#rape

What I think was hardest for me to realize was that he had tried each time to stop himself. He had killed animals, taking lesser lives to keep from killing a child ↗

— Alice Sebold

#family #heaven #murder #pergatory #personal-growth

I don’t believe rape is inevitable or natural. If I did, I would have no reason to be here. If I did, my political practice would be different than it is. Have you ever wondered why we [women] are not just in armed combat against you? It’s not because there’s a shortage of kitchen knives in this country. It is because we believe in your humanity, against all the evidence. ↗

— Andrea Dworkin

#nature

The survivor movements were also challenging the notion of a dysfunctional family as the cause and culture of abuse, rather than being one of the many places where abuse nested. This notion, which in the 190s and early 198s was the dominant understanding of professionals characterised the sex abuser as a pathetic person who had been denied sex and warmth by his wife, who in turn denied warmth to her daughters. Out of this dysfunctional triad grew the far-too-cosy incest dyad. Simply diagnosed, relying on the signs: alcoholic father, cold distant mother, provocative daughter. Simply resolved, because everyone would want to stop, to return to the functioning family where mum and dad had sex and daughter concentrated on her exams. Professionals really believed for a while that sex offenders would want to stop what they were doing. They thought if abuse were decriminalised, abusers would seek help. The survivors knew different. P5 ↗

— Beatrix Campbell

#abusers #child-abuse #crime #criminal #dysfunctional-family

I forgive you," I said. I said what I had to. I would die by pieces to save myself from real death. ↗

— Alice Sebold

#rape #violence #death

I don't know what London's coming to — the higher the buildings the lower the morals. ↗

— Noël Coward

#buildings #cities #london #morality #skyscrapers

Many Survivors blame themselves for the abuse and continue to feel responsible and guilty for anything bad that happens to them or to other people they know. Survivors often feel bad about themselves and different from other people. They therefore isolate themselves from other people and avoid making close friendships. ↗

— Carolyn Ainscough

#child-abuse #isolation #rape #sexual-abuse #survivors

My advice for a person who's just fallen out of a skyscraper window is, Flap your arms...faster. ↗

— Jarod Kintz

#flap #fly #funny #humor #skyscraper

Ceres wanted a united front in the plant war." "The plant war," Percy said. "You're going to arm all the little grapes with tiny assault rifles? ↗

— Rick Riordan

#grapes #humor #riffles #war #funny

I was probably never going to get to do the kind of things dramatically that I really wanted to do, so I returned to theater from time to time, and to write, and produce. It's by no means sour grapes. ↗

— Larry Hovis

#from time to time #get #going #grapes #i

Ninety-six per cent of juvenile prostitutes are fugitives from abusive domestic situations; 66 per cent began working before they turned 16. (Prostitution is their only perceived means of survival.) Millions of children work as prostitutes around the world. A third are male. One study revealed that over 50 per cent of prostitutes are the children of alcoholics or substance abusers, and 90 per cent are deflowered through incest or rape. Ninety-one per cent of prostitutes do not speak of the abuse. (The truth of life is told through the language of behavior.) Abused children suffer Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, guilt, self-destructive impulses, suspicion, fear. Seventy-five per cent of prostitutes attempt suicide. (Imagine their scrapbook of memories.) ↗

— Antonella Gambotto-Burke

#children-of-alcoholics #fear #guilt #incest #juvenile-prostitutes