I’ve seen this causing a lot of angry discussions on Facebook and I felt the need to add my two cents, but instead of shouting at strangers on FB I’ll do it here to you guys since I feel like my opinion matters just slightly more.
Let me start by saying this. Rape, under any context, is wrong. There’s no excuse, no justification that could make such a vile, horrific act excusable.
People have seen the headline for this article and began to use it to both insult and undermine the victim, and to dismiss what they are trying to do. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
“They started writing letters to each other for 8 years, met up in South Africa, continued healing, and he took full responsibility, and has been out speaking to his fellow men ever since. They wanna use their voices to talk about it and be the people they felt they would have needed back in high school when the shit went down.” I completely understand where all the hatred and hurt feelings are coming from, but I think a lot of us are reacting with our personal feelings rather than looking at the situation objectively. She coped with her trauma in a healthy way that worked for her and her extraordinary circumstance. They are (both) using their experiences to help prevent the same thing they are being condemned for promoting.
It takes less than a few minutes to read into their story and realize this isn’t meant to be apologist, or never do either of them try to justify the actions of what happened, but they are mutually conscious of what he did and are willing to work together to prevent it from happening to others in the future. I think that’s very empowering to the victim and we should encourage not to forgive those who assault victims but to put the power in the hands of the survivors.
I think we are still ways away from dismantling rape culture, but I see this a small step forward, seeing people immediately shut it down because it doesn’t fit their narrative is very discouraging to me, as a survivor.
