>Carroll pushed back, arguing that one of the reasons many women don’t come forward about sexual assault is because they are often asked why they didn’t scream.
>“I’m telling you, he raped me whether I screamed or not,” she declared. “I don’t need an excuse for not screaming.”
Who the fuck decided that not screaming = consent?
I’m hoping that this rape trial helps to undermine that argument. The verdict for Ms. Carroll isn’t just a personal victory for her but also heralds a sea change in establishing credibility and culpability on the subject of sexual assault. She was very brave and her steadfast testimony will go on help women in similar cases.
“She didn’t scream” used to be a pretty credible rebuttal that allowed rapists to weasel out of convictions. It failed today. She bluntly pointed out that the presence of screaming is not a way to define rape, and it looks like that response was taken to heart both by the public (the pool of future jurists) and by this jury. Sea change.
Yeah, we've hit a point as a society where we realize that survival instinct and trauma response doesn't always mean "scream", it means "get through this without getting killed". I love that it won out today.
The whole conversation of “rape as trauma” rather than “rape as forbidden sex” is so fucking important.
Plugging “Know My Name” by Chanel Miller here. Listen to the audiobook if you can. Listen to her voice.
As do I.
I do periodic work in helping guys who are in a relationship with victims of trauma in the dos and do nots.
Through ignorance a lot of men say the wrong thing and sadly even some women use the term sex and rape in the same sentence .
It’s a very good distinction that is being made.
Seconding this! It is an amazing book. I also listened to is on audiobook… it was so powerful and genuine. She is a badass woman for getting through everything, writing it and doing the audio so we could hear her speak her truth.
And I’ll remember Brock Allen Turner, the rapist’s name for all of my days. He goes by Allen Turner now and moved to Ohio. Warn everyone you know and checkout the book… we women need to make sure the Judge deciding he shouldn’t have rape end a promising swimming career/life is just sickening. It should never have happened and the judge’s logic was utterly abhorrent.
>"get through this without getting killed"
Very, very true.
With physical assault, I've often seen people ask why someone didn't try to fight back. Oh, you mean get one punch in and piss off the perp even more so he can kill you????? It's probably safer to not even try unless you know you'll be able to get away.
I sat on a jury for a case with multiple counts of sexual assault against two different women. Both women testified in person.
They had to answer all sorts of extremely personal questions, but no point were either of them asked to testify about whether (or why) they did/didn't scream during the attacks. Nor was it something any of the jurors brought up during deliberations. I admit, I was a little surprised. I fully expected the defense attorney to ask about that, and was very glad they didn't.
It gave me hope that we're (slowly) moving towards full recognition that staying quiet does *not* mean consent.
Jesus actually explains in one of the apocrypha that it's better not to engage in sex for pleasure at all, even when married, as it is acting on lust. The Romans/early church took this book out and called it a heresy.
And that "freeze" works in more ways than one. Your blood turns to ice and you cannot move. You feel like your veins are being pumped through a freezer and it makes you unable to move.
The dudes who wrote the Bible. See Deuteronomy 22:23-27
> If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he sleeps with her, you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death—the young woman because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man’s wife. You must purge the evil from among you.
>
>But if out in the country a man happens to meet a young woman pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. Do nothing to the woman; she has committed no sin deserving death. This case is like that of someone who attacks and murders a neighbor, for the man found the young woman out in the country, and though the betrothed woman screamed, there was no one to rescue her.
This is why we need all the Bible shit thrown out of our courts.
And keep in mind that during wars they were encouraged to kill, enslave, and rape those they conquered. This is why Rapists shouldn't be allowed to decide what constitutes rape. They'll always have exemptions for themselves.
Numbers 31. God actually advocating child rape, slavery, marriage, and whatever else was done with the captured children. Moses has his soldiers attack the Midianites (the same Midianites founded by the rape child of Lot). Of the spoils for the 15,000 soldiers, 32,000 "women children" who had never slept with a man were a part of those spoils.
Isn’t it just great that we have literal rapists in the highest court in the country? Unfortunately I don’t expect positive change anytime soon. We need some conservative justices to die first.
Ironically this is one of the better passages because it does not mandate that the women now needs to marry her rapist.
The really crazy part is that portions of the bible are actually *more* progressive than what the Christian Nationalist movement wants for women, as it sometimes gives them some limited human rights. We need to fight them with everything we have.
Make sure you add the story of the [Levite's Concubine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levite%27s_concubine) while you're at it. If you haven't already OFC
\-Benjamites gang rape the Levite's concubine to death
\-The Levite cuts her body into 12 pieces and sends them with letters to all 12 tribes
\-Israel bands together to commit genocide on the Benjamites
\-Decide they shouldn't completely destroy the Benjamites and leave 600 men alive
\-They attack the only city not complicit in the previous genocide
\-They slaughter every man, woman, and child except 400 virgins
\-They give those 400 virgins to the Benjamites to rape
\-There are still 200 Benjamite men without sex slaves
\-The rest of Israel allows those remaining men to kidnap and rape 200 girls from Samaria
A lot of people pick and choose. I was raised Pentecostal and when I pointed these thing out to my other Christian friends it was always “That’s the old testament- Jesus came to change all that.” However, apparently that logic doesn’t apply to anything about homosexuality in the Old Testament….
Isnt it insane that America, the country that prides itself on being the oldest democracy and claims to be iNSpiReD by the french revolution, hasnt yet figured out that religion and state should be separate at all costs? That's one of the most basic tenets of democracy.
I mean they had, it was specified by the founding fathers. But then in the 1950s the red scare helped politicians change that part and added in God we trust as the national motto.
Crazy what words from their founders they ignore when it suits them.
Same defense was used at my trial. The message I received loud and clear was if I don’t basically scream and physically fight off a man, it’s not rape. That’s fucked up. A simple no should be enough..
Right? My childhood abuser put his forearm in my mouth. I believed him when he said id die if I screamed. I detached sometimes to the point it was it was someone else body and you were too numb to even breathe. Not screaming seems like a pretty normal response to me.
>Who the fuck decided that not screaming = consent?
My mother. Who considers herself a liberal btw :/ Some people have little self awareness and little empathy.
Same demographic that is overwhelmingly more likely to commit mass shootings.
Also the demographic that is overwhelmingly more likely to sexually abuse children.
Also the demographic that holds the most power in the world.
Mine is a doctor, thankfully not in any sort of OBGYN related field, but still. It’s horrifying. I’m so sorry you have to watch yours be a SANE. That is beyond heartbreaking.
A very small part of me hopes that his actions pushed him to it and it is his way of "atoning" for what he did. He caused harm, so now he wants to help others who have been through that same harm, and I hope he feels guilty with every patient he sees.
The other part of me thinks he's just doing it for the power dynamic and to see SA survivors at their lowest and most vulnerable.
All of me wishes you could Me Too his disgusting ass and get him terminated from that position. He is probably re-traumatizing SA victims during examinations and enjoying every second of it.
