San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Why rape victims stay in contact with attackers
Last month, after a month-long trial and nine days of deliberations, Los Angeles jurors found former Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein guilty of raping one woman. But some of those same jurors found him not guilty of other sexual battery charges brought by three other women, resulting in one acquittal and two mistrials from undecided verdicts.
When some of the jurors were later asked about the mixed verdicts, they noted the fact that these other accusers had all had contact with Weinstein following their assault. The jurors believed that continued contact created enough reasonable doubt to vote “not guilty.”
For many, including myself, it is baffling why a woman forced to engage in nonconsensual sex acts would stay in contact with her perpetrator.
For years, I was baffled by my own behavior toward my rapist.
Nearly 30 years ago, I went on vacation to a remote tropical island for a week-long scuba diving trip. In the wee hours of my first night there, the German manager at the resort where I was staying banged at my door, drunk. In a jet-lagged stupor, afraid that there was an emergency back home, I let him in. I’d had no reason to fear him — he’d been friendly and even a bit flirty, upgrading my room and buying me a glass of wine at the bar.
We began kissing, then having sex. This wasn’t what I’d planned, but I wasn’t saying “no.” However, when he reached down and removed his condom before entering me again, it was definitely not consensual. I froze. It didn’t occur to me to try and fight this husky man who was so heavy on me and holding down my shoulders as he thrust. I just wanted it to be over.
For the rest of the trip, I acted like nothing had happened. Although I kept him at arm’s length, I interacted with him at resort parties. He, too, acted like nothing had happened, as if this is how all the single women were welcomed. I even met him and his assistant manager in the bar for drinks one evening with my assigned dive buddy, a French woman I’d just met who spoke no English. But when the two men entered the bar, her stony expression told me she’d been “island welcomed,” too. I tried to hide how ashamed I was by my nonchalance.
After I returned home, it took me several months to define what happened as a “rape.” This was 1994, before open discussions about “date rape,” before it was widely acknowledged that most nonconsensual sex assaults happen between acquaintances — not by the guy in the dark hoodie who attacks unsuspecting women in seedy alleys. I was so relieved when, six months later, my AIDS test was negative.
It took me years to unravel my confusing behavior toward that man following our encounter. To this day, I still have trouble calling it a “rape” because doing so revives my vulnerability. Denial feels safer.
It wasn’t until five years ago, when I read Jon Krakauer’s book about the plague of sexual assaults on America’s college campuses, “Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town,” that I finally got it. Krakauer interviewed David Lisak, a researcher on the psychology of rape victims, whose insights helped me understand my complex and conflicting responses.
Acquaintance rapes often occur in places where a woman has presumed herself to be safe — her dorm room, the family room in her friend’s home, her hotel room — and by someone she had no reason to fear — the captain of the football team, her friend’s boyfriend or the friendly resort manager.
In order to feel safe again, the victim might deny what happened to her by questioning herself about whether she’d been raped or pretending nothing “wrong” had happened. If the rapist held some level of control over her in other ways — say over her career or reputation, for example — she might compartmentalize and minimize what occurred in order to regain her sense of control and safety. In my case, I needed the resort manager’s help to secure transportation off the island to catch my international flight. Interacting with one’s rapist is a way to re-establish normalcy.
It terrifies me now to consider how vulnerable I was back then. I was traveling alone, stuck on an isolated island with a serial rapist who probably told himself he was treating his guests to a fun vacation anecdote. There were no police to call. This was before emails and cell phones. There was no hospital, only a medical clinic attached to the resort. Everyone worked for this man.
It’s no surprise to me now that my body, mind and psyche went into denial. So it doesn’t surprise me that some of the women accusing Weinstein of sexual assault may have retreated into denial as well and continued communicating with this powerful man.
Jurors and judges in these sensitive cases need to be better educated about the variety of unexpected responses victims of sexual assault can have. We used to blame women’s preassault behavior for their assault — their clothing, their level of sobriety, their number of previous sexual partners. Now, we blame women’s post-assault behavior for creating enough reasonable doubt to acquit their perpetrators.
When will we stop blaming the victims?