The news her in The Netherland has been filled this past week around sexual intimidation and harming against women after a TV production called the Voice received a charge for sexual assault. Which then snowballed into hundreds of women speaking up and expressing their traumatic sexual experiences. I had written a post about it in Dutch on Facebook. But I feel called to share it in English too so my whole community can read it too.
***Trigger warning!!
Sexual intimidation and harming against women is a social problem that not only affects the Netherlands but all the world.
And it’s about time we start seeing and feeling and chancing it!!
All of our media; tv, movies, magazines, commercials, social media is steeped in it.
In a subtle way….
The same way that women don’t mention it, don’t speak up, keep silent, push it away, down playing it.
Because otherwise you will be labeled as:
Difficult
Neurotic
Sick
Crazy
A bitch
A witch
A whore….
We women have been indoctrinated for thousands of years to be the good-girl.
Noooo… not women... but girls…
To be the good-natured, easy-going, sweet-girl that doesn’t speak up, does what others expect from her, willingly follows, is never difficult, doesn’t express what she desires or needs, and never stand up for herself.
A lot of us think we have left tis conditioning behind us and that the woman of today is the emancipated woman, who stands in her power. But the patters of ‘the-good-girl’ goes very very deep. And is still today very much influencing EVERY woman.
Now that the women in the Netherlands are openly expressing their traumatic experiences, every woman living in the Netherlands realizes she can write down a list of things where her boundaries where crossed, her NO! was not listened to, and no consent was agreed on:
The degrading jokes about women on the daily radio show, where a group of men are laughing about loudly. Cause these are the most funny right?!
As a young teenager being on the beach with my friends seeing my bestie get touched by some random dude and she freezes up. When I stand up for her, I am a bitch and a cunt, cause she didn’t say she didn’t want it!
Being bullyragged for Kankerhoer (a Whore who has cancer… yeh.. I know… the swearwords here are horrific) by a guy who drives his car so fast, while I tried to cross the street. I stop to make sure I am safe. He stops his car, takes the trouble to open his window and throws these words at me: “What are you standing there, Kankerhoer!” (that was last week by the way)
As a 24 year old going out dancing in Amsterdam and when I got home to find out there a sperm spots on my pants! WTF! Was that wat was happening when it was so crowded and that weird dude came and dance so close and I couldn’t move away?!!
A girlfriend of mine calls me, cause she is at a metro station and feels unsafe. She is frozen and doesn’t know what to do, and this guy is touching her, no one around her helps her out! While we are on the phone, and this guy continues to touch her, I coach her what to say, how to say it and what to do to get out of the freeze mode and to make sure this guy f*cks off!!
Sitting in the park during the day time enjoying the sun, and a random man comes and sit next to me and start touching me, and he things it is normal and okay.
Walking home at night time with my house keys between my knuckles. Always prepared and being alert for a possible assault or unwanted intimidation.
Receiving unconsented dick-picks on social media from strange guys.
Men that you date with or have a relationship with that get angry or feel rejected and upset or even aggressive when you don’t want to have sex.
The primary school teacher who slaps your bum.
Whistled after and when you don’t respond, having them shout derogatory comments at you.
The men that pinch your butt in the pub.
The men that can’t hear a no and get angry and aggressive.
The neighbor that I wish happy new year (out of politeness) and sticks his tongue in my mouth.
A partner that pushes his dick in my asshole unasked and without warning while we are intimate, and when I scream STOP, he pushes one more time.
A partner who gets angry and takes it personal when I don’t get wet within 5 minutes when he wants to f*ck me. And then he has the guts to tell me that I am not normal, cause all women should get wet within 5 minutes!
The man in the bus who feels like he has the right to touch my breast while I fell asleep on the bus.
When you move through life this way, then the only possible way is to turn off your feeling.
To not feel any more
To distance yourself from yourself
To put others on first place and yourself on last.
This way of being has been passed down through the female generations.
It has become part of our genes, thousands of years long!
It is the imprint of the patriarchal system that has made our female lives unsafe for centuries.
In most western places on this planet we are not being punished publicly, or put on the stake if we stand up for ourselves or don’t want to subject us to a man.
BUT we are STILL
Misused
Humiliated
Scolded
Called names
Abused
Raped
And even killed
It is a structural social societal problem!
It’s a problem of all of us. A problem that influences us all.
But it is also much more than a problem, it is the trail of TRAUMA.
A thousand years old deep traumatic wound!
A trauma wound that in my practice as a sexual psychologist and female pleasure expert I encounter daily.
Women with a diversity of problems and feel they are NO WHERE being
Heard
Seen
Understood
Helped.
Women that feel broken
Women that are afraid their relationship will end if they say no to sex
Women that die to have sex, but their vagina experiences horrendous pain
Women that are certain there is something wrong with them
Women that think their body is broken
Women that blame themselves of all that has happened to them.
This is not the problem of the woman, this is a social cultural problem!
These are the tracks of thousands of years of patriarchy.
This is TRAUMA!
Patriarchal trauma.
Generational trauma.
Trauma that’s been played out through a system in which women are inferior.
Trauma that has been passed on from mother to daughter, from grandmother to granddaughter.
We have been blinded, we are not even consciously aware of the trauma we carry, it has become normal…
Part of our society…
When women experience sexual intimidation, unacceptable behavior, we shove it aside with:
“Well, that’s what men do”
“Oh well those things just happen”
“Oh yeah, that’s part of it”
“Oh, that didn’t mean anything”
“That’s boys”
“It wasn’t that bad”
“Get over it”
“You asked for it yourself”
“You shouldn’t have worn that short skirt”
All assumptions, limiting beliefs, and conditioning that have been passed on to us. Which has a huge influence on how we interpret our experience. And distort our judgement.
It is something that creeps through all the layers of our society.
It breaks our relationships
And lets our women suffer in burn-out.
This stress, trauma and tension drips into the next generation.
It is time we become conscious of the derogatory, consent-less and degrading behavior towards women. And that we start to see how deep these wounds of trauma have left their mark.
We need more than just emancipation and feminism. We need to repair the sacred men women relationship.
A relationship of reciprocal communication, consent, safety, honor, and equivalence.
It is time we start to see this, feel this and change this….
And the time is NOW!
By: Marianne van Katwijk
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