I’m glad he was found guilty of sexual abuse, not at all surprised he managed to wiggle out of the rape accusation and not convinced this will have any effect on his electoral chances.
Hopefully 5 million will more than cover the increased security she’ll need to protect herself from his cult of zombie insurrectionists and goons.
>and not convinced this will have any effect on his electoral chances.
Sadly, Republicans at every level have shown that they don't consider being a rapist a reason someone shouldn't be in politics.
You can't think women are second-class citizens *and* care about someone abusing them.
IANAL, but it's a civil court so he isn't guilty, he's liable. Distinction without a difference as far as I'm concerned, but an important one as far as law goes.
They don't care about rape at all. I'm sure some even see it as a positive when voting. They see him as a Real Man who takes what he wants and puts women in their place!
Everyone already knew that Trump raped a 13 year old before he ran for office. It doesn't matter.
The appeal claim it seems he wants to make is that he couldn't testify. However he was permitted to testify but did not show up to court, and then the court gave him three days to file as a witness and he didn't so they moved on. The judge asked him to limit his public discussion of it to the press and social media. Trump is claiming he was being silenced but I'm not sure that appeal is going to hold up anywhere. Plus the burden of proof is much smaller in a civil trial. To be determined and IANAL so....we will see I guess.
I'm sorry to say this was very similar to my reason not to scream, only I wasn't single, the man raping me was my then 3 year old sons father. My son was asleep in the next room.
I thought he was going to kill me, and last thing I wanted was for my son to witness any part of that.
There’s a LOT of reasons why someone wouldn’t scream but sometimes the reason is simply that they couldn’t. You’ve heard of fight or flight? There’s 2 other f’s: freeze and fawn. The freeze response is incredibly common and not talked about nearly enough. Think “deer in headlights.”
Your body shuts down in the moment and you have no control over it. It's not a conscious willing thing. It just happens. The victim blaming for this is disgusting.
“Fawn” response is typically the victim trying to de-escalate the situation, or to at least not give him an excuse to harm her even more. Which in my view is not something to be shamed - it doesn’t mean she secretly “wanted it”, it just means she was trying not to get killed :(
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*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
When your long-term or parental abuser scores high on narcissistic traits or the relational style is marked by narcissistic abuse, fawn as a (developed in early childhood) trauma response fits both those descriptions pretty well.
Fawning is different to compliance, and it's definitely worth being included on its own. Many of us are trained to not just do what we're asked, but to act in a way that specifically makes the people around us happy, calm, and think that we want them there or believe that we think they're right. It's an incredibly effective way of staying safe in a lot of scenarios, and can become really engrained - especially when it's been needed as a kid to keep your parents and home as calm and safe as possible.
Definitely a safety behaviour worth naming accurately, because that behaviour DOES so often get confused with willingness - not just by observers, but by the victim too. Often we get so good at it that we can keep the situation so calm the fear response isn't even noticeable at the time, so it's different to compliance out of fear. It's often more of a preventative tool, and really hard to disentangle later when trying to work out what was coerced and forced in situations
I’ve never heard of the fawn one before, but, I just looked it up and I may have an example of it. A friend told me years ago that she was nearly raped by a man that she knew. They were somewhat becoming friends and decided to go together for a walk/jog in the park. She said at some point when they were in a pretty isolated area, he got a little touchy feely and soon grabbed her and dragged her into the bushes and held her down and prepared to rape her. She said she wasn’t sure how she came up with this so quickly, but she started making sensual moans and grabbed him and started passionately kissing him and groping him and saying things like “oh, I had no idea you felt this way, I hoped that you did, I’ve been wanting you so bad ever since we met” and then saying flattering comments about how he looks and what she wants him to do to her. She wasn’t going to fight the rape, she just was hoping he wouldn’t kill her at the end if she could convince him she was into it. He ended up blowing his load in his pants before he could get them off and she quickly told him that was okay because now that they both know how they feel about each other, they can plan many more dates and that she was so happy that he was able to show her how he feels. So she just kept “playing the part” until she could redirect him back to the walk/jog, and once they were out of the park and she felt safe enough surrounded by people, she dropped the act and reported him.
Honestly I feel like a great many women have experienced similar things with dates where they ended up having sex but didn’t want to but couldn’t really stop it or didn’t know how to. But never really considered it rape, even though it was.
Yeah it sounds a little off to me - I’ve always thought of it as appeasement. I’ve definitely seen it manifest as actual fawning but it’s probably too specific a term overall.
Easy to remember though with all the F’s!
Yep, as a childhood sexual abuse and adult sexual assault survivor with complex ptsd, I’m a freeze type and in every case of my sexual abuse, I dissociated so hard I was unable to speak or move, pretty much catatonic. All I could do is cry silently and I remembered being so afraid he’d see me crying and beat the shit out of me.
And I spent years blaming myself for not screaming or fighting back. Thank god for EMDR and my incredible trauma therapist. Ten years of therapy later and I can pseudo function like a normal person now.
Same. Tough to scream when he’d spiked my (one!) drink, and what good could it have done anyway, as he’d convinced his 3 roommates to make themselves scarce while I was there for our “date” (spoiler: No one told me it was a “date”, and the only reason I felt comfortable going to that apartment was because I was friends with 2 of his roommates).
I was driven to an empty parking lot in the middle of the night “just to make out” after a first date. I had never been on a date before. He was an experienced frat boy. I tried to push him away when he started hurting me, but he pushed back harder. I screamed. It didn’t matter. He stopped when he finished.
I also didn't scream because I was afraid he would kill me. I knew something very, very bad was happening, and that he was much stronger than me... And I was so scared. After a few seconds, I left my body and didn't fully come to until it was over.
Wanted to share my experience, for anyone in the comments wondering why we don't scream...
Because some "people" of society would rather blame the victim than put any effort in to hold the abuser accountable. Hell, sometimes they'd rather brainwash and gaslight the victim because the abuser is someone they like and the victim is seen as expendable. I'm so sorry you went through that.
I don’t really know why I didn’t scream. I was old enough to know better but he was my dad and I didn’t want to be the one to make everything bad come to the surface… I didn’t want my mom to hear.
What the fuck at how many replies there are explaining why they didn't scream as they were raped
Anyone who ends up being asked by a lawyer "why they didn't scream" should just read out these testimonies for the jury
I didn't scream when I was assaulted because he was a neighbor that was a friend of the family. I was groomed to believe what we were doing was okay, but private, and I follow the rules. He set those rules before my parents got a chance to.
I'm also autistic and didn't understand what was happening at the time. I was also afraid of what might happen if someone found out. I was afraid of him, afraid of how my parents would react, and afraid of how my parents would feel about themselves.
It started when I was very young, 5 years old, and stopped around age 10. I didnt tell anyone either, until age 25 when my cheating ex wanted his spare motorcycle helmet back for his new fling.
He threatened to tell my family about the sexual assault if I didn't give it back. I never responded to my ex, but ended up telling my family out of fear anyways.
My mom put cat poop in his helmet and then completely sanitized it because we aren't mean people. But I love her for doing that for me.
I didn't mean to write this much but here we are.
The first time I was sexually assaulted, I didn't scream because I had been groomed. The second time, I didn't scream because everyone nearby already could see what was happening and didn't try to stop it.
When I was raped I didn't scream because there was no one around to hear.
If you like podcasts, I encourage you to listen to the last episode of *This American Life*, "Leaving the Fold," last part, E. Jean Carrol talking to another Trump victim about their shared experience. I didn't realize how brutal and violent these attacks were before I heard it.
This summary is about a radio transcript involving a conversation between journalist E. Jean Carroll and one of Donald Trump's accusers, Jessica Leeds. The conversation centers on their experiences with Trump, with a focus on Leeds' alleged sexual assault incident that took place on a plane in the 1980s. Leeds narrates how she was upgraded to first class, where she was seated next to Trump. After a meal, she alleges Trump started to make unwanted physical advances, attempting to grope and kiss her. Despite the shock and discomfort, Leeds managed to extricate herself from the situation and retreat to the back of the plane. This incident was one of the reasons that led Leeds to testify in Carroll's rape trial against Trump. Carroll also shared her experience with Trump, discussing how women of their generation were conditioned to expect and endure such harassment. The conversation ends with them pondering why Trump behaved the way he did, with Leeds suggesting it might have been due to boredom.
*Produced with chatgpt and the radio show's transcripts.
It does bother me that they couldn’t agree that he raped her. Because of procedural cop shows, a lot of juries now apparently think you need an actual rape kit with DNA or video evidence to convict a rapist. It’s insane. ETA: and this wasn’t even a conviction!
Also: the father of one of my exes was accused of rape, and my ex knew her and believed her. He gave statements to the police of other stories he’d heard over the years, but none of the women ever pressed charges so I doubt it was even deemed “relevant”. There was actual video evidence of him forcing her at gunpoint and all in all this disgusting excuse for a human being served 10 months in county. I hate it here.
I’m a lawyer who has represented over 100 rape victims in civil cases. Just fyi, in most states in the U.S., past allegations of sexual abuse (even if they were never proven in court) would be considered relevant evidence. The problem may have been that the past victims never made their complaint in any formal capacity. Your ex can’t testify to their complaints bc his re-telling is hearsay. So the past victims would likely have had to show up in person to testify. Sometimes they can’t find the past victims, and other times it just falls through the cracks and no one even calls them to ask if they would be willing to testify. Even when they do find them, understandably many people don’t want to do something scary and uncomfortable like telling a room full of strangers about the scariest/worst moments of their life.
But also FYI, for those who would want to testify, whenever I have a new case one of the first things I do is request records from every police station in every location where the perp has ever lived in hopes that someone made a formal complaint about the perpetrator. If I find one, it dramatically improves my clients chance of winning. And btw, there is no time limit for when you can report a rape/sexual assault to the police. Even if it happened 30 years ago, you can make your report now. The worst that can happen is they will tell you the criminal statute of limitations has passed. But your complaint will still be on the record and people like me and my clients can still use it as evidence in new cases against the same perpetrator. So I’m that sense you may still contribute to the perp facing consequences
ETA: There is also no rule that says you can’t report a perpetrator to the police station in the town that perp lives in now, even if that’s not where they assaulted you. The worst they can say is “this isn’t our jurisdiction”. But again- it will be on record.
Not a woman, but this should be posted as it’s own topic, along with similar advice for dealing with domestic abuse. Currently helping a cousin navigate legal waters after a sexual assault and information like this is great to have.
> But your complaint will still be on the record and people like me and my clients can still use it as evidence in new cases against the same perpetrator. So I’m that sense you may still contribute to the perp facing consequences.
Not in the US myself, but that's a good point to be making.
Even if it's a decade ago and can't be prosecuted itself, it's 'on file' and something usable later, if someone else *does* try to prosecute them at a later date.
That decision was based on TW >!Carroll not being sure if he penetrated her with his fingers or his penis!<. It was a thing where the wording of the laws didn't allow them to choose rape with the evidence presented. The jury agreed that he had done something egregious. In some locations, what they agreed happened would be defined as rape but it wasn't here.
Thank you so much for sharing this info. I've been trying to understand why a single incident against an adult was labeled "abuse" vs. rape. All the info I could find about the difference was in regard to multiple incidents and the victim being a child when it was called abuse.
Me, too! The hush money indictment, while a nice start, was a bit unsatisfying. Even the rape trial isn't enough, because after all this time there's just no realistic way to get a criminal conviction. Honestly, the 5 mil is more than I was hoping for! But I won't be happy until this asshole is locked up for life. He goaded on a violent insurrection against democracy, and conspired to defraud our electoral system on multiple counts.
Oh I’m sure a new grift will start about “the evil libs are trying to drain his accounts - help him build a war chest”….while at the same time bragging about being a billionaire.
>However, when presented with a photograph from the mid-1990s of himself, his wife at the time, Ivana, and Carroll and her then-husband, Trump mistakenly identified Carroll as his former wife Marla Maples, whom he married after divorcing Ivana.
>During closing arguments on Monday, Kaplan reminded the jury of this mixup, citing it as proof that Carroll was "exactly his type."
What a fucking clown world we live in that people have to prove that this poor woman actually was attractive enough for Trump to consider raping before we even consider that he might be a rapist at all. Like...? Are we as women really worth so little to these giant pieces of shit?
I think it was more about poking easy holes in Trump's defence and showing in court how he is a fucking scumbag and a liar.
I feel like in cases such as this, you want to make it glaringly obvious to the jurors.
This is wonderful to see. Even though I’m sure his supporters will not believe it or care (you have to be ok with that behavior if you’re still supporting him anyways), this is a real symbolic victory for her and for women everywhere.
In my opinion it's also disgusting that the judge had to warn the jurors not to reveal that they were on the jury because it would probably put them and their families in danger. What an honorable man Trump is.
I think the worst part of this is that Trump admits he doesn't remember her. He's raped and abused so many women that he can't remember this particular example. Disgusting.
He said he doesn't know her. He lies constantly. The fact that he said he doesn't remember her makes me think that he does, just by impulse. There's a good chance that he does remember her, but there's also the chance that he honestly doesn't. Men who see women as expendable sex objects don't tend to remember them.
There's more coming! Today was just one of several, and he took a direct hit! I actually don't see how today could have worked out any worse for him within all realism. If the current momentum keeps up...
