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Rape Culture

No one knows what they would have done in my shoes, or anyone else's shoes for that matter, because they weren't in my shoes.
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When I was 19, incredibly drunk and wanting to go home, I trusted a guy I worked with to give me a ride. I didn't expect that he would drive me back to his apartment. In fact, I don't even remember getting out of his car and into his apartment.

In retrospect, should I have gone with him? No, probably not. Should I have drank in excess? No, especially not at 19. Should I have demanded he take me home as soon as I saw that his apartment clearly wasn't my home? Yeah, most likely. But that's not what happened.

When I was 21, at a party, intoxicated, passing out in an upstairs bedroom should I have locked the door? Yeah. Should I have told my friends where I was going? Yeah. But I didn't.

We can't "should" all over ourselves. There's nothing I can do to change what happened but I sure as hell can fight to change the future.

Why is it always the woman's responsibility to make sure the men don't lose control? It's not. It never has been and it never should be. Men are responsible for their actions and if they just so happen to get caught, well, fuck them.

When I see stories of teenage girls being told to cover their shoulders because, "It will cause the boys hormones to flare up" I want to scream! It's not their fault teenage boys can't control themselves. Teach them how to control themselves!

I was so angry when Paul Ryan enforced a dress code that applied basically ONLY to women. Dress codes are a microcosm of a greater issue that no one in leadership wants to address. RAPE CULTURE
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When I walk down the street and get whistled at? Rape Culture
When a man honks his horn at me and expects me to run away with him? Rape Culture
When a man rubs himself against me on the subway? Rape Culture
When a man touches my leg on the subway? Rape Culture
When a female boss tells me that my skirt is too short and she doesn't want men to see me "that way"? Rape Culture
When a female colleague tells me my high heeled boots are "better suited for a Friday night"? Rape Culture
When I have lunch with an executive that happens to be male and the females all assume we are sleeping together? Rape Culture
When the President's son says that women should leave the workplace if they don't like how the men talk? Rape Culture

I could go on and on, you get the point. We are so far down the rabbit hole of rape culture that discrimination against the most marginalized minority group in America gets swept under the rug. That's right, women.

I'm sick of it, frankly. I'm sick of the men that do it and the women that enable it. I'm sick of the wives that stay quiet when they know their husbands are out there doing the things they are being accused of.

MeToo has helped to shine a light on the problem but there are so many layers it's nearly impossible to fathom.

It's a culture, and culture is hard to change without changing the people. So what do we do?

We start to fix the problem where it begins.

When kids are small, we teach them to ask permission for things. We teach them manners, say "please" and "thank you". We teach them not to expect things.

When they go to school, we teach them to be kind no matter what. We teach them that not everyone has a daddy that lives in a dark tower in Manhattan with thousands of connections. We teach them that we should all work hard to be better people even if we just so happen to have monetary wealth. (Look at JK Rowling, she gave so much of her earnings away she lost her billionaire status, umm, hero!)

When they go to college, we remind them of what we taught them when they were small. Ask permission, don't take what's not yours. If a woman is drunk or passed out, help her to get home, don't rape her.

Looking back at the movies of the 80's they perpetuate Rape Culture in a way that I hadn't realized when I was growing up. Risky Business is about a teenager that loses his virginity to a prostitute when his parents go away and then to pay for her services he turns his parents house into a brothel and somehow hilarity ensues. Gross.

It's not easy to change something that seems so innate in our culture. Especially when you add in all of the other issues of our times. The fact that there are white men in our country that think they "built this country" so they can "take it back from the minorities" is a major problem. The fact that Donald Trump was somehow elected president and is clearly a white supremacist that hates women is a major problem. The fact that the checks and balances that are supposed to protect our democracy are failing to cater to the ego of a white supremacist is a major problem.

Help make the changes. If we all work to change we can see change but we have to start. I had a professor that told me real change comes from the bottom. We create our own circles of excellence and we can impact lasting change at the top. Let's do it.

Tell me one way you plan to help change our culture and then do it.

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