Sexual Violence Quotes

“It is not a single crime when a child is photographed while sexually assaulted (raped.) It is a life time crime that should have life time punishments attached to it. If the surviving child is, more often than not, going to suffer for life for the crime(s) committed against them, shouldn't the pedophiles suffer just as long? If it often takes decades for survivors to come to terms with exactly how much damage was caused to them, why are there time limits for prosecution?”
― Sierra D. Waters, Debbie.

“Most women are all too familiar with men like Calvin Smith. Men whose sense of prerogative renders them deaf when women say, "No thanks," "Not interested," or even "Fuck off, creep.”
― Jon Krakauer, Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town

“But too often men react to women in positions of power with misogyny, often in sexualized terms. I have heard men in such situations talk about how "I'd like to fuck that bitch and teach her a lesson," for example. That kind of reaction demonstrates that no matter what the class position of a man and woman, men can use the weapon of sexualized violence to attempt to assert their dominance.”
― Robert Jensen

“When there is inconsistency in belief and action (such as being violated by someone who is supposed to love you) our mind has to make an adjustment so that thought and action are aligned. So sometimes the adjustment that the mind makes is for the victim to bring her or his behavior in line with the violator, since the violator cannot be controlled by the victim. Our greatest source of survival is to adapt to our environment. So increasing emotional intimacy with a person who is forcing physical intimacy makes sense in our minds. It resolves cognitive dissonance.”
― Rosenna Bakari, Tree Leaves: Breaking The Fall Of The Loud Silence

“Why Is It So Important to Remember?

When you were abused, those around you acted as if it weren’t happening. Since no one else acknowledged the abuse, you sometimes felt that it wasn’t real. Because of this you felt confused. You couldn’t trust your own experience and perceptions. Moreover, others’ denial led you to suppress your memories, thus further obscuring the issue.

You can end your own denial by remembering. Allowing yourself to remember is a way of confirming in your own mind that you didn’t just imagine it. Because the person who abused you did not acknowledge your pain, you may have also thought that perhaps it wasn’t as bad as you felt it was. In order to acknowledge to yourself that it really was that bad, you need to remember as much detail as possible. Because by denying what happened to you, you are doing to yourself exactly what others have done to you in the past: You are negating and denying yourself.”
― Beverly Engel, The Right to Innocence: Healing the Trauma of Childhood Sexual Abuse: A Therapeutic 7-Step Self-Help Program for Men and Women, Including How to Choose a Therapist and Find a Support Group

“If telling men "don't rape" instead of telling women "don't get raped", is like telling thieves "don't steal" instead of home owners to "lock your houses", why don't we hear more victims of home invasion being told "you got what you deserved for having such a beautiful house on display for everyone to see" ???”
― Miya Yamanouchi , Embrace Your Sexual Self: A Practical Guide for Women

“The story of my birth that my mother told me went like this: "When you were coming out I wasn't ready yet and neither was the nurse. The nurse tried to push you back in, but I shit on the table and when you came out, you landed in my shit."

If there ever was a way to sum things up, the story of my birth was it.”
― Sierra D. Waters, Debbie.

“Everyone heals in their own time and in their own way. The path isn't always a straight line, and you don't need to go it alone.”
― Zeke Thomas

“John was still making comments regarding violent things that he shouldn't, but I hoped he was just being a big mouth. Nobody was going to listen to me anyway.”
― Sierra D. Waters, Debbie.

“The reactionary of any kind condemns sexual pleasure because it stimulates and repulses him at the same time. He is unable to solve the conflict within him between sexual demands and moralistic inhibitions. The revolutionary refutes the perverse, unhealthy kind of pleasure, because it is not his kind of pleasure, because it is not the sexuality of the future, but the sexuality which results from the conflict between instinct and morals, the sexuality of authoritarian society, a debased, smutty, pathological sexuality.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism

“The assumption of choice leads to the conclusion of consent, but choice and consent are erroneous concepts here. Their invalidity rests on the fact that a woman’s compliance in prostitution is a response to circumstances beyond her control, and this produces an environment which prohibits even the possibility of true consent. There is a difference between consent and reluctant submission. As a lawyer and scholar Catharine Mackinnon says ‘…when fear and despair produce acquiescence and acquiescence is taken to mean consent, consent is not a meaningful concept’.”
― Rachel Moran, Paid For: My Journey Through Prostitution

