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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to have just realised that I have been sexual assaulted many times

518 replies

PippiLongBottom · 23/10/2011 22:37

I had extremely large breasts as a young teen. I was a 30DD at 13 and my size 8 hour glass figure was very popular with the boys Hmm.

At 19 I had my breasts reduced on the NHS because my head was fucked.

It is only with many years of hindsight (I am 36) thanks to Mumsnet and a recently developed feminist perspective that I realise that all the 'incidents' that happened to me were sexual assaults/grooming and not my fault.

I have fb'd one of the cuntslprits tonight.

OP posts:
StopRainingPlease · 24/10/2011 09:37

I'm not sure why there's all the comment about whether OP's breasts are big or not - irrelevant except probably in the frequency of assault she has endured, and her own view of her body.

I had my breast grabbed by a stranger in the street when I was an A-cup - it's still assault.

BupcakesandHaunting · 24/10/2011 09:43

Page three, shit rags like Zoo and Nuts and FHM... all work towards the illusion that young women enjoy being leered at. It's disheartening that in 2011 that there are still men dim enough to buy this shite.

StewieGriffinsMom · 24/10/2011 09:53

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

PosiesOfPoison · 24/10/2011 09:57

Bupcakes, judging by what I saw in Bristol city centre (huge group of girls dressed as sexy nurses with arses hanging out of shorts and short skirts, tiny tops, bras on show) many girls feel they have to live up to this, and are tricked into thinking this is their value so suck it up. By the time I was fifteen when a bloke (about thirty) said I had nice 'tits' to a mutual friend I thought it was a complimentSad.

Wooooooooooooooppity · 24/10/2011 10:01

Bupcakes, it's even more disheartening that there are women who are prepared to buy this shit.

You can see why they do though. Right from our first experience of having our bodily integrity breached, we are told that we don't have the right to feel outraged about it. Someone pings our bra strap, or puts their hand up our skirt, if we complain we're told that's just what silly boys do and we're over-reacting. And when they yell at us in the street, make fucking gestures with their fingers, waggle their tongues at us, pat us on the bum as they walk past, grope our breast as they pass us, rub up against us on the tube - each of these encroachments into our bodily integrity and privacy, is treated as a minor nuisance infringement and any response stronger than mild boredom is deemed to be an over-reaction. Our outrage, which is a reasonable and proper response, is deemed OTT and militant.

And yet, if this stuff happened to men in the street, in their schools, in clubs, in all the mixed spaces that they went, nobody would ever tell them that their outrage was misplaced. Because nobody ever feels the need to question their bodily integrity, unless they are gay and therefore don't fit into the patriarchal model of what a man should be. Only women and homosexuals are deemed to be so unworthy of physical dignity.

BupcakesandHaunting · 24/10/2011 10:03

Posies, we are conditioned to think that degrading sexual remarks such as the one aimed at you are compliments. We are supposed to feel lucky that a man would have sex with us, usually based on the flimsiest of criteria (boobs/face) I also HATE the "sexy" hen night trend. Don't kid me that women enjoy dressing in cheapo bits of polyester and glitter and getting letched at by sub-standard men. I'm sure that some will come on here to tell me that I Am Wrong but if they look deep enough, they know that they only think that they enjoy it.

PosiesOfPoison · 24/10/2011 10:09
onefatcat · 24/10/2011 10:12

We KNOW men SHOULD NOT assault women,
We KNOW we SHOULD be able to wear what we like and NOT be assaulted,
We KNOW we SHOULD be safe to walk where we like and NOT be assaulted,
We KNOW we SHOULD be able to talk to ANY man and not be assaulted,
We KNOW it is NOT the victims fault if a man assaults her.

HOWEVER there ARE men who think it is OK to assault a woman.

I was asking WHY these men chose this particular woman as their victim and NOT others. She has been assaulted more than 20 times, while some women have never been assaulted.

I know if I am raped going down a dark alley at night on my own that it will be the rapists fault- it doesn't mean I am going to go down that dark alley though!

If you have a very attractive and well developed teenage daughter like the OP was, are you going to tell her to dress as she likes and and go wherever she likes and talk to whoever she likes, and behave as she likes, or are you going to teach her that there are some men/boys who may try to take advantage of her and give her strategies which may help to avoid those situations?

Obviously the OP was very young and naive at the time and I know the assaults were not her fault, but maybe there are some lessons to be learned here.

tooearlymustdache · 24/10/2011 10:14

i couldn't get past the 2nd page of this thread, i was sickened by the questioning directed towards the OP re; the size of her breasts and did she not know it was wrong at the time Shock

and we wonder why so many assaults go unreported, mine own included

shame on you

tooearlymustdache · 24/10/2011 10:15

onefat

yeah, that's right...take all the women off the streets so there is no-one left to rape?

fuck off

PosiesOfPoison · 24/10/2011 10:17

onefatcunt Are you serious? I can't even bother to engage and tell you why you're a whole heap of wrong.

