A person in a position of power once asked this. They had survivors of s-a write down 5 positives about being a survivor. This seemed so dystopian to me.
I can’t say anything to them, now. But, to any teacher, parent, therapist, dr, etc, I want you to ask yourself:
What makes a “survivor?” The fact that they’re alive? What distinguishes them from everybody else who is living for them to have this title? The s-a, right?
When you tell a survivor to “write down the positives of being a survivor,” you’re really asking them, “how did you benefit from being s-a’ed? What do you appreciate about what this person did to you? How did they help you?”
I want you to think about that. It doesn’t matter what you’ve been instructed to do. This is sexist, apologist indocttination. And it’s down-right abusve.
Comments
The benefit of being a survivor is that it is better than being a murder victim, in spite of what some cultures believe.
Expecting anyone to come up with anything else is just adding to the trauma.
I hate crap like this. This and “post traumatic growth” – if you don’t magically grow into a better person after being raped then it’s implied you failed somehow because “that woman over there did it!”
That’s so gross.
It’s so fucked up when you’re a kid too. Like there’s supposed to be something you’re thankful for, like you’re not allowed to be angry and hateful. Like you should be grateful just to be alive and to grow and be inspired.
In my IOP I was in once, they literally asked the women SAed by their own fathers to forgive them for their sickness and find the things they had in common as addicts and, obviously, rapists. I refuse to participate and had to sit in a separate room I was so livid. Shit like this is everywhere in recovery. Just like how the 13th step is basically a term for SA (there’s a very good documentary called the 13th step about this)
It sick. It’s not okay to ask victims/survivors to tie their recovery to relating with their attacker. Their abuser. And it’s EVERYWHERE
I think finding support and community is what’s positive. Not the trauma itself. That aspect is weird as fuck to say.
What’s a positive about being a survivor? Literally nothing
My trauma gave me nothing but ptsd, mental health issues and probably MS
All of my trauma led to decisions that gave me more trauma until the ultimate trauma of having brain surgery.
My life has been really hard and I don’t feel grateful or positive about any of the things that have happened to me, I prayed in the hospital that I had brain cancer and not MS because if I had brain cancer I could die
And I am doing better now, but honestly? My whole life would have been much much better without all the trauma.
“Please find the positives about having had your leg blown off.”
It’s broken windows economics, applied to trauma.
I hate the term “survivor” like men assaulting women is as uncontrollable as cancer or a natural disaster.
No other crime has people telling victims they are survivors. No, I’m a victim of a crime and the man who did this to me is a criminal, not an act of nature.
Calling yourself a victim is couched as taking back power, but really all it’s doing is stepping back from holding rapists accountable.
“yeah but what did I do right?“
🤬🤮
Some people do come to a view that there are positives about their traumatic experience but it is deeply personal to each person and comes from within the person authentically, and should never be assumed could/would happen to anyone else.
Asking people what are the positives suggests that there are some available/applicable to them. It’s giving CBT gaslighting. It’s a cheap solution and one that requires nothing of anyone else. Responsibility gets passed back to the survivor. Pain is individualised, when it should be seen as personal and so treated with respect, and also seen as communal, and political because it is a pain experienced by so many and would be experienced so much less if the law and policy changed.
Oh good, we are discussing this. Once, a therapist told me to list out ways I can avoid being raped again, and when I told that story HEREI was told “well duh, how else can they help you to feel safe again?” Reader, I was raped over a decade as a child, but even if that was not the case, it’s fucked up.
And therapists ABSOLUTELY BELIEVE that as long as you fail to forgive and become stronger and better and faster and smarter, you are “unhealed”. They and society expect you to gaslight yours3lf until you become un-raped and the community can interact with you without being reminded of the crimes committed against you, because that is so unpleasant FOR THEM.
Oh, and like with religion, if you “fail” at therapy it’s your fault. You didn’t do the work, you didn’t travel 5 hours away to see the “right” therpaist, etc ad nauseum. You didn’t pray right, basically.