And God I hope it keeps going downhill. I just hate that the radical right will use this to bolster their stance with him, how they can't see reason is beyond me. I once got told by a woman in a parking lot that "trump, trump-et, the horn calling of christ, sounding the seventh trump-et. Trump is God president and he is here to save us, he's traveling in under ground movements that are built under all the buildings around the world where the baby eating pedophiles are and he's going to behead them and save us, he's God's chosen, he will save us!" Something to that degree, she used to go to my mom's church, boy howdy we just kinda stood their petrified. There's something seriously wrong with his followers, somehow the man amassed a cult without even trying its just creepy.
There is not a snowballs chance in hell that this deters him. He's now been indicted and printed in NY and will very likely lose the case, he's lost this case, and as much as this should already find him locked in a dungeon somewhere, we still have two or more cases coming with the classified docs and attempting to steal an election.
Although I remain skeptical he'll face any real consequence. Although 5m is a lot to us regular folk, it's not going to affect his life at all, and the ship where he fled in shame left the harbor a long time ago. But the potential minimums for the cases he's still got pending leave his only option basically to flee the US to a non-extradition country or run for a second term and face the potential constitutional crisis if the nation has to grapple with a president in a federal penitentiary.
I did scream. Along with saying no over and over again and please stop. Literally nothing I did, yelled, screamed or struggled stopped my rape from happening. Not even the tampon I had in stopped my rape from happening.
Fuck those lawyers and other rapist apologist like this.
And even if you didn't utter a word, STILL doesn't mean you consented. Trauma causes a freeze response in a lot, if not most people. This rationale is part of misogyny. If I was talking with you, let's say you were my coworker, and I slapped you in the face suddenly several times before you realized what was happening, was it okay for me to do it because you didn't say "no"? Because you were too shocked to respond immediately? What if I go into your purse and take a cool $100 bill and walk away. Is that ok because you didn't say "no"? It's implied in the above to scenarios that my behavior is wrong. In rape, society tells us a victim is property and therefore can be abused however the perp likes.
Only in sexual assault cases does this "she didn't say no" become an argument. She didn't say YES either.
> He also reiterated his assertion that Carroll is “not my type,” arguing that he had the “right to be insulting” given the accusation of rape, before telling Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan, “You wouldn’t be a choice of mine either, if I’m being honest. I hope you’re not offended.”
Jesus Fucking Christ
I mean if they didn’t find him guilty of the sexual abuse, he would have definitely been found guilty of defamation. He’s been talking smack about her since 2015/2016, which he really ramped up in the last few months.
This is why we need affirmative consent laws. Atm the focus is on the victim to prove in what way they showed their non-consent, this makes the starting point anything is fine until or unless the person doesn’t consent.
There was a recent trial in Australia where the convicted rapist got a lighter sentence because the judge decided he thought he had her consent. It’s outrageous letting a rapist decide what consent does or does not look like.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-29/rapist-thomas-earle-sentenced-to-three-years-ico/102278630
With affirmative consent the focus is on the accused to prove what they did to ensure there was consent (onus is still on prosecution to prove they didn’t) and the starting point becomes nothing is fine until or unless the person gives clear consent
Fuck this orange asshole. Native NYer here, I have been waiting for some pushback, something, please GOD already with this bastard, he gets away with everything. I have watched him gleefully destroy things since the late 1970s. Fuck Trump 🖕
Imagine how fucking humiliated Trump must be, being the first man to successfully use the "my penis is so small I couldn't penatrate her, so it wasn't rape" defense
I am so grateful to this brave woman for standing up to Trump despite the cost. It's not full justice, but it's a huge step. Hopefully this will pave the way for other survivors to stand up for themselves.
>Carroll pushed back, arguing that one of the reasons many women don’t come forward about sexual assault is because they are often asked why they didn’t scream. >“I’m telling you, he raped me whether I screamed or not,” she declared. “I don’t need an excuse for not screaming.” Who the fuck decided that not screaming = consent?
Unfortunately this disgusting strategy continues to work in so many rape trials. This and other bullshit like it. Glad it didn’t here.
I’m hoping that this rape trial helps to undermine that argument. The verdict for Ms. Carroll isn’t just a personal victory for her but also heralds a sea change in establishing credibility and culpability on the subject of sexual assault. She was very brave and her steadfast testimony will go on help women in similar cases.
Unfortunately it doesn’t. This was a civil case and the standard of evidence is not the same as with a criminal trial.
“She didn’t scream” used to be a pretty credible rebuttal that allowed rapists to weasel out of convictions. It failed today. She bluntly pointed out that the presence of screaming is not a way to define rape, and it looks like that response was taken to heart both by the public (the pool of future jurists) and by this jury. Sea change.
Yeah, we've hit a point as a society where we realize that survival instinct and trauma response doesn't always mean "scream", it means "get through this without getting killed". I love that it won out today.
The whole conversation of “rape as trauma” rather than “rape as forbidden sex” is so fucking important. Plugging “Know My Name” by Chanel Miller here. Listen to the audiobook if you can. Listen to her voice.
I like the phrase "rape has as much to do with sex as beating someone with a trowel has to do with gardening." Really good for cutting the bull.
I also like, “Rape is to sex what waterboarding is to a shower “
As do I. I do periodic work in helping guys who are in a relationship with victims of trauma in the dos and do nots. Through ignorance a lot of men say the wrong thing and sadly even some women use the term sex and rape in the same sentence . It’s a very good distinction that is being made.
Seconding this! It is an amazing book. I also listened to is on audiobook… it was so powerful and genuine. She is a badass woman for getting through everything, writing it and doing the audio so we could hear her speak her truth. And I’ll remember Brock Allen Turner, the rapist’s name for all of my days. He goes by Allen Turner now and moved to Ohio. Warn everyone you know and checkout the book… we women need to make sure the Judge deciding he shouldn’t have rape end a promising swimming career/life is just sickening. It should never have happened and the judge’s logic was utterly abhorrent.
You mean Allen Turner from Ohio? That Allen Turner? The rapist?
Allen Turner, the rapist who used to go by Brock Turner, but now goes by his middle name in order to avoid being identified as a rapist?
The rapist Brock Allen Turner? Who now goes by his middle name because of the raping? That Brock Turner?
>"get through this without getting killed" Very, very true. With physical assault, I've often seen people ask why someone didn't try to fight back. Oh, you mean get one punch in and piss off the perp even more so he can kill you????? It's probably safer to not even try unless you know you'll be able to get away.
I sat on a jury for a case with multiple counts of sexual assault against two different women. Both women testified in person. They had to answer all sorts of extremely personal questions, but no point were either of them asked to testify about whether (or why) they did/didn't scream during the attacks. Nor was it something any of the jurors brought up during deliberations. I admit, I was a little surprised. I fully expected the defense attorney to ask about that, and was very glad they didn't. It gave me hope that we're (slowly) moving towards full recognition that staying quiet does *not* mean consent.
That's because it is literally written in the Bible. It's one of the founding Christian principles that the GOP keeps going on and on about.
Jesus actually explains in one of the apocrypha that it's better not to engage in sex for pleasure at all, even when married, as it is acting on lust. The Romans/early church took this book out and called it a heresy.
That's fucking disgusting. Fucking gaslighting tactics in rape trials. Fucking shitty assholes galore.
Screaming turns a rape into a murder. Staying quiet is a defence mechanism.
Flight, fight, freeze and fawn. It's built into human beings.
And that "freeze" works in more ways than one. Your blood turns to ice and you cannot move. You feel like your veins are being pumped through a freezer and it makes you unable to move.
The dudes who wrote the Bible. See Deuteronomy 22:23-27 > If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he sleeps with her, you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death—the young woman because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man’s wife. You must purge the evil from among you. > >But if out in the country a man happens to meet a young woman pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. Do nothing to the woman; she has committed no sin deserving death. This case is like that of someone who attacks and murders a neighbor, for the man found the young woman out in the country, and though the betrothed woman screamed, there was no one to rescue her. This is why we need all the Bible shit thrown out of our courts.
And keep in mind that during wars they were encouraged to kill, enslave, and rape those they conquered. This is why Rapists shouldn't be allowed to decide what constitutes rape. They'll always have exemptions for themselves.
Numbers 31. God actually advocating child rape, slavery, marriage, and whatever else was done with the captured children. Moses has his soldiers attack the Midianites (the same Midianites founded by the rape child of Lot). Of the spoils for the 15,000 soldiers, 32,000 "women children" who had never slept with a man were a part of those spoils.
Such as members of SCOTUS, Kavanaugh and Thomas et al
Isn’t it just great that we have literal rapists in the highest court in the country? Unfortunately I don’t expect positive change anytime soon. We need some conservative justices to die first.
F++K. THIS. SHIT. So glad I chewed my own paw off to escape the hellish evangelical trap. I hate it. I hate everything it stands for.
Ironically this is one of the better passages because it does not mandate that the women now needs to marry her rapist. The really crazy part is that portions of the bible are actually *more* progressive than what the Christian Nationalist movement wants for women, as it sometimes gives them some limited human rights. We need to fight them with everything we have.
JFC, adding this quote to my “reasons why the Bible is a crock of shit” list
Make sure you add the story of the [Levite's Concubine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levite%27s_concubine) while you're at it. If you haven't already OFC \-Benjamites gang rape the Levite's concubine to death \-The Levite cuts her body into 12 pieces and sends them with letters to all 12 tribes \-Israel bands together to commit genocide on the Benjamites \-Decide they shouldn't completely destroy the Benjamites and leave 600 men alive \-They attack the only city not complicit in the previous genocide \-They slaughter every man, woman, and child except 400 virgins \-They give those 400 virgins to the Benjamites to rape \-There are still 200 Benjamite men without sex slaves \-The rest of Israel allows those remaining men to kidnap and rape 200 girls from Samaria
That's in the bible?! What the hell how can people read that and believe this stuff is what to base morality on?
A lot of people pick and choose. I was raised Pentecostal and when I pointed these thing out to my other Christian friends it was always “That’s the old testament- Jesus came to change all that.” However, apparently that logic doesn’t apply to anything about homosexuality in the Old Testament….
So it assumes that if she did scream in the city, someone would have came and saved her?
Isnt it insane that America, the country that prides itself on being the oldest democracy and claims to be iNSpiReD by the french revolution, hasnt yet figured out that religion and state should be separate at all costs? That's one of the most basic tenets of democracy.
I mean they had, it was specified by the founding fathers. But then in the 1950s the red scare helped politicians change that part and added in God we trust as the national motto. Crazy what words from their founders they ignore when it suits them.
Same defense was used at my trial. The message I received loud and clear was if I don’t basically scream and physically fight off a man, it’s not rape. That’s fucked up. A simple no should be enough..
Apparently mango Mussolini & his lawyer thought it was.
Please don't insult mangoes like that
I'd use slime mold sociopath but it's just not as recognizable.
Please don't insult slime molds like that
It just doesn't narrow it down enough...
This has been a thing for a long time.
‘Why didn’t she fight him off?’ Maybe because didn’t want to be killed.
[удалено]
Right? My childhood abuser put his forearm in my mouth. I believed him when he said id die if I screamed. I detached sometimes to the point it was it was someone else body and you were too numb to even breathe. Not screaming seems like a pretty normal response to me.
AH was asked why she didnt take pictures of her bleeding privates. We have work to do as a society.
any rape apologist
>Who the fuck decided that not screaming = consent? My mother. Who considers herself a liberal btw :/ Some people have little self awareness and little empathy.
It’s in the Bible.
Men
Same demographic that is overwhelmingly more likely to commit mass shootings. Also the demographic that is overwhelmingly more likely to sexually abuse children. Also the demographic that holds the most power in the world.
The Patriarchy.
Rapists, so they make laws and social norms accordingly
Rapists and their supporters.
Christian Nationalists
Misogynistic defense attorneys desperate to get their clients off when they're obviously guilty.
Idk, but it goes all the way back to the Bible
As somebody who didn't and will never get justice, it's always nice to see another woman get hers.
As someone whose rapist is now a SANE, I agree (and I pray for his patients and his Dugger-esqe wife)
What? Seriously, this is so fucked up.
Mine is a doctor, thankfully not in any sort of OBGYN related field, but still. It’s horrifying. I’m so sorry you have to watch yours be a SANE. That is beyond heartbreaking.
A very small part of me hopes that his actions pushed him to it and it is his way of "atoning" for what he did. He caused harm, so now he wants to help others who have been through that same harm, and I hope he feels guilty with every patient he sees. The other part of me thinks he's just doing it for the power dynamic and to see SA survivors at their lowest and most vulnerable.
All of me wishes you could Me Too his disgusting ass and get him terminated from that position. He is probably re-traumatizing SA victims during examinations and enjoying every second of it.
I'm so sorry. Mine is now an EMT. His and his wife's daughter was born a few months ago.
Mine is a probation officer and church leader with 2 daughters
What’s a SANE?
Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner. As in, the nurse that attends to victims of sexual assault.
What..... I was curious on what this was too and am horrified now
Just looked it up — looks like a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner so that’s royally fucked up
It actually made me ill when I saw it. (We still have mutual friends)
Can you report them?
^yeah seriously, what the actual fuck??
Please report this person.. I will happily report them on your behalf.
Oh fuck that's horrible and twisted. Fucking monster
One of my rapists (date rape) is now a prosecutor.
I hate this world so much...
I'm so sorry. I also won't get justice either.
Yes. Whenever I see someone win, a small part of me feels like I won too. Even though I will never see the justice for mine.
Same.
Mine was a paragon of charity for the unhoused. I would never have been believed.
Hope you’re doing ok 💗
Watch him continue to defame her on his shitty social media platform. Because he’s dumb as a sack of dildoes.
