#WhyIMarch

In the past three days I've seen various facebook posts praising the women's march on Washington and sister marches all over the world. And I've seen some not so praising ones too, ones that said it was an adult temper tantrum, liberals were crying for not getting their way, complaining that their signs were vulgar, that they needed to grow up and let it go, that marching doesn't do any good and all those women should've volunteered instead, that women in other countries have it worse, and that there was no need to protest because "Trump hasn't even done anything yet."

I get it, y'all. People disagree about a lot of things, and the big ones are front and center of this issue. I don't feel like I need to persuade anyone to protest, but I wonder if I might explain to you why I participated in our local march?

#WhyIMarch

Do I agree with every woman there on every issue? Of course not. Do I hate Donald Trump? No. Do I think that all conservative Republicans are racist, ignorant, hillbillies? Not even a little bit (and I hope you won't assume that all Democrats are vying for killing babies either). Do I think the march was perfect? No. But I do think it was important.

I am a therapist. For seven years I worked exclusively with child victims of crime at a local non-profit, providing counseling and advocacy following the crimes. Seventy-five percent of the kids that I worked with during that time had reported a sexual assault. Many of them were not taken seriously by their parents, teachers, friends, perpetrators, or even law enforcement. Many of their stories were minimized, trivialized, or turned into jokes. Women and even children are blamed for their own assault or have the validity of their story questioned. People routinely ask what she was wearing when she was assaulted, as though somehow a particular outfit is an invitation for sexual advances. (This should also be offensive to men, by the way, because it assumes that a man's natural state is rapist and that he has no control over his impulses). People laugh off unwanted sexual behavior as boys being boys and locker room talk. Ladies and gentlemen, rape culture exists.

Toula Drimonis says the term rape culture "was designed to show the ways in which society blamed victims of sexual assault and normalized male sexual violence through jokes, TV, music, advertising, laws, words and imagery that make violence against women and their overt sexualization seem practically normal."

The Boy, front and center with the organizer

I've sat with women and children as they've questioned their worth after an assault. I've made safety plans with women who were suicidal, not sure they could go on after being raped. Because of the confusing and conflicting messages women get about their sexuality from our culture, it is normal for women to question whether or not they are partly to blame for their own sexual assaults. If a man is sitting in a bar and someone comes in and chats with him and then punches him in the face, no one asks what he was wearing to deserve that.

I have much respect for the office of President of the United States, but we have just elected a promoter of rape culture. I have voted Republican and I have voted Democratic, so this is not just about politics. By talking about grabbing women by their genitals, and laughing it off as locker room talk, he is contributing to the culture that makes this seem okay, and men all over the country feel like the jokes are okay, like the victim blaming is okay, like the minimizing is okay. I want a culture where grabbing women by their genitals doesn't seem okay. I want a culture where the words gay and black and latino and women are valued just as much as the words straight, white, men. Did one march make all my dreams come true? No. If I had stayed home would it have mattered? Probably not. But if the millions of women all over the world had stayed home, there wouldn't be all these posts on facebook. At the bare minimum we've started a discussion.

Now in my work I often do consultations and classes on how to talk to kids about sex, and what's developmentally appropriate sexual behavior and sexual knowledge. Two key components of that workshop are to teach kids the appropriate labels for their genitals, and to start talking about consent early. That means that my boys know the formal names for body parts, and they know that they're private. So I explained to The Boy what the march was about, and together we made a sign.

It says I know not to touch other people's private parts (PS- they're called vaginas). 

He was so into it. All he knows is that Trump said something that sounded like he doesn't respect other people's private parts, but he wanted to help. He helped me with the sign, and then he very seriously asked if I could help him draw some private parts on the sign. I do not want to create shame around private parts, but I'm not trying to show up at a women's march with a poster of pictures of penises. So we ran out of time for homemade genitals. 😆

We loaded up and went to the march, signs in hand. The atmosphere was encouraging, positive, hopeful. There was no violence. There was no conflict. We saw a lot of friends. I saw at least a half dozen clients or former clients. We made new friends, and people asked if they could take a picture of our signs. We chanted "Love wins! Love wins!" and the boys ran and laughed. BeYoYo called it a parade, and he was right. What a beautiful way to show our support. 

Did I personally send a message to Trump on Saturday that I find his behavior and words inappropriate and unacceptable? Maybe not. But I sent a message to every sexual assault survivor, to my community, and to my children that I do. I also talked to my children about the fact that we were being peaceful. I told them that it's like how they're allowed to disagree with me or their teachers, but they aren't allowed to hit us or scream at us. 

Love wins! Love wins!

I support your right to disagree with our marching, I hope you'll support our right to disagree with rape culture. And for those of you who think it didn't do anything, it at least got you to read this post. #WhyIMarch