Stop.

Do you really think large breasts invite groping?
Do you think any women invites this?

This sort of victim blaming is why this shit happens so effortlessly for most men/boys that do this sort of thing.

I don't know any women that hasn't been flashed at, strap pinged, gawped at, whilstled at, raped, sexually assaulted. Most of us have at some time or another been a victim of something.

PosiesOfPoison · 24/10/2011 10:17

Sorry onefatcat. Blush

tooearlymustdache · 24/10/2011 10:20

i think you were right 1st time Posies although being in support of reclaiming the word cunt i find it a bit of a back-handed slap Wink

NinkyNonker · 24/10/2011 10:21

This thread is just as disillusioning as the rape threads, how sad.

BupcakesandHaunting · 24/10/2011 10:22

Oh I suppose it was my fault I was raped when wearing a zip-up hoodie, shorts and thick black tights because I was in the wrong place. Hmm

You're an idiot. Rape doesn't always subscribe to your idiotic preconcieved ideas of what happens in one i.e woman tottering down dark alley in heels/tight dress. Plenty of women are getting raped every day in their own homes by their own partners when they are wearing nothing more "provocative" than a jumper and jeans. Rape isn't about sexual attraction, it's about control.

FanjoForTheMuahahammaries · 24/10/2011 10:22

i was super shy at school when the incidents happened to me. And the guys had never seen me in anything other than school uniform. So that blows onefatcats ignorant theory out of the water.

slightlymad72 · 24/10/2011 10:27

Forgive me for this but I'm angry (I am physically shaking) and this might come out as a rant with spelling mistakes.

I was sexually abused as a child for over 2.5 years, I was raped by coercion as an adult (abusive relationship) for 6 years, I was made to watch my mother get smacked around by my father, I have been sexually assaulted, my FIL has taken photos of my cleavage without my permission. the lsit is too long.

Was it something I did, did I dress inappropriatly, did I give them the LOOK, did I do something in a pass life that warrants any of this?

NO I FUCKING DIDN'T, but according to ONEFATCAT there must have been something about me.

No wonder I use to keep most of this to myself, dealing with my past has taken a lot of emotional and physical strength, getting to the point of 'It was not my fault' was a battle. I had to answer everyone of those questions and many more. I am so glad I kept it a secret, only confiding in the trusted few, as some of the reponses on here, if i had heard them in RL, would have left me a wreck.

BupcakesandHaunting · 24/10/2011 10:29

I also got flashed at when I was fifteen, on a bus. When the police came to interview me, the first thing they asked me was "What were you wearing?" A female police officer, too. She looked embarrassed to be asking it tbf.

FanjoForTheMuahahammaries · 24/10/2011 10:29

I'm sure very few people think like onefatcat.

Not even sure if onefatcat actually thinks like that or just wants a reaction tbh.

PosiesOfPoison · 24/10/2011 10:30

Slightlymad, you have support here.

Whatmeworry · 24/10/2011 10:31

I have just thought of another one: Me running in sports day aged 14/15 wearing a bra, cropped top, t shirt and sweatshirt to minimise visible movement. The boys lining alongside the perimeter of the track singing 'oops up'. That's lovely and confidence building isn't it

And swimming etc...I think those are the sort of things schools should look at more closely as its very tough on all the girls - gawky, big, late developers etc.

AnyPhantomFucker · 24/10/2011 10:32

slightlymad I hope you are ok

I understand how you feel and I believe you. I am very sorry you had to endure that. x

flippinada · 24/10/2011 10:33

I was a super shy, super dorky, wouldn't say boo to a goose teen and was still assaulted in many small ways on a regular basis (bra strap twanged, arse pinched, inappropriate comments on body etc).

I remember once when I was about 11 I dropped something and bent over to pick it up. Some old wanker came up and slapped me on the arse. I was so shocked and upset it must have showed on by face, he walked off laughing.

SlightlyMad Angry on your behalf and Sad for you that you went through that (please don't take that as patronising, its absolutely not meant to be).

slightlymad72 · 24/10/2011 10:33

I'm okay, its taken nearly 30 years to be able to say that, I am just VVVV angry not just at onefatcat posts but at a lot that has been said on this thread.

hatesponge · 24/10/2011 10:35

fanjo like you, the stuff that happened to me was at school (or on the way to/from school). I was 12/13, I didn't wear revealing clothes, I didn't wear make up, I had my hair in plaits. I dressed like the little girl I was.

to further confirm how much bullshit onefatcat's theory is: in my early 20s, I used to go out to clubs in the skimpiest of dresses, very short, very low cut/backless, I was a 34e by then. And whilst I may have got the occasional comment, it was a fraction of what I got on a regular basis at school.

It is nothing to do with what you wear.