Why *I* didn't report

[AngryGreasedSantaCatcus]

A lot of the time the answers to the "why didn't she report it" question tend to be quite abstract like statistics, research etc.

AIBU to hope with all my being that maybe, just maybe , reading some real life stories and experiences will explain why and won't be as easily dismissed?

So here is my story, one of them at least.

As a teenager I needed a maths tutor before some very important exam. The one my parents chose was a Uni mathematics professor with a great reputation and accomplishments, in the classroom and in his tutoring groups. He was the man to pick if you wanted your kids to get good results and parents felt grateful/lucky to get a spot for their kids, often needing a referral or a good word put in by someone with some standing.

The first few sessions were normal , bog standard,brain melting maths. These took place in his house, with his wife and son at home. The sessions were in groups of 5/6. I was with 4 other girls. Then during one session, while leaning over to help me with a maths problem he put his hands under my jumper. It was winter so it was a big bulky , high neck red jumper. I remember the colour of it and the rather scratchy feeling of it vividly. First on my back, around my waist, while still talking and explaining the answer. Then his hands moved up and he started grabbing, pinching, twisting. Through it all I remember stupidly still trying to solve that stupid equation and trying to focus on his words. Because what was happening it couldn't be happening. His hands were not on me. Who does that? I'm imagining it. It's some kind of accident. It's not happening. It's not happening. I even went again (did that imply consent, did I secretly want it, did it mean it wasn't that bad, did it mean it didn't happen) and 10 minutes in he came to "help" me again. Humiliatingly, I still didn't say or do anything. I just sat there, got on with my maths, screaming in my head that this isn't happening. Screaming in my head to do something,to say something. If he does it again I will, i promised myself. He did, I didn't. Next time.

That night I told my mother. She laughed at me, she made a crude joke. I rang him myself pretending to be her and cancelling my sessions. He didn't put up a fight and I remember how stupidly proud i was for dealing with it and "pulling one over him" and for actually doing it since I'd been dreading it and practiced for hours what I would say and how I would say it.

I didn't report because I was young and had had no support to do so. I didn't report because despite 4 witnesses, they didn't see anything . I didn't report because who would believe slutty old me, vs a Uni professor with a great reputation. I didn't report because I probably deserved it, I went back, I was this and that and the other. I didn't report because it was never presented as a real option.

It turns out the adults fucking knew. They whispered and warned each other about it. They gossiped and shared knowing looks about it. My own mother was told not to send me to him. But his results were more important, his reputation was more important, our grades were more important than our bodies, our sanity, our safety ,our voices.

I'm not looking for sympathy and I'm sorrys and flowers. It is what it is. It happened.
If anyone else wants to add their story, to share,to be heard, to be listened to , to be believed, to just let another soul know and let it all out (and hopefully to educate-as a side effect not a main goal) feel free to share, but no pressure to do so.

I’d argue that you did report it to the person who should have believed you and taken steps to protect you.

But, even I’m aware that how I think I’d react versus the reality of being in that situation can be poles apart.

Until the narrative is changed to one where women are believed and men are deemed to be responsible for controlling themselves I can understand why (some) women won’t report.

As a very naive and young 15 year old, a 'kind' teacher gave me 1:1 catch up lessons in break... he quite clearly 'enjoyed' them, and appeared to need to stand with his crotch touching me at all times.... I was young and vulnerable, and confused. Of course I didn't report.

Sorry, I meant to the police. Because telling friends,family, therapists, journalists etc. apparently doesn't count. Only reporting to the police counts.

I'm not sure if we have anyone in the police here - but if you do 'make a complaint' (not necessarily rape) but it's not taken further- does it remain on file ? Because my view these days is to report - even it's not taken further for lack of evidence- as it may help in case of evidence needed in the future.

I didn't report because, in the late 'Sixties, nobody seemed to think it was a big deal. This is from my personal timeline, here: https://fairplayforwomen.com/everyday-sexual-assaults/

Aged 11, on my way to school at around 8:30am. Some geezer walking along the lane complimented my hair, “Thanks”, I replied. He caught up to me: “It’s sexy”, he said. At this age I thought I knew all about sexy, so I laughed and told him I couldn’t be sexy because I was a child. “Not too young to be sexy”, he insisted – and that’s where it all went weird for me. I was completely thrown by his insistence: still trying ward him off politely, still thinking he’d made a mistake, I was soon pressed to the fence by this adult crawling over me with unfamiliar but unmistakable lust. I remember the smell of recently-creosoted wood against my face.

Some of his workmates arrived and, incomprehensibly, found it all very funny. I was crying by now but they were too busy jeering at my regulation big knickers to care about a terrified child.

