.160 --> 0:15:21.640 of the rate myths that still exists in our society. 0:15:21.800 --> 0:15:23.720 So we tend to still think that when victims come 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:27.760 forward with their stories, that they're being vindictive, that they're 0:15:27.760 --> 0:15:30.840 trying to ruin lives, and that could not be farther 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:33.600 from the truth. Most of the time, when victims come 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:36.200 forward about their stories, they just want to tell their 0:15:36.280 --> 0:15:38.760 life story from beginning to end and violence was a 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:42.640 part of it. Or they have a reason that they're 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:45.720 speaking out. They either want to protect other potential victims. 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.200 They know that this person is still in a position 0:15:48.240 --> 0:15:50.760 of power that they're abusing and that's why they want 0:15:50.800 --> 0:15:54.520 them to lose that position of power, which isn't a punishment, 0:15:54.600 --> 0:15:58.320 it's a fair consequence for an abuse of power, or 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:02.280 they're often still facing violence from that person themselves. I 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:04.080 think that was one of the most surprising things to 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:06.920 me about getting into this work is how many of 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:10.480 the victims, when deciding to come forward, just wanted the 0:16:10.560 --> 0:16:15.680 violence to stop. And unfortunately, when victims come forward, especially 0:16:15.760 --> 0:16:18.760 very publicly, that tends to be an increase of violence, 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:21.720 not just from the perpetrator who starts to retaliate, but 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:24.640 from the people who are fans of that perpetrator, who 0:16:24.640 --> 0:16:27.760 are friends and family of that perpetrator, colleagues of that perpetrator, 0:16:27.920 --> 0:16:30.880 who rush to their defense and often harass and disparage 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:35.320 the victim. It's interesting, I've heard often, well, why did 0:16:35.320 --> 0:16:38.360 it take them so long to talk about it? Clearly 0:16:38.360 --> 0:16:41.800 it wasn't that much of a big deal, and the 0:16:41.840 --> 0:16:45.000 truth of the matter is it's taken that long to 0:16:45.160 --> 0:16:50.080 even face what happened. Yeah, it can be really confusing 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:52.720 because a lot of these acts of violence, it's a 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:55.560 lot more common than people think, and because it's so common, 0:16:55.560 --> 0:16:58.920 it can start to feel normal, even though it shouldn't be. 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:03.760 But it's interesting in our society because we really do 0:17:03.840 --> 0:17:06.960 allow so much space for people to cope with things 0:17:06.960 --> 0:17:10.920 like death or illness or any source of other types 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:14.680 of grief, but we don't actually make the same accommodations 0:17:14.720 --> 0:17:19.400 for survivors of sexual assault who are coping with many 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:21.920 of this, I mean, there are many of the same feelings. 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:25.199 They're sort of relegated to doing it in silence. They 0:17:25.240 --> 0:17:27.880 have to act as if their life is normal. How 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:32.679 do we carve out that space for survivors to feel 0:17:32.840 --> 0:17:37.040 that they have the room to be heard or to 0:17:37.160 --> 0:17:40.520 at least come to terms with how they feel about something. 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.199 There are few ways to answer that question. I'm going 0:17:43.240 --> 0:17:45.240 to answer it a couple of ways. So the first 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:48.240 one is about in our inner personal lives, how do 0:17:48.280 --> 0:17:51.680 we support survivors that we know and love, and how 0:17:51.720 --> 0:17:54.800 do we give them enough space to process a sexual 0:17:54.840 --> 0:17:59.040 assault that you know, it's very similar to grief. They're 0:17:59.040 --> 0:18:03.719 sort of stages of feeling sexual assault and feeling that 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:08.440 new survivor identity. Right, and denial is a big one. 0:18:09.280 --> 0:18:11.600 Often for a lot of friends and family of survivors, 0:18:11.640 --> 0:18:13.600 they don't get past the denial piece. They say, oh, 0:18:13.600 --> 0:18:15.480 you said it wasn't that bad when it happens, so 0:18:15.520 --> 0:18:17.639 I don't want to support you. Well, they don't know 0:18:17.680 --> 0:18:19.320 how to answer. They don't a lot of the time 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:23.800 if you've talked to someone about the situation, if at all, 0:18:24.600 --> 0:18:27.680 they don't know how to respond to you. Right, and 0:18:27.840 --> 0:18:31.240 often they're trying to fit your experience into their narrative 0:18:31.280 --> 0:18:33.520 of what a sexual assault should be, which might not 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:37.240 be inclusive of your experience of sexual assault. Because the 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:40.000 narrative we have about what rape is is pretty far 0:18:40.080 --> 0:18:42.480 off from what it actually looks like most of the time, 0:18:42.880 --> 0:18:45.359 and so a lot of people are pretty poorly equipped 0:18:45.680 --> 0:18:48.560 to be able to not only respond the right way 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:50.959 in the moment, but then a lot don't even have interest. Right. 