“To clarify the dilemma women have about sexual enthusiasm for men, it is helpful to contrast it with men's situation. It is unlikely in the extreme that men will have experienced actual sexual violence from women or its threat. Men do not live in cultures where the degradation and brutalisation of men at the hands of women is the stuff of pornography, entertainment and advertising. Men do not live with the consciousness that they are being hunted by women who would take sexual delight in dismembering them simply on account of their gender. They do not live in a society in which their degradation through sex is the dominant theme of the culture. They do not have to approach women sexually in fear or with distressing images or associations with their own oppression. The images they are likely to carry with them are those of women degraded and brutalised by men. In fact they are likely to have practised sexual arousal with such images, extensively, through pornography and fantasy. It is not surprising, then, that sexologists have identified women's 'inhibition' as the main sexual problem of this century. They have identified as healthy sexual feelings those which the male ruling class experiences and have chosen to avoid recognising the political reasons why women might feel differently.”
― Sheila Jeffreys, Anticlimax: A Feminist Perspective on the Sexual Revolution

“Are you gay, Cherie?
Me, No… I’m not anything… I-I mean I prefer not to indulge, I stammered.
“Really... how do you mean?”
Well love has been an elusive story, like a fairytale adults tell children but I have never known any of it to be true. In reality it reminds me of religion. I am not sure God is real either, if God is real why do so many innocents suffer?
Innocents suffer because it is their destiny to suffer.
What? What does that mean?” I’m annoyed.
God has nothing to do with it. We are born into this world to experience all that is not God-like, so we can then be inspired to reach for higher spiritual goals.
I have never thought of it that way before. If that is so then I must be preparing for sainthood. Am I to think that all of my suffering as a child has been to prepare me for greatness?”
― Darwun St James, Angel Sins

“For many abusive men, pornography has shaped their sexuality since they were teenagers or even younger. It has helped to form their view of what women are like and what they ought to be. When a graduate of what I call "The Pornography School of Sexuality" discovers, for example, that his partner does not find a slap in the face arousing, he thinks that's evidence of something sexually wrong with her.”
― Lundy Bancroft, Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men

“Self respect by definition is a confidence and pride in knowing that your behaviour is both honorable and dignified. -Respect yourself by respecting others.”
― Miya Yamanouchi, Embrace Your Sexual Self: A Practical Guide for Women

“I can line up these moments of violence, precariously as dominoes. Sometimes I worry they will all fall; knocking each other down, knocking me down. Sometimes they do. Violence left me hollow. It left me enraged. It left me desperately needing to leave a body I couldn't trust. But most frustrating of all, violence left me too wounded to claim the space I needed in order to find fulfillment in the arms, heart, and body of a queer relationship.”
― Jennifer Patterson, Queering Sexual Violence: Radical Voices from Within the Anti-Violence Movement

“When we’re talking about race or religion or politics, it is often said we need to speak carefully. These are difficult topics where we need to be vigilant not only in what we say but also in how we express ourselves. That same care must extend to how we write about violence and sexual violence in particular.”
― Roxane Gay, Bad Feminist

“We hit every jazz and blues club on and off Bourbon Street, dancing and drinking until we girls were drunk enough to go with the boys to the strip clubs which outnumbered all other businesses in the French Quarter. Here is where my solution unfolded.”
― Darwun St James, Angel Sins

“Sexual violence is a difficult topic to think about and even harder to deal with. I understand that a wide range of emotions may have been ignited while reading this book, so I ask you to take care of yourself. Always remember to take care of yourself no matter what, and never stop doing the things you love that bring peace and joy to your life. Whether it is music, art, exercise, cooking, reading, sports, prayer, nature, or any of the other amazing gifts life has to offer: Embrace them. Do what you love to do, embrace all the beauty that exists within yourself and the world around you, and take care of yourself. And of course, reach out to someone if you need help. Talk to a family member or friend, find the right therapist, or seek out a religious or spiritual guide if needed. Life is very difficult to go through it alone, so please talk to someone you love and trust, and one who always has your best interest at heart.”
― Robert Uttaro

“He was about to cross a point of no return. The place separating him from the imaginary line in the sand. The one society demanded no one cross. He crossed the point on many occasions. This would be different. This could land him in prison or the electric chair. The prospect filled him with sexual energy he normally lacked”
― Jaime Allison Parker, Justice of the Fox

“How many rapes occurred inside the walls of the main camp of Ravensbrück is hard to put a figure to: so many of the victims—already, as Ilse Heinrich said, half dead—did not survive long enough after the war to talk about it.

While many older Soviet women were reluctant to talk of the rape, younger survivors feel less restraint today. Nadia Vasilyeva was one of the Red Army nurses who were cornered by the Germans on the cliffs of the Crimea. Three years later in Neustrelitz, northwest of Ravensbrück, she and scores of other Red Army women were cornered again, this time by their own Soviet liberators intent on mass rape. Other women make no excuses for the Soviet rapists. ‘They were demanding payment for liberation,’ said Ilena Barsukova. ‘The Germans never raped the prisoners because we were Russian swine, but our own soldiers raped us. We were disgusted that they behaved like this. Stalin had said that no soldiers should be taken prisoner, so they felt they could treat us like dirt.’

Like the Russians, Polish survivors were also reluctant for many years to talk of Red Army rape. ‘We were terrified by our Russian liberators,’ said Krystyna Zając. ‘But we could not talk about it later because of the communists who had by then taken over in Poland.’ Nevertheless, Poles, Yugoslavs, Czechs and French survivors all left accounts of being raped as soon as they reached the Soviet lines. They talked of being ‘hunted down’, ‘captured’ or ‘cornered’ and then raped.

In her memoirs Wanda Wojtasik, one of the rabbits, says it was impossible to encounter a single Russian without being raped. As she, Krysia and their Lublin friends tried to head east towards their home, they were attacked at every turn. Sometimes the approach would begin with romantic overtures from ‘handsome men’, but these approaches soon degenerated into harassment and then rape. Wanda did not say she was raped herself, but describes episodes where soldiers pounced on friends, or attacked them in houses where they sheltered, or dragged women off behind trees, who then reappeared sobbing and screaming. ‘After a while we never accepted lifts and didn’t dare go near any villages, and when we slept someone always stood watch.”
― Sarah Helm, Ravensbruck: Life and Death in Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women

“The Farmer’s Almanac promised a cold winter. The coldest in decades. Andrew grinned, unaware of how hideously ugly it made him. Let the winter be record breaking. The year would be marked in infamy and not for the weather alone. He could imagine the headlines, mentioning it as the winter of death, as his spree was just beginning. It would put the town on the map.”
― Jaime Allison Parker, Justice of the Fox

“Terror - manchmal offen ausgedrückt, doch meistens stillschweigend erkannt - schleicht sich in die Leben von Menschen ein, oft durch etwas "Gewusstes", aber nie Geäußertes. Auf solche Weise wird Terror von der Mutter an die Tochter vererbt Viele Mütter, die in der Innenstadt leben, warten in Sorge auf ihrer Töchter, die auf ihrem Heimweg von der Schule durch Straßen gehen müssen, wo Zuhälter herumlungern. Eltern, die in Vororten wohnen, warten vor der Schule oder an Bushaltestellen, um sicherzugehen, dass ihren Kindern auf dem Heimweg nichts passiert. Und Mütter erklären ihren Teenagertöchtern, warum sie nachts lieber nicht ausgehen sollen, obgleich ihre Brüder es tun. Sexueller Terrorismus ist für Frauen etwas geworden, womit sie leben müssen.”
― Kathleen Barry, Female Sexual Slavery

“Im Jahr 1970 noch protestierten Feministinnen gegen die Vergegenständlichung von Frauen in mondänen pornographischen Männermagazinen wir dem Playboy. Jetzt konzentriert sich der organisierte Protest gegen die Verwendung von Kindern und die Porträtierung von Gewalt in der Pornographie. Die Forderung, Frauen nicht als Sexualobjekte darzustellen, wird als übertrieben und hysterisch abgetan. Eine Toleranz wird geschaffen, wenn eine Stufe von Missbrauch (z.B. sexuelle Vergegenständlichung) in Anbetracht höherer Stufen der Vergegenständlichung und schwerwiegenderer Formen von Gewalt gerechtfertigt wird”
― Kathleen Barry, Female Sexual Slavery

“It's easy not to abuse your power when you don't actually have any power.”
― Oliver Markus Malloy, Inside The Mind of an Introvert: Comics, Deep Thoughts and Quotable Quotes

“Sie sind überall in diesen Straßen, nehmen was sie wollen; zweihundert Millionen kleine Henry Millers mit steifen Schwänzen und einem miesen Prosastil; Pulitzerpreisträger-Arschlöcher,die Bargeld benutzen. Auf der Suche nach Erfahrung, und die nennen sie hinterher Möse, wenn sie in ihre gestylten Apartments zurückkommen und sich zu rechtfertigen versuchen. Die Erfahrung sind wir, die, in die sie ihn stecken. Erfahrung ist, wenn sie das Geld hinlegen, dann drehen sie dich um, als wärst du ein Hähnchen, das sie grillen; sie stecken ihn in jedes Loch, das sie finden können, nur um es auszuprobieren, oder weil sie sturzbetrunken sind und es nicht rot angemalt ist, können sie es nicht finden; du wirst zu einer Labormaus für sie; sie stecken den berühmten Stählernen Prügel in jedes Fleischerne Loch, das sie finden können, und sie rammen den Prügel hinein, wenn sie es schaffen, was Gott sei Dank oft genug nicht der Fall ist. Die Prosa wird dann richtig purpurn. Du kannst es allerdings nicht auf Impotenz zurückführen, weil sie aufs Kreuz gelegt wurden, und sie hatten Frauen, und sie fickten jede Menge; sie scheinen einfach nie über das Wunder hinwegzukommen, dass sie es sind, im Körper eines erwachsenen Mannes, die all den Schaden anrichten; Guck mal, Mammi, ich bins. Zwölfter Band. SIe benehmen sich nicht wie menschliche Wesen und sind ziemlich stolz darauf, deshalb hat es keinen Sinn, so zu tun, als seien sie doch welche; obwohl du es gerne möchtest - so tun als ob. Du würdest gerne glauben, dass sie etwas fühlen können - Traurigkeit oder Reue; oder etwas ganz Schlichtes, eine Minute des Begreifens.”
― Andrea Dworkin, Mercy

“Es ist wie eine mathematische Gleichung, aber niemand lernt sie in der Schule auswendig; sie wird nicht deutlich auf die Tafel geschrieben. Es ist Algebra für Mädchen, aber niemand bringt sie dir bei. Du wirst zu Fall gebracht oder niedergeworfen, und du lernst selber. Keine Mutter der Welt kann es ertragen, es dir zu erklären.”
― Andrea Dworkin, Mercy

“Ich erfinde keine Geschichten. Ich schreibe eine andere Sorte Geschichten. Ich schreibe so wahrhaftig wie der Mann mit seinen Fingern, wenn ich nur alles behalten und sagen kann; aber ich bin nicht auf seiner Seite. Ich bin auf einer anderen Seite. Ich sage die Wahrheit, aber aus einer anderen Sicht. Ich bin diejenige, der er es angetan hat. Der Köder spricht, Süßer.”
― Andrea Dworkin, Mercy

“The beating soon had Laurelene nearly senseless. The carbineer began to tear away her hempcloth robe and when she tried to crawl away he dragged her back and punched her face until she lay unresisting, her legs bare and apart. He's done this before, so this is what it's like to be violated, she thought as he settled down on top of her with a long, shuddering sigh. Anything, anything, just no more beating, she thought, her eyes closed.”
― Sean McMullen, The Miocene Arrow

“Despite this inundation of rape imagery, where we are immersed in a rape culture—one that is overly permissive toward all manner of sexual violence—not enough victims of gang rape speak out about the toll the experience exacts. The right stories are not being told, or we’re not writing enough about the topic of rape in the right ways. Perhaps we too casually use the term “rape culture” to address the very specific problems that rise from a culture mired in sexual violence. Should we, instead, focus on “rapist culture” because decades of addressing “rape culture” has accomplished so little?”
― Roxane Gay, Bad Feminist