to feel that most females have been the victim of some kind of sexual abuse?

[SoleSource]

AIBU?

I was very nearly raped by a taxi driver. Also my cries of NO have been ignored on a couple of occasions.

this thread has made me realise that i completely accept men groping/flashing/masterbating etc as inevitable

a few years after my wn last experience, i was with a friend when she got grabbed in the crotch in a busy street in the middle of the day. she was a bit shaken, we went for a coffee and then continued. i hardly batted an eyelid

Also just as crucial to bring up your sons properly. Respect and to be well just kind.

I agree, this is probably the case, but I think it's worth putting it behind you in most cases and just joining the collective effort to reduce the incidence for future women.

I have lost count of the times I have been followed, groped, flashed at and cocerced in my life, but I have to say I feel crosser and more anxious about people being outragously rude and unfair to me in shops or in bureaucratic situations. Am I alone?

What can you do to safeguard yourself when the abuser is someone in a position of trust or authority though?

Nothing.

But you should hope for a better response from those in a position to help you than the one the body received.

SabrinaMulhollandJjones ah, luck, unlucky, chance etc I think that depends on your personal view of the world.

Interestingly, there is some research a friend was telling me about which is about how you see good and bad thing that have happened to you. If you see good things as within your control (eg promotion at work) but bad things as not in your locus of control (the mantra it wasn't your fault) then you do better at dealing with bad things. I'm massively paraphrasing, but it's quite interesting. Although when you think about it not very surprising. I think that is why the cycle for friend A (we shall call her) never seems to break because it's become so normalised for her to have shit men (conditioned?). Makes me so cross. I want to fucking castrate her last 'boyfriend' on her behalf.

I never realised that I might in some way have been to blame/responsible for unwanted attention. I thought until now that every woman would have some story to tell. I was a very confident, responsible, friendly teen, but definitely too trusting and unworldly. I've always thought I was the target of these particular men because i had big breasts, they definitely were focused on them (and I did get many random, lewd comments and looks in the street even though I dressed very modestly). All 4 men were at least 50 years old.

I never had issues with boyfriends or boys my own age, I was well prepared and expected to have to deal with them I think (and I never came across anything worse than a bit of trying it on, not like so many on this thread).

I've never told anyone about these incidents so if you were my best friend you wouldn't know.

Allpastyears you go girl! :)

I punched him! Never punched anyone before or since, so I hurt my hand more than him. And I swore lots

I had hoped you would say something like that!

I hope I would react similar and not be too shocked or something.

Same here ithink - so sad. I was thinking I hadn't because of the scale - but I've been flashed at, on my morning commute by a young man. I felt violated, was scared he would follow me and attack me. I did report it to the police.

Also had a colleague try it on with me - no signals given. Told him he'd just done something very stupid (his partner works in same organisation) and I was going to give him the benefit of the doubt that he was just pissed and stupid and to pretend it hadnt happened. He tried his luck again! So I left. I see him occasionally at work and he is sheepish with me these days.

Anastasia how did the police treat you, when you reporyed the incident?

AllPastYears It is the norm in the part of the South East where I grew up to walk home with your keys in your hand, one sticking out between your 2nd and 3rd fingers "just in case".

nemno you were never responsible, even if you weere doinmg the can-can naked.

I feel absolutely certain that those men had free will! If they didn't have control over their actions, then they should've been in a psychiatric unit, and it's still not your responsibility!

WHY do men/boys secually assault otbers?

WHY do women/girls sexually assault others?

Does anybody blame their parents, the environment in which the abuser was raised, porn industry etc?
Or is it mental illness associated with their own abuse as a child or adult?

How the hell can we stop sexual abuse?

Abusers do not have I AM A SEXUAL ABUSER tattooed on their forrid.

We as people rely on our instincts and even in the best circumstances that does not prevent us being abused.

Children are obviously the most vulnerable and people who are not in control of makibg best decisions - the mentally disabled etc.

Maybe we can mever stop it.

Is why I believe I have been fortunate that sexual abuse has not happened to me more than it already has.

