I'm so sad that Rob has had to go through even more trauma.😞 I wonder if people are actually going to care this time. Because it always felt like everyone else was allowed to have their struggles and trauma and was deserving of support for it except for Rob. I will especially never forgive the show for how everything with Rebecca was handled.
Just a reminder for people who don't remember how everything went down or for newbies who weren't in the fandom back then and also really because I feel like none of this gets talked about enough:
Rob was born and raised in Emmerdale and then left for a while when he was younger (look up Max King's death if you haven't seen those eps). He came back (in 2014) with his fiancé (Chrissie) and her father Lawrence to live at Home Farm. Chrissie had a sister named Rebecca who Rob cheated with before coming back to Emmerdale. Rebecca didn't show up in Emmerdale until 2016 though. By that time Chrissie and Robert were no longer together and Rob was with Aaron.
From from the moment Rebecca stepped foot in the village she kept trying to drive a wedge in between Robert and Aaron and kept trying to get Rob (back) in her bed. Except he kept turning her down because he loved Aaron and wanted to be with only Aaron. The only way she was able to get Rob to sleep with her was after Aaron had gone to jail (in 2017) and started using drugs and him and Rob had a big fight about it. Robert was distraught and thought their marriage was over. He went back to the mill and drank a whole bottle of whiskey and was basically fall down drunk. He didn't even remember contacting Rebecca by the time she showed up at the mill. He didn't tell her to come over either she chose to on her own after she heard Adam talking about how upset Rob was (in the pub). She knew he was drunk and upset and that him and Aaron had fought and she still chose to sleep with him. Worst of all she didn't even make sure that protection was used, which I think was on purpose.
When Rob talked about that night the next day and then again later when he told Aaron multiple things he said proved he wasn't sober enough to consent. He tells Rebecca maybe he thought it was what he wanted at the time but it wasn't. He tells Aaron that he must have passed out and his retelling of the events are spotty.
It just makes me angry anytime I think about all of that because I'm positive if the roles had been reversed and Rob had done to Rebecca what she did to him people would still be calling him an abuser (and rightfully so). All of this was just handled so badly by the show. I mean they even had Aaron (who is a survivor of abuse himself) say to Rob "don’t tell me you couldn’t have stopped it if you wanted" even though he knew Rob was drunk. And I don't bring that up as some way to hate on Aaron because that line always felt out of character for him. I mean look at how he was during the reunion episode (in 2018). He immediately asked Rob if something bad had happened (with Mike the chef) when he found him in the garage. So I feel like even as angry and upset as Aaron was when he found out about the Rebecca stuff he still wouldn't have said something like that.
That line they had Aaron say was just down right offensive to both of them. To have a survivor of child r*pe say something like you could have stopped it if you wanted to someone who was factually too drunk to consent is just all kinds of fcked up.
On top of everything Rebecca got treated like she was Rob's victim and had people both canonically on the show and in the fandom defending her. Even some Robron fans were defending her. Then she got to ride off into the sunset with Ross and Seb and got her happily ever after (even if they did eventually kill her off). Meanwhile Robron ended up split apart with Rob in prison for years. And I know that wasn't connected to her but it still pisses me off that she got to be happy when Robert and Aaron had so little time together.
It drives me crazy to hear how people talk about that storyline to this day. I hate seeing people talk about how Rob cheated on Aaron. Yes Rob has a history of cheating (it's how him and Aaron even started together). And maybe there was a part of him that was so hurt and angry that he did want to hurt Aaron that night by sleeping with Rebecca (he said as much to Aaron when he told him about what happened). But he also may not have gone through with it if he had a clear head. Rebecca knowing how drunk he was and still choosing to sleep with him anyway robbed him of his ability to say no.
I also can't see Rob consciously choosing to cheat on Aaron especially not with Rebecca of all people. He could have had Rebecca any time he wanted her but he didn't want her he wanted Aaron. When Aaron went to prison Rob fell apart to the point he couldn't even sleep in their bed without him. Rob has only ever loved one person as wholly and intensely as he loves Aaron. Rob is the king of self sabotage but I still don't think if he'd been sober he would have cheated.
I know some people probably don't want to think about Rebecca or that storyline and want it to just be dead and buried with her but I also feel like what happened to Rob wasn't given the attention it deserved by the show or the fandom at the time. I think a big part of that is because he's a guy and male SA victims aren't taken nearly as seriously as women are. I also think most people are under the impression that a women could never SA a man and that's just not true. It also has always bothered me that for a fandom that has always been so supportive of what Aaron went through and for a fandom that has a lot of people who relate to what Aaron went through that our same fandom wasn't as supportive of Rob nor as vocal about speaking up for him. I literally got sent hate back in the day for calling what happened between Rebecca and Rob assault.
Part of the reason I started thinking about all of this again is because of all the stuff coming up for Rob. Him getting drugged by a guy he goes out with. Trauma in prison that we don't know the full details of yet. I really hope that the show does right by him this time in how they handle all of this.
I'm also nervous for what's going to come out about what Rob endured in prison. I hope that it was just getting beat up (which is bad enough) I'm worried though that with how he reacted to being touched in his sleep that it could be something worse. Whatever happened in there I hope that Rob gets the support he deserves. He's gone through so much on his own and for all of the mistakes he's made he's been there so many times when his family and most of all Aaron have needed him. They better as hell be there for him now that he's the one going through stuff this time.
Thanks for reading my long ramble ❤️ (btw I made a gifset a while back about what happened to Rob that night that I'm pretty proud of. You can find it here.)