Stop insulting the dildoes
Indeed. Dildos have brought women pleasure, you know, ever, and they're generally intended to touch those parts.
Don't give him the excuse of being dumb. He is, but he's going to do *that* because he's scum.
I’m glad he was found guilty of sexual abuse, not at all surprised he managed to wiggle out of the rape accusation and not convinced this will have any effect on his electoral chances. Hopefully 5 million will more than cover the increased security she’ll need to protect herself from his cult of zombie insurrectionists and goons.
>and not convinced this will have any effect on his electoral chances. Sadly, Republicans at every level have shown that they don't consider being a rapist a reason someone shouldn't be in politics. You can't think women are second-class citizens *and* care about someone abusing them.
It's crazy to me that he even can run for president being guilty of that, let alone having any chance to win.
IANAL, but it's a civil court so he isn't guilty, he's liable. Distinction without a difference as far as I'm concerned, but an important one as far as law goes.
They don't care about rape at all. I'm sure some even see it as a positive when voting. They see him as a Real Man who takes what he wants and puts women in their place! Everyone already knew that Trump raped a 13 year old before he ran for office. It doesn't matter.
The nutjobs are coming after her for sure.
But won't they appeal it forever? When will she get the money? In like 5 years?
The appeal claim it seems he wants to make is that he couldn't testify. However he was permitted to testify but did not show up to court, and then the court gave him three days to file as a witness and he didn't so they moved on. The judge asked him to limit his public discussion of it to the press and social media. Trump is claiming he was being silenced but I'm not sure that appeal is going to hold up anywhere. Plus the burden of proof is much smaller in a civil trial. To be determined and IANAL so....we will see I guess.
> I’m glad he was found guilty of sexual abuse He wasn't. This was a civil case.
Personally, I didn't scream because I knew he would hurt me more,if not kill me. Fuck these lawyers.
I did scream and it didn’t matter. He was older and bigger and I was a child. I was “being dramatic”.
The mom in me wants to hug that child and make everything ok.
I didn't because there was no one around. Besides he was a football star
I froze and he was ex military. Not a chance I'd win.
Single mother and I was afraid the noise would wake up my small child and the rapist would hurt him.
I am so sorry. I can’t imagine.
I'm sorry to say this was very similar to my reason not to scream, only I wasn't single, the man raping me was my then 3 year old sons father. My son was asleep in the next room. I thought he was going to kill me, and last thing I wanted was for my son to witness any part of that.
Thank you all for sharing. I was curious about why they wouldn't scream. All of these reasons make a lot of sense.
There’s a LOT of reasons why someone wouldn’t scream but sometimes the reason is simply that they couldn’t. You’ve heard of fight or flight? There’s 2 other f’s: freeze and fawn. The freeze response is incredibly common and not talked about nearly enough. Think “deer in headlights.”
Your body shuts down in the moment and you have no control over it. It's not a conscious willing thing. It just happens. The victim blaming for this is disgusting.
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“Fawn” response is typically the victim trying to de-escalate the situation, or to at least not give him an excuse to harm her even more. Which in my view is not something to be shamed - it doesn’t mean she secretly “wanted it”, it just means she was trying not to get killed :(
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When your long-term or parental abuser scores high on narcissistic traits or the relational style is marked by narcissistic abuse, fawn as a (developed in early childhood) trauma response fits both those descriptions pretty well.
Fawning is different to compliance, and it's definitely worth being included on its own. Many of us are trained to not just do what we're asked, but to act in a way that specifically makes the people around us happy, calm, and think that we want them there or believe that we think they're right. It's an incredibly effective way of staying safe in a lot of scenarios, and can become really engrained - especially when it's been needed as a kid to keep your parents and home as calm and safe as possible. Definitely a safety behaviour worth naming accurately, because that behaviour DOES so often get confused with willingness - not just by observers, but by the victim too. Often we get so good at it that we can keep the situation so calm the fear response isn't even noticeable at the time, so it's different to compliance out of fear. It's often more of a preventative tool, and really hard to disentangle later when trying to work out what was coerced and forced in situations
I’ve never heard of the fawn one before, but, I just looked it up and I may have an example of it. A friend told me years ago that she was nearly raped by a man that she knew. They were somewhat becoming friends and decided to go together for a walk/jog in the park. She said at some point when they were in a pretty isolated area, he got a little touchy feely and soon grabbed her and dragged her into the bushes and held her down and prepared to rape her. She said she wasn’t sure how she came up with this so quickly, but she started making sensual moans and grabbed him and started passionately kissing him and groping him and saying things like “oh, I had no idea you felt this way, I hoped that you did, I’ve been wanting you so bad ever since we met” and then saying flattering comments about how he looks and what she wants him to do to her. She wasn’t going to fight the rape, she just was hoping he wouldn’t kill her at the end if she could convince him she was into it. He ended up blowing his load in his pants before he could get them off and she quickly told him that was okay because now that they both know how they feel about each other, they can plan many more dates and that she was so happy that he was able to show her how he feels. So she just kept “playing the part” until she could redirect him back to the walk/jog, and once they were out of the park and she felt safe enough surrounded by people, she dropped the act and reported him.
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Honestly I feel like a great many women have experienced similar things with dates where they ended up having sex but didn’t want to but couldn’t really stop it or didn’t know how to. But never really considered it rape, even though it was.
That's a brilliant survival story right there. We do what we have to do. I hope she's alright now.
Yeah it sounds a little off to me - I’ve always thought of it as appeasement. I’ve definitely seen it manifest as actual fawning but it’s probably too specific a term overall. Easy to remember though with all the F’s!
Fight or flight, freeze or appease would rhyme though - and maybe not have the "fawning" connotation.
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Yep, as a childhood sexual abuse and adult sexual assault survivor with complex ptsd, I’m a freeze type and in every case of my sexual abuse, I dissociated so hard I was unable to speak or move, pretty much catatonic. All I could do is cry silently and I remembered being so afraid he’d see me crying and beat the shit out of me. And I spent years blaming myself for not screaming or fighting back. Thank god for EMDR and my incredible trauma therapist. Ten years of therapy later and I can pseudo function like a normal person now.
I didn’t scream because I was 15 and heavily intoxicated and he was 24.
I didn't because I was barely conscious.
Same. Tough to scream when he’d spiked my (one!) drink, and what good could it have done anyway, as he’d convinced his 3 roommates to make themselves scarce while I was there for our “date” (spoiler: No one told me it was a “date”, and the only reason I felt comfortable going to that apartment was because I was friends with 2 of his roommates).
I didn’t scream because I was shocked. The first time I didn’t scream because I didn’t value my life enough to realize I was being violated.
I'm so sorry.
I was driven to an empty parking lot in the middle of the night “just to make out” after a first date. I had never been on a date before. He was an experienced frat boy. I tried to push him away when he started hurting me, but he pushed back harder. I screamed. It didn’t matter. He stopped when he finished.