The taxi driver who tried to rape me :( jumped on me, I was sober wearing modest clothing and had not e gaged in anythingbut formal conversation etc

It is not the victims fault EVER

My mum and biological dad split up the moment she caught him wanking over me. I was 4 (maybe three) and have flashes of a memory of him doing more than that. Mum was pressured not to do anything about it, just to divorce him and move on. My DH and plenty of others know about it and some think the story is just a rumour.

Then, about 10 years ago, the man who had then brought us up as his own, got drunk, got in bed with me and put his hand down my knickers. I was petrified and couldn't move. I was worried he'd get in trouble. I was worried my mum or sisters wouldn't believe me, as he wasn't like that. It wasn't until he sat up and tried to pull my knickers down that I thought I'd get out and went and sat downstairs. He came down and tried to give me a cuddle. When I said no, he told me to go back to bed and he was sorry. He didn't come back up, and it's never been mentioned since. At all. I don't know if he would even remember he did it. He and mum had split up about 5 years before, and I put it down as him just being lonely. I feel sick now. DH doesn't know about it. No one does. Well, except you lot! I was 19, and don't know why I didn't stop him. I think I was worried he'd tell me off. At 19 years old!?!

This thread will stick with me all day.

Rapists believe rape myths, too. Hardly anyone thinks of themselves as a "bad person". We all, whatever the moral nature and gravity of our actions, have justifications. Rapists don't think ofg themselves as "proper rapists". Proper rapists, to them, are people like Peter Sutcliffe. We need to bring our sons up to understand that none of those victim-blaming pieces of nonsense, I.e. Rape myths, are true.

Exvellent point TheBiJessoe.

I was raised to believe that stealing, telling lies and hitting is wrong.

I have done all three many times

I'm so sorry for all the experiences told on here. This thread will also stay with me all day, and a lot longer. Not least because I was just told by another poster that I was just 'unlucky' to have been raped. To dismiss someone else's experience like this is beyond the pale.

TheBigJessie (sp correction)

Thank you Jessie for that, but don't worry I have absolutely no problems arising from the incidents. I really, until now, thought they were normal. It's realising from this thread that I did have more than my 'fair' share of attention that I am wondering 'why me?'. And though the obvious and correct answer is that I was unlucky to encounter these particular tossers, many comments on this thread seem to suggest that there is something about the victim that attracts the attention.

In my case I have been happy to assume it was big breasts and thus out of my control. But thinking about it, all 4 men knew me (to varying degrees) before the assaults, they were all older men. They all clocked that I wouldn't tell, and they were right. I am pondering this.

Sabrina it is not your fault. I/we believe you.

Nemno abusers also on some level take the chance that victims will not tell. They cannever be sure we won't. Some do but most do not tell I think. That is probably what they rely on, probably not much to do with what vibe you/I/others were sending out at the time or before that.

You have done nothing wrong.

If anything serious had happened to me between say, 15 and 18, I wouldn't have reported it, because then my mother would have found out, and reacted by severely limiting my freedoms. In effect punishing me!

That was another reason I did not report TheBigJessie.

Blimey you guys are good. That will have been part of my (unconscious) thinking too!

old uncle and aunty next doot ( not 'real' ones) who befriended us when we were new to the area. i was 9, sibling 4, used to try and put his tongue in our mouths when kissed bye bye. lifted me up by my feet and held my legs open, my mother was in the other room. used to feel my bra straps.

mother just said avoid him. late 1970's. it was 'that' mentality back then, that 'oh he's just a dirty old man' thing.

I had a lucky escape on a holiday in my early 20's. I think I would have been raped. My drink had been spiked by a 'rep' at a party, he followed me into the bathroom and started undressing me. Thank God for my friend who followed me in, she was suspicious of him and I had been acting strangely and out of character, and hauled me out before....makes me want to vomit thinking of the bastard.

I have had my backside groped at work and received inappropriate sexual comments at two different workplaces. In the first incident, it was more recnt, before I was pregnant with DS1, I was more confident and was so angry. I yelled "get your filthy hands off, never touch me again, I'm reporting you, you pervert!" I did report him and other female colleagues came forward with similar complaints. He was investigated and warned, but is still working there.

Some of the posts are so saddening and sickening. There are some evil, disgusting monsters about.

I can't believe this shit still goes on.