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Alcohol doesn't cause sexual assault; it's used as a weapon or an excuse in 50% of assaults. Studies show that hypermasculinity and belief in rigid gender norms cause aggressive behavior, not alcohol.
I wrote about this in WaPo in 2016 (ignore the title) https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/06/10/alcohol-isnt-what-causes-campus-sexual-assault-men-are/
I wrote about this in WaPo in 2016 (ignore the title) https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/06/10/alcohol-isnt-what-causes-campus-sexual-assault-men-are/
From 2011-2013, I was in an abusive relationship with an alcoholic. He convinced me that he needed me to help him stop drinking, and that if he could stop drinking, then he would also stop abusing me.
I thought that addressing the alcoholism would make our relationship safe.
I thought that addressing the alcoholism would make our relationship safe.
I went to Al Anon meetings to support him. I bought books and watched videos about coping with someone else’s alcoholism. I thought we were in it together.
At one point, I drew a thermometer and put it up on the wall. For every day he didn't drink, he'd get a point. If he could go out without me and not drink, 1.5 points. Enough points, and he'd get things he wanted. If we colored in the full thermometer, I'd let him move back in.
But he wasn’t going to stop drinking. He was doing everything he had to do to manipulate me into believing things were going to get better, to manipulate me into staying in a relationship that wasn't safe.
I listened to the most recent Hella Black Podcast, and I was horrified. Not all sex under the influence is rape, they know that. Delency violated consent, he knows that. To claim that he experienced rape simultaneously is gaslighting the survivor. He knows that, too. DARVO 101.
Alcohol doesn't cause abuse or assault; it's often used as a weapon to facilitate assault, or as an excuse for aggressive behavior. Learning that - and studies are linked in the article - is what helped me get safe.
I didn’t have a lot of tools to respond to abuse back then. When trying to help him heal wasn’t working, I did what I knew how to do: I fought back. I got arrested for defending myself with a knife, and the arrest deepened my sense of self blame.
The state became a second abuser
The state became a second abuser
Now, today, I have many more tools for responding. I have a bigger community now, too. As a survivor of patriarchal & state violence, I reject the assertion that it is “carceral” for survivors to write letters about our feelings and experiences.
Instead of shaming and blaming survivors for using the tools at our disposal to keep ourselves and each other safe without the state, I hope that we can move toward building communities — and especially organizing communities — that don’t tolerate abuse & support survivors.
