What Donald Trump’s Win Means For Sexual Assault Survivors

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In light of Trump’s Presidency after all of the sexual assault allegations against him, my thoughts go to the women who once had him in control of their body, and he is now in control of their country.

I wanted to send a message of support to every man, woman and child who has ever felt unsafe in their own skin as well as demonstrating why this does matter and is relevant.

It’s nearly one whole year since my own assault in my own home. Since then I have spent 6 months pretending it never happened and I am totally fine, swiftly moving onto the rather public mental breakdown of summer 2016. I want to emphasize that the most mundane of situations can send my brain back in it’s own personal time machine with only one setting:

Hear his name? I’m trying to get his attention, maybe he doesn’t know what he’s doing

Wear a scarf? I can’t breathe, the pressure on my neck is too much, I’m going to pass out

Decorated my own bathroom with fake blood for Halloween? He’s finally gone, there’s blood everywhere, what just happened?

I can’t even fathom how awful it would be if I had to see his face every day in everything I do, newspapers, TV, Facebook.

My friends are worried that sexual assaults are going to be on the rise, as sexual assault allegations appear to have no impact on one’s career. And for people who were already worried as campus rapes are never out of the public eye — with Brock Turner essentially only receiving a slap on the wrist for his crime in case it ruined his career — while another accused man becomes President.

While we’re trying to tell our girls to stay safe, we’re talking about telling our boys about consent, but in reality, yes they’re being told what consent is, but at the same time we’re showing both boys and girls that it doesn’t matter whether the girl gives consent, your life will go on anyway with no consequences.

I propose that instead of talking about keeping women safe and teaching men about consent (C’mon guys, everyone knows about consent, it’s not rocket science) we create a world where we shut up and show that actