I’ve known for a long time that victims of abuse or bullying
are often not believed. I was a victim of both myself. When my mother learned that
her second husband had sexually abused me and one of my brothers, not only
did she believe us, she reassured us that it wasn’t our fault. For that, I will
be forever grateful.
However, there were times in my life when I was the victim
of bullying, but no one believed me when it was reported. The first incident
was pretty minor. I was in the third grade. We’d gone outside for recess and at
the end of it had lined up to wait for our teacher to lead us back to the
classroom. As we were waiting, I saw a nice rock and picked it up. Another girl
in my class, Nancy, saw the rock in my hand. She told me that we weren’t
supposed to throw rocks. I told her that I wasn’t going to throw it; that I
wanted to keep it. She then slapped my hand forcing me to drop the rock. When we got back to class, both of us got a
sheet of scrap paper and wrote down what happened for the teacher. She read
both stories and then sent me to the principal’s office. When I got there, I didn’t bother to defend
myself. If my teacher didn’t believe me, why would I think he might?
The second incident happened when I was in the sixth grade.
I was walking along a path in the schoolyard after school. It was later than
usual, so it was just me. As I was walking down the path, I heard a noise and
looked up. A couple of boys were up above me on the path. I didn’t think
anything of it at first, until they started throwing rocks at me. I turned and
ran. Unfortunately, one of the rocks hit me in the temple cutting me. I then
turned and ran to the school office to get help. The secretary took care of me
and then called my mother. At the time, I didn’t know either boy’s name, so was
unable to tell her who had thrown the rocks. A few days later I was in the
office for another reason when I saw a picture of one of the boys on the school
secretary’s desk. I said, “Miss Letty, that’s one of the boys who chased me and
threw rocks at me!”
She said, “Who Keith? He’s a nice boy. He wouldn’t do that.”
I was so surprised and disappointed.
The worst one though was when a neighborhood boy threatened to beat me with a baseball bat if I talked to his mother about something else he'd done earlier in the day. When I finally did get to talk to her, she told me that "Boys would be boys."
In other words, she didn't take his threat to me seriously. That really bothered me, but I couldn't do anything more. Years later that "boy" would be in and out of jail several times.
My point with all this is that when victims aren’t believed or taken seriously,
the damage is multiplied. They’re taught that there’s no reason to speak as no
one will believe them anyway. This also leaves the victim feeling like s/he
must have done something wrong to bring this on. That somehow it’s the victim’s
fault. This just makes it easier for someone else to victimize or hurt that person.
These incidents are minor compared to what a lot of women go
through. It never ceases to amaze me the things men are allowed to get away
with because they’re men and they "can’t control themselves." I call Bullshit on
that idea. Men can be taught to respect women. Men can be taught that women are
worthy of respect. That women are not simply sexual objects put here on earth
to satisfy their every whim.
The worst part is and always has been to me, the fact that
men can run around shirtless and no one says a thing. If a woman, on the other
hand, so much as exposes a bit of cleavage, or nurses a baby in public, she’s
considered a slut or an exhibitionist. If women wear clothing that could be
considered the least bit provocative, she’s giving “permission” for any man to
fondle her if he gets close enough. We as a society blame women for the way men
behave. We don’t seem to realize that men have a responsibility to control
their actions. That they don’t have the right to fondle any woman, regardless
of how she’s dressed.
In closing, I have included links to other blogs about victim
blaming. One is simply a history of that woman’s encounters with violence and
how it affected her. The other is about a young woman who was literally put
into foster care for rebelling against her mother’s religion, after being
called a liar for speaking up when an elder in that religion abused her. You
may need to copy and paste the links into your browser.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/happened-mom-dumped-foster-care-160000998.html
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