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:52.240 You would want people, if they don't know what to 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:54.320 say in the moment, to jump on the internet and 0:18:54.520 --> 0:18:56.840 to find some good resources about how to be supportive. 0:18:57.160 --> 0:18:59.600 And you know, the thing is, it's actually not that complicated, 0:19:00.040 --> 0:19:04.080 and sexual assault is traumatic because of a loss of autonomy. 0:19:04.119 --> 0:19:07.680 To heal survivors, they just need autonomy back. And so 0:19:07.760 --> 0:19:11.520 when someone who you know and love has experienced sexual assault, 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:13.440 all you really have to do is just let them 0:19:13.520 --> 0:19:17.760 lead the way, validate their experiences, listen to them, tell 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:20.640 them that it wasn't their fault, and that however they 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:22.920 want to think about it is okay, and it's okay 0:19:22.960 --> 0:19:25.920 if it changes over time too. It's all about giving 0:19:25.920 --> 0:19:28.520 survivors control back. But we're not really comfortable with it. 0:19:29.119 --> 0:19:32.919 Especially because people kind of go back and forth in 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:35.760 their understandings of what took place. I just want to 0:19:35.760 --> 0:19:39.040 say one more time, that's normal in a society that 0:19:39.080 --> 0:19:42.879 treats sexual violence as no big deal when you're getting 0:19:42.960 --> 0:19:44.879 all of these social reactions where some people are going 0:19:44.920 --> 0:19:46.280 to say, this is a really big deal and you 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:50.000 deserve support, but then someone else the next day might say, well, 0:19:50.040 --> 0:19:53.639 I think you're overreacting. We can't expect survivors to not 0:19:53.720 --> 0:19:56.399 internalize any of that. And how does that work with 0:19:56.520 --> 0:20:01.120 families because or specifically our partners or our children, how 0:20:01.119 --> 0:20:04.160 do we talk about our experiences to families, because that's 0:20:04.160 --> 0:20:10.760 a whole other area that can be very disruptive. Yeah, 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:12.920 I think that can be one of the hardest places 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:16.040 to talk about this type of violence. For sure. I've 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:20.119 done research with queer women survivors and for them talking 0:20:20.119 --> 0:20:22.439 to their families about it is consistently one of the 0:20:22.480 --> 0:20:26.640 worst experiences they have following a sexual assault. And so 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:29.040 one of the things I'd recommend to survivors is just 0:20:29.080 --> 0:20:30.879 to trust your gut. If you think someone's going to 0:20:30.960 --> 0:20:34.080 be supportive, then that's who you should go to for support. 0:20:34.359 --> 0:20:36.119 If you get a sense that they won't be and 0:20:36.160 --> 0:20:38.080 you don't want to tell them, you're not obligated to 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:40.440 tell them. And then if you're going to be the 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:42.600 supportive family member, the thing you need to do is 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:46.560 again be patient, give it lots of time, allow someone 0:20:46.600 --> 0:20:49.760 to go through the different iterations, and be open to education, 0:20:49.960 --> 0:20:52.840 go seek it out on your own. But also when 0:20:52.880 --> 0:20:55.359 you think about a partner and how sexual wilds can 0:20:55.400 --> 0:20:58.399 disrupt intimacy, that could be a problem that both people 0:20:58.600 --> 0:21:01.800 are working on. We have tendency and intimate relationships. To 0:21:01.880 --> 0:21:04.040 say that, well, the survivor is the one who has trauma, 0:21:04.119 --> 0:21:06.280 so they have an obligation to heal and fix their 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:09.440 trauma so that they can be perfect for their partner again, 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:11.920 but that's really damaging. It should go the other way. 0:21:12.119 --> 0:21:15.360 It should say, oh, my partner has trauma, they're going 0:21:15.400 --> 0:21:18.520 to need adjustments. Our relationship is going to look different now. 0:21:18.720 --> 0:21:22.520 Really responsive partners can notice when their partner who is 0:21:22.560 --> 0:21:25.399 a survivor is reacting a certain ways, getting stressed out, 0:21:25.400 --> 0:21:27.680 as getting triggered, and so to look for those signs 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:31.000 of a trigger and say, hey, let's take a beat here, 0:21:31.280 --> 0:21:34.000 let's talk through it. And to be really proactive this 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:36.800 shouldn't fall all on survivors to heal themselves. The people 0:21:36.800 --> 0:21:39.600 who are closest to us should facilitate that healing and 0:21:39.640 --> 0:21:50.159 create safe spaces for us. I was not prepared for 0:21:50.320 --> 0:21:57.120 how my children would respond to learning about my assault. 0:21:57.800 --> 0:22:00.880 What did you find the most challenging about it? Well, 0:22:00.880 --> 0:22:04.080 that I had missed the opportunity to prepare them. The 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:08.840 first thing I felt it was a unfortunate and I 0:22:08.880 --> 0:22:13.159 wasn't proud of that moment. I for some reason didn't 0:22:13.280 --> 0:22:17.520 think that I would need it. And yet they felt 0:22:18.640 --> 0:22:22.720 absolutely confronted by this, and they felt sort of blindsided 0:22:22.760 --> 0:22:27.360 by it. One of them did in particular, and there 0:22:27.440 --> 0:22:34.000