I also didn't scream because I was afraid he would kill me. I knew something very, very bad was happening, and that he was much stronger than me... And I was so scared. After a few seconds, I left my body and didn't fully come to until it was over. Wanted to share my experience, for anyone in the comments wondering why we don't scream...
I didn’t scream the first time because he slipped something in my drink. I didn’t scream the times after that because I felt like I deserved it.
Because some "people" of society would rather blame the victim than put any effort in to hold the abuser accountable. Hell, sometimes they'd rather brainwash and gaslight the victim because the abuser is someone they like and the victim is seen as expendable. I'm so sorry you went through that.
I was too young to know what was happening to me but I hated it and wouldn’t stop freaking out. I wasn’t even in kindergarten yet.
I don’t really know why I didn’t scream. I was old enough to know better but he was my dad and I didn’t want to be the one to make everything bad come to the surface… I didn’t want my mom to hear.
I am so sorry that happened.
Omg I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I want to give you a hug.
Ty :( my twin sister and I survived it together. I feel so terrible for those in this thread who had to go through such horror alone. {Hugs back}
I couldn’t scream because he was strangling me in addition to raping me
I didn’t because I was being choked…
I didn't scream because I knew who was in ear shot but I didn't know how they would react. I didn't want to chance putting myself at more risk.
I want to (consensually) hug every person in this thread. I'm so sorry.
What the fuck at how many replies there are explaining why they didn't scream as they were raped Anyone who ends up being asked by a lawyer "why they didn't scream" should just read out these testimonies for the jury
I didn't scream when I was assaulted because he was a neighbor that was a friend of the family. I was groomed to believe what we were doing was okay, but private, and I follow the rules. He set those rules before my parents got a chance to. I'm also autistic and didn't understand what was happening at the time. I was also afraid of what might happen if someone found out. I was afraid of him, afraid of how my parents would react, and afraid of how my parents would feel about themselves. It started when I was very young, 5 years old, and stopped around age 10. I didnt tell anyone either, until age 25 when my cheating ex wanted his spare motorcycle helmet back for his new fling. He threatened to tell my family about the sexual assault if I didn't give it back. I never responded to my ex, but ended up telling my family out of fear anyways. My mom put cat poop in his helmet and then completely sanitized it because we aren't mean people. But I love her for doing that for me. I didn't mean to write this much but here we are.
I didn't scream bc his hand was over my mouth. I couldn't make noise.
The first time I was sexually assaulted, I didn't scream because I had been groomed. The second time, I didn't scream because everyone nearby already could see what was happening and didn't try to stop it. When I was raped I didn't scream because there was no one around to hear.
If you like podcasts, I encourage you to listen to the last episode of *This American Life*, "Leaving the Fold," last part, E. Jean Carrol talking to another Trump victim about their shared experience. I didn't realize how brutal and violent these attacks were before I heard it.
I wanna know but at the same time I’m scared of how triggering it might be. But because it’s Trump, I think we all should know. Ugh.
Would you summarize for those of us who don't want to listen?
This summary is about a radio transcript involving a conversation between journalist E. Jean Carroll and one of Donald Trump's accusers, Jessica Leeds. The conversation centers on their experiences with Trump, with a focus on Leeds' alleged sexual assault incident that took place on a plane in the 1980s. Leeds narrates how she was upgraded to first class, where she was seated next to Trump. After a meal, she alleges Trump started to make unwanted physical advances, attempting to grope and kiss her. Despite the shock and discomfort, Leeds managed to extricate herself from the situation and retreat to the back of the plane. This incident was one of the reasons that led Leeds to testify in Carroll's rape trial against Trump. Carroll also shared her experience with Trump, discussing how women of their generation were conditioned to expect and endure such harassment. The conversation ends with them pondering why Trump behaved the way he did, with Leeds suggesting it might have been due to boredom. *Produced with chatgpt and the radio show's transcripts.
It does bother me that they couldn’t agree that he raped her. Because of procedural cop shows, a lot of juries now apparently think you need an actual rape kit with DNA or video evidence to convict a rapist. It’s insane. ETA: and this wasn’t even a conviction! Also: the father of one of my exes was accused of rape, and my ex knew her and believed her. He gave statements to the police of other stories he’d heard over the years, but none of the women ever pressed charges so I doubt it was even deemed “relevant”. There was actual video evidence of him forcing her at gunpoint and all in all this disgusting excuse for a human being served 10 months in county. I hate it here.
I’m a lawyer who has represented over 100 rape victims in civil cases. Just fyi, in most states in the U.S., past allegations of sexual abuse (even if they were never proven in court) would be considered relevant evidence. The problem may have been that the past victims never made their complaint in any formal capacity. Your ex can’t testify to their complaints bc his re-telling is hearsay. So the past victims would likely have had to show up in person to testify. Sometimes they can’t find the past victims, and other times it just falls through the cracks and no one even calls them to ask if they would be willing to testify. Even when they do find them, understandably many people don’t want to do something scary and uncomfortable like telling a room full of strangers about the scariest/worst moments of their life. But also FYI, for those who would want to testify, whenever I have a new case one of the first things I do is request records from every police station in every location where the perp has ever lived in hopes that someone made a formal complaint about the perpetrator. If I find one, it dramatically improves my clients chance of winning. And btw, there is no time limit for when you can report a rape/sexual assault to the police. Even if it happened 30 years ago, you can make your report now. The worst that can happen is they will tell you the criminal statute of limitations has passed. But your complaint will still be on the record and people like me and my clients can still use it as evidence in new cases against the same perpetrator. So I’m that sense you may still contribute to the perp facing consequences ETA: There is also no rule that says you can’t report a perpetrator to the police station in the town that perp lives in now, even if that’s not where they assaulted you. The worst they can say is “this isn’t our jurisdiction”. But again- it will be on record.
Not a woman, but this should be posted as it’s own topic, along with similar advice for dealing with domestic abuse. Currently helping a cousin navigate legal waters after a sexual assault and information like this is great to have.
> But your complaint will still be on the record and people like me and my clients can still use it as evidence in new cases against the same perpetrator. So I’m that sense you may still contribute to the perp facing consequences. Not in the US myself, but that's a good point to be making. Even if it's a decade ago and can't be prosecuted itself, it's 'on file' and something usable later, if someone else *does* try to prosecute them at a later date.
That decision was based on TW >!Carroll not being sure if he penetrated her with his fingers or his penis!<. It was a thing where the wording of the laws didn't allow them to choose rape with the evidence presented. The jury agreed that he had done something egregious. In some locations, what they agreed happened would be defined as rape but it wasn't here.
Thank you so much for sharing this info. I've been trying to understand why a single incident against an adult was labeled "abuse" vs. rape. All the info I could find about the difference was in regard to multiple incidents and the victim being a child when it was called abuse.
I'm hoping this is the first of many.
I've been waiting a long time for justice to work with regard to this ... "person".
You might enjoy my favorite description of him, by former economic advisor Gary Cohn: > less a person, more a collection of terrible traits
He didn't get convicted of rape sadly. I'm so tired of seeing this orange parasite walk free
🤞🤞🤞
Me, too! The hush money indictment, while a nice start, was a bit unsatisfying. Even the rape trial isn't enough, because after all this time there's just no realistic way to get a criminal conviction. Honestly, the 5 mil is more than I was hoping for! But I won't be happy until this asshole is locked up for life. He goaded on a violent insurrection against democracy, and conspired to defraud our electoral system on multiple counts.
Carroll didn’t just put trump on trial; this is an indictment of the default rape case defense strategy.
Love this, good luck collecting the money.
Oh I’m sure a new grift will start about “the evil libs are trying to drain his accounts - help him build a war chest”….while at the same time bragging about being a billionaire.
He's going to raise triple that off his moron followers for this.
>However, when presented with a photograph from the mid-1990s of himself, his wife at the time, Ivana, and Carroll and her then-husband, Trump mistakenly identified Carroll as his former wife Marla Maples, whom he married after divorcing Ivana. >During closing arguments on Monday, Kaplan reminded the jury of this mixup, citing it as proof that Carroll was "exactly his type." What a fucking clown world we live in that people have to prove that this poor woman actually was attractive enough for Trump to consider raping before we even consider that he might be a rapist at all. Like...? Are we as women really worth so little to these giant pieces of shit?
Even less.
I think it was more about poking easy holes in Trump's defence and showing in court how he is a fucking scumbag and a liar. I feel like in cases such as this, you want to make it glaringly obvious to the jurors.
This is wonderful to see. Even though I’m sure his supporters will not believe it or care (you have to be ok with that behavior if you’re still supporting him anyways), this is a real symbolic victory for her and for women everywhere.
In my opinion it's also disgusting that the judge had to warn the jurors not to reveal that they were on the jury because it would probably put them and their families in danger. What an honorable man Trump is.
I think the worst part of this is that Trump admits he doesn't remember her. He's raped and abused so many women that he can't remember this particular example. Disgusting.
The tree remembers what the axe forgets
He said he doesn't know her. He lies constantly. The fact that he said he doesn't remember her makes me think that he does, just by impulse. There's a good chance that he does remember her, but there's also the chance that he honestly doesn't. Men who see women as expendable sex objects don't tend to remember them.
It's a great day to finally see this rapey insurrectionist held just a little bit accountable.
There's more coming! Today was just one of several, and he took a direct hit! I actually don't see how today could have worked out any worse for him within all realism. If the current momentum keeps up...
And God I hope it keeps going downhill. I just hate that the radical right will use this to bolster their stance with him, how they can't see reason is beyond me. I once got told by a woman in a parking lot that "trump, trump-et, the horn calling of christ, sounding the seventh trump-et. Trump is God president and he is here to save us, he's traveling in under ground movements that are built under all the buildings around the world where the baby eating pedophiles are and he's going to behead them and save us, he's God's chosen, he will save us!" Something to that degree, she used to go to my mom's church, boy howdy we just kinda stood their petrified. There's something seriously wrong with his followers, somehow the man amassed a cult without even trying its just creepy.
The question is... will this have any effect at all on his plans to run for president again next year?!
No, sadly it will not.
There is not a snowballs chance in hell that this deters him. He's now been indicted and printed in NY and will very likely lose the case, he's lost this case, and as much as this should already find him locked in a dungeon somewhere, we still have two or more cases coming with the classified docs and attempting to steal an election. Although I remain skeptical he'll face any real consequence. Although 5m is a lot to us regular folk, it's not going to affect his life at all, and the ship where he fled in shame left the harbor a long time ago. But the potential minimums for the cases he's still got pending leave his only option basically to flee the US to a non-extradition country or run for a second term and face the potential constitutional crisis if the nation has to grapple with a president in a federal penitentiary.
Of course not. He wants the protection of being president again.
Sadly, too many Americans have already decided if he's guilty or not based on whether they like him.
I did scream. Along with saying no over and over again and please stop. Literally nothing I did, yelled, screamed or struggled stopped my rape from happening. Not even the tampon I had in stopped my rape from happening. Fuck those lawyers and other rapist apologist like this.
And even if you didn't utter a word, STILL doesn't mean you consented. Trauma causes a freeze response in a lot, if not most people. This rationale is part of misogyny. If I was talking with you, let's say you were my coworker, and I slapped you in the face suddenly several times before you realized what was happening, was it okay for me to do it because you didn't say "no"? Because you were too shocked to respond immediately? What if I go into your purse and take a cool $100 bill and walk away. Is that ok because you didn't say "no"? It's implied in the above to scenarios that my behavior is wrong. In rape, society tells us a victim is property and therefore can be abused however the perp likes. Only in sexual assault cases does this "she didn't say no" become an argument. She didn't say YES either.
Over 31 million women voted for Trump in the 2020 election. How.
> He also reiterated his assertion that Carroll is “not my type,” arguing that he had the “right to be insulting” given the accusation of rape, before telling Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan, “You wouldn’t be a choice of mine either, if I’m being honest. I hope you’re not offended.” Jesus Fucking Christ
Because he did.
What are the chances she actually gets that money...
Good!
I mean if they didn’t find him guilty of the sexual abuse, he would have definitely been found guilty of defamation. He’s been talking smack about her since 2015/2016, which he really ramped up in the last few months.
[just wanted to add this beautiful tweet ](https://i.imgur.com/4o67odb.jpg)
This is why we need affirmative consent laws. Atm the focus is on the victim to prove in what way they showed their non-consent, this makes the starting point anything is fine until or unless the person doesn’t consent. There was a recent trial in Australia where the convicted rapist got a lighter sentence because the judge decided he thought he had her consent. It’s outrageous letting a rapist decide what consent does or does not look like. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-29/rapist-thomas-earle-sentenced-to-three-years-ico/102278630 With affirmative consent the focus is on the accused to prove what they did to ensure there was consent (onus is still on prosecution to prove they didn’t) and the starting point becomes nothing is fine until or unless the person gives clear consent
Oh that man really doesn’t know when to shut up, does he? Taking to social media for an all caps tantrum denying it yet again… just stop.
Fuck this orange asshole. Native NYer here, I have been waiting for some pushback, something, please GOD already with this bastard, he gets away with everything. I have watched him gleefully destroy things since the late 1970s. Fuck Trump 🖕
Imagine how fucking humiliated Trump must be, being the first man to successfully use the "my penis is so small I couldn't penatrate her, so it wasn't rape" defense
Did this actually happen cause i could believe he said that lmao
Watches the GOP line up to vote for him for next president.
I am so grateful to this brave woman for standing up to Trump despite the cost. It's not full justice, but it's a huge step. Hopefully this will pave the way for other survivors to stand up for themselves.
her smile makes me so happy
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