For women to come forward. We can’t even stand up for each other when someone asks if a questionable sexual encounter was wrong. We incorrectly tell them it was their fault. That they should have known better. That they didn’t try harder to get away. They they didn’t do what they should have done to stop the situation.

The fact of the matter is that if you did NOT consent - and CONSENT is enthusiastic, it’s not coerced, it’s not questioned, it’s absolute - then it is sexual assault. Period. End of story.

If you only said yes because they asked you over and over and over again, if you only said yes because you didn’t want them to hurt you for saying no, if you only said yes because they wouldn’t let you go to sleep without putting out first, if you didn’t say yes but they made you feel guilty about it and did it anyway, that is rape. That is not okay.

My mother shared with me a few stories of what happened to her over her life. Times when she woke up to her husband inside her even though she said no and went to sleep. Times when she was passed out drunk and woke up in the middle of him finishing. Times when he pestered her over and over and over again saying that she was his wife so she “had” to do it

Times when her OWN BROTHER came into her room and threatened her if she ever screamed or told her parents (who found out btw and then sent HER away because they told her it was her fault for dressing in a way that made her brother “unable to help himself”).

If you think that it’s ever the victim’s fault because “they weren’t clear enough / they shouldn’t have put themselves in that position / they should have said no more firmly / they should have fought back,” then YOU are part of the problem.