A ‘hero’ showed up: another of his co-workers, but this one had common sense. He yelled at the men, punched my attacker and dusted me down. He did, however, instruct me not to tell anyone.

I kept quiet all day, and told my mother in the evening. Distracted by a house full of children and boiling pans, she gave me a minute or two then asked “But did he do anything to you, sexually I mean?” Assured that he only touched my chest and backside, she murmured “That’s all right, then”, and returned to her work. I realise now that she was reassuring herself and not offering guidance, but it stuck. Interestingly, the school friends I told the next day made similar remarks.

Because my Dad always told that if I got myself raped, he would have to go and beat / kill the rapist and would go to prison and I would be responsible and my Mum said that only girls who were asking for it got raped. So when I was, I kept quiet. At 17 I knew I wouldn’t be believed as he was my boyfriend and my Mum would say I asked for it and if I even tried I would be responsible to destroying my family as my Dad wouldn’t be able to exercise a modicum of self control. I’m 54 now and NC with my parents. Can’t think why.

Because I was his manager and it was just ‘banter’ but really it was sexual assault.
Because I didn’t remember and what if he was drunk too.

I did report an assault in my 20's though. My friend's ex broke her nose trying to shove her in his car and punched me so hard in the head when I intervened I collapsed and banged my head on the concrete, lost consciousness and ended up in hospital. I thought this one was clear cut, no excuses. No one asks to be punched, clothes don't matter, there's no ifs and maybes. We went to the police station with our story and medical reports. We made the complaint. I also asked if there was anything like a restraining order (didn't know the correct terminology) given he kidnapped her in his car, took her to his flat and didn't let her out for two days. The police officer laughed and asked " Where do you think you are? In cowboy movies?".
Nothing ever came from it, no follow up, no arrest,no conviction.

I also got in trouble at home for reporting it and actually involving the police. It definitely wasn't worth that hassle.

I didn’t report because I didn’t want to talk about it, and I still don’t. It’s been 30 years.

Totally fair enough.

I did tell, and parents called police who visited house. They didn’t believe me (old man exposing himself on walk to primary school). I got in trouble with my parents who were embarrassed.

subsequently never said anything about a family member who touched me for years, but eventually told a youth worker at church. She was angry I had told her I think. I was then left out of any activities she organised. She tried to avoid me.
I didn’t tell anyone about the physics teacher who rubbed against us as we sat on lab stools, the the boy who liked to rub against us in the tuck queue, or the PE teacher who liked watching us change.
I was assaulted more than once as a student, but I was drunk, so considered it my own fault.

Working in the legal area, so so many of the previous posts resonate with me. There is a fear of what can happen if reported, no only with respect to police/legal system, but also with respect to ones family and social/work circle.

On the other side I've encountered women who've felt really bad about NOT reporting too. Mostly that they wish they have prevented that person continuing with offend with others.

Sometimes it just seems like a lose-lose for women in these situations.

I didn’t report because he was my dad

Sending love @AngryGreasedSantaCatcus

stay strong

Support for all victims of rape, sexual assault and abuse http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/4897710-support-for-all-victims-of-rape-sexual-assault-and-abuse

Copied from another thread if anyone who posted or is reading needs it. to you all.

I didn’t report to the police because I wasn’t even believed by my so called best friend who was in the room ‘sleeping’ when her on/off boyfriend raped me. She told everyone at school that I’d slept with him so I was made to feel like a dirty liar who had betrayed my friend. I also had a reactive father, I was scared about what he would do to the boy and what might happen to him as well as being embarrassed and ashamed about the whole thing.

Because I didn't know it was assault. I thought I asked for it. I was a naive 18 year old from an all girls school. He was an older student. I was flattered. With hindsight he was a predator preying on younger women. I was drunk, he hurt me and didn't stop when I cried. He just said 'you're not enjoying this much are you' and carried on. Later he told his friends 'virgins, I hate it when they cry' and they all had a good laugh about it. He's a very senior police officer now.

I didn't report because I told a 'friend' who didn't believe me because, 'it can't be him, he's nice and quiet' and another friend who said 'well you went to his house what did you expect?'
Which is exactly what the defence would have said.
He's now a GP.

I was raped by my boss’s boss after a night out, 20 odd years ago. It was in my house and dh was asleep upstairs. He came back to mine because he’d missed his last train home, and I didn’t think twice about it because he was (I thought) a good friend.

I didn’t report it because I just felt like it would open a whole can of worms and I didn’t know how people would react. I thought dh would get mad and attack him, and might get injured or in trouble himself. It would have become a massive thing at work, and he was more senior than me. I thought nobody would believe me over him and it was better to put it behind me.

I left that job not long afterwards, as did he.

I didn’t realise until years later that it is still called ‘rape’ if your teenage boyfriend is the one who does it to you. Even when it really hurts and you’re screaming ‘no.’

