[Trigger warning: Rape and Sexual Assault]
Yesterday I turned 20. If we’re talking numbers, mine is 22. I’ve been called a slut 100+ times for that number. I’ve also been raped by four different men. Guess how many times I’ve spoken that last sentence out loud? Zero.
The first time it happened, I was 17. We'll call him Paul: Paul, who took my virginity by force. I had sex with him four more times that summer. Sex isn't supposed to be about domination and subjection? At 17, only knowing Paul, I assumed it was normal.
I went on to have lots of sex after Paul. I had sex with lots of different people, in lots of different positions, places—sometimes under the influence, sometimes sober. I loved sex, even though it was introduced to me in such a fucked up way. My newfound sexuality made it easy to forgive Paul. He took my virginity, but gave me something I loved in return.
The second and third times I was raped marked the fourteenth and fifteenth time I'd had sex. They were in the same fraternity; let's call them Jake and Andrew. I’d slept with both of them consensually before. And I called them my friends. They raped me within ten days of each other. They took my trust. I still loved sex, though. Even though I wouldn't call them my friends anymore, I still feel obligated to wave to them on Locust.
Number four...I’m still trying to figure out what four took. It’s been a month, and if I had to guess, I’d say he took fragments of me; my confidence, my sense of safety, my happiness. I've seen number four twice on campus today. I know his name now, although I didn’t when it happened, but calling him Four seems more fitting to me. Giving him a name would give him a place in my life, and he doesn’t deserve that.
If you’re doing the math correctly, you’ve probably figured out that I’m a second semester sophomore. You’ve also figured out that I’ve been raped three times at Penn. I figured that out too, but you’ll never catch me admitting it. Why? You’ve probably read the DP’s “Sexual Assualt” series and think it’s because I don’t know what my resources, reporting options and counseling outlets are. Maybe you think I’m quiet because I blame myself? Maybe you think I don’t even know how to really define my experiences as rape?
You’re wrong on three counts. I know all about OSC, CAPS, the Women’s Center, preponderances of evidence, the works. I also don’t blame myself because I'm not dumb enough to believe that downing three bottles of Jack Daniels could make me deserving of being violated and disrespected. And I certainly know how to define my rape experiences. I did not ask for them. I did not give verbal consent. I did not want them. They were rape.
If you think I didn't report my assaultants because I didn't think they deserved it, you're misunderstanding me. I do believe that they deserve to be punished. But do they deserve me having to relive the assaults in my head, on paper, to my parents and to legal officials, all in service of an uncertain outcome? I know Four doesn’t deserve my attention. I couldn’t even tell you what color hair he had until after I had unwillingly added him to my growing list of teenage sexual partners. He capitalized on my most vulnerable state, and he doesn’t deserve another thought from me.
But let’s be honest, I think about him all the time. I probably always will. And I will probably never truly understand what he took from me because I don’t know what my life would be without him anymore. He is so important to me in the worst way. They all are. That’s a paradox that I can’t explain to you until you experience it. And I hope you never will.
I get that you can’t help me unless I am willing to be helped. I appreciate the efforts by the many good people on this campus: my best friends, strangers in student support groups. But how fucking unfortunate is it that we have to give it so much attention and that doing so means putting all the pressure on the victims? I’m so sick of reading stories that I can so strongly relate to. It hurts me more to know I’m not alone. I wish I were alone.
I'm not criticizing the conversations we've had on campus about sexual assault, but there's a key voice missing: the always silent perpetrator. I want to hear how my rapist is coping with what he did to me and what was going through his head when he decided to change my life forever. But I know I’m never going to see that side because we shelter these criminals in the safety of a social culture that perpetuates rape culture by calling it “hooking up.” Call it what it is Penn. Yes, I’m a victim. But Number Four, you are a rapist. So why am I the one that needs help?
Maybe you think I am perpetuating rape culture by not reporting my experiences. To that, I say fuck you. I don’t love sex anymore, and that is something that I am far more concerned about than making sure my rapist faces that legal consequences he certainly deserves. I want to love sex again. I want to love sex again so fucking badly. I wish that everyone did, including my attackers. I want my rapist, and every other rapist on this campus to love sex too. Because if they truly loved it, respected it, cherished it, we would never be having this conversation in the first place.
