Men are victims of sexual attacks too – and they need our support

My friend, a truly beautiful person, cried as he told me what had happened to him

HIS piercing light-blue eyes and kind smile are still etched in my memory, as this 17-year-old boy had trusted me enough, all those years ago, to divulge one of the darkest secrets anyone could carry – that he too was a survivor of rape.

The memory of him, of that conversation, flooded back to me in recent days, as thousands of women and hundreds of men took to the streets to march for rape victims’ rights to be further recognised by the law.

But somehow I worried that as we rush to defend women’s rights as complainants in rape cases – a matter that does need society’s attention – we are forgetting men and boys, like my former friend.

The Dublin Rape Crisis Centre statistics from 2016 show a quarter of all calls to the centre came from male victims of sexual assault.

While it is an uphill struggle for female victims to report rape or sexual assault, it seems men may face even more of a battle to speak about or consider reporting such crimes.

After all, men feel that pressure to be seen as masculine and, for many, rape or sexual assault isn’t something that should happen to a man. Of course, this view is nonsensical, yet it is how many have been socialised.

The Dublin Rape Crisis Centre releases such statistics to break down public perceptions that rape and sexual assault only happen to women and girls, but as a society are we really opening up to the fact that a victim could be our brother, boyfriend or husband?

I’ll never forget that summer evening, in a rural Irish town all those years ago, when my teenage friend, a boy I’d snatched kisses from, told me his secret.

We walked through the woods as the long summer evening and the possibilities of our youth stretched before us. In that moment, I wanted the clocks to stop ticking and time to evaporate.

I ran my hands through his blond hair and saw the evening sun light up his eyes as he unburdened himself for the first time, telling me how he’d been set upon by a number of boys in a neighbouring town one evening.

At first I didn’t understand what he was saying – I was 17 after all – and I’d only ever heard of women being victims of male rape or sexual assault. My mother had only ever warned me to be careful if I went to the shops as dark fell. I’d never heard her warn my brothers about such unseen threats.

Those who had carried out this evil act on this innocent young boy had known him, and the rape had been just another act of ridiculing him, of having power over him. Rape is, after all, about trying to have power and control over someone else.

MY friend, a handsome and beautiful person, cried as he told me what had happened to him. I don’t remember seeing him after that walk and I’m not sure why he didn’t get in touch again. I adored him, and what happened to him hadn’t made any difference to how I viewed him.

If only I could tell him, I’ve never forgotten him, what he told me, or how much he meant to me in the short time we shared. Those were the innocent, heady, teenage days of summer, after all. Never again would I find a time so carefree and full of hope.

Though he may have felt at times he’d had all hope stolen from him, I felt his trusting me enough to share his pain had showed just how much hope there was for our generation.

I, like many women, witnessed a watershed moment in Ireland, as we watched the sheer number of women, of all ages, march across the country for rape victims’ rights.

The power of protest would seem to be already effecting change within the State, with the Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan now set to review the legal protections for complainants in sexual assault and rape cases.

Mr Flanagan has also expressed interest in drawing up a new Sexual Abuse and Violence in Ireland study – some 16 years after the first statistics on rape and sexual assault.

But I worry, as we continue this much-needed debate, are we as women thinking of our brothers, partners and male friends, those silent victims who may never find anyone they feel they can share such darkness with?

Will we ever get to the point when it is acceptable for men to realise they too need to speak, feel pain, cry? And, if they are survivors of rape or sexual assault, they too should feel embraced by a movement for change.