Later I thought that drinking and taking drugs with two older men, and ending up far more out of it than I should have been (I took a small amount of coke but was nearly paralytic) and then somehow in a bed with both of them, was a ‘mistake’ we had all made. Then I didn’t want to admit even to myself that what the doctor I went to see afterwards did to me was not a medical examination.

Later I felt sorry for the boy I was sort of seeing as he was a cancer survivor and it had left him with a fairly obvious disability and he had not had much experience. I had liked a lot about him and he seemed sensitive, but then he suddenly didn’t understand the word ‘no’ - i fought him off and then he said sorry and we went on a bizarre walk holding hands. I thought he must have not learned social skills because of missing so many normal teenage experiences. I hated holding his hand though.

I wish I’d understood those situations for what they were earlier, but reporting them would have done no good at all.

Thank you for the link OP ❤️

I just want to say, I am sorry to hear about what happened to you. And I’m even sorrier that your parent did not either believe you or protect you. You haven’t said when this was but, I hope, if nothing else, it’s more likely that parents will believe their daughters now we are all so much more aware, even if if formal justice evades them. Even that will help victims in a very small way. Did your relationship with your mother ever recover, if you don’t mind me asking?

I can completely understand your reasoning op. But when it comes to the current allegations in our media, several women have not reported (and most were women not girls) yet have spoken to a journalist. The journalist says they want justice so go to the police and let there be a trial. If it's proven he needs to be criminally prosecuted.

Other high profile celebrities have had similar allegations against them that were malicious though and until legal proceedings occur it's just sensationalist to publish/broadcast. Once you speak to a journalist the "I didn't want to report" doesn't apply

Name changed for this because it's outing, but also- as the name attests- because I'm quite ashamed for not reporting him.

So, I didn't report because it started when he was my teacher and I don't think anybody would believe me because I loved him. And anyone who was around at the time knew that I loved him; it was obvious, I was a love struck idiot and followed him around like a lapdog. And I loved him for years.

Even after he sexually assaulted me and even after he carried on after I said no and even after he stealthed me, I still loved him. Our relationship went on (and off) for seven years and he sexually assaulted and abused me many times throughout that period, but I still truly loved him and kept going back for more.

He was married and his wife covered for him after it all came to light. The whole thing began when I was 16 and she destroyed things in his position that might have proven what he had done (because it's illegal to sleep with a student of yours, even if they're over the age of consent). She was a teacher too and knew how bad what he had done was, although she made it clear that my obvious adoration for him around school from the time I was 12 or 13 (she had been at the school) was a well known staffroom joke and if I reported him all of my teachers would say that I'd clearly thrown myself at him.

But a few years after the relationship ended, I did try and report some of this to the police. I was told- and this is verbatim, from a police officer- "silly little girls get themselves into trouble when they mess around with men like that." The officer told me that it was my word against his and that none of my accusations would ever stick, especially as it sounded like he had the ongoing support of his wife. I walked out of the police station after that and have never tried to tell again. That was in about 2008 when we had been split up a few years and I was about 27.

He's still teaching and if I think about it too hard it makes me feel awful. I'm sure he probably did it again. His wife is still teaching too and she's a safeguarding lead for a large academy chain, with a lot of power in that organisation. She does training and safeguarding for about 15 schools.

Sometimes I have moments where I think that I'm going to sort this out and make sure he is stopped/justice is served, but the truth is that the idea terrifies me. So I suppose the truth is, that's why I haven't reported: even all these years on, I'm scared of him.

19 yr old me needed to ask for help at a rural filling station when my ancient Mini overheated. Pre mobile phones, miles from home in unfamiliar surroundings, nobody to call. The guy called a friend, who arrived in a little van with two young boys, possibly his sons. He got my car going but I felt very uncomfortable around him, especially as he wouldn’t accept my repeated offers of money for his services.

He followed me into the toilet and made his move. He wasn’t violent or aggressive but he was pushy and I had a struggle getting clear of him. He gave up when it was clear he wasn’t getting anything from me. I think the boys in the van probably saved me, because with them there he couldn’t risk a scene.

Unbelievable though it sounds, we were expected to protect a man’s feelings at all costs when fending off unwanted attention, so I felt I had to be “nice” about it. I’d have something very different to say now.

I didn’t report because I was in magaluf. That’s where everyone goes for sex, right? Except I was a virgin and my drink was spiked I didn’t consent to being vaginally and anally raped for 4 hours at 18 years old but how could I ever prove I didn’t?

Oh goodness this thread is heartbreaking. So many women, so much violence and violstion It’s sickening.

I didn’t report because I knew it would be my word against his. And I invited him to my room for a coffee. It was the 80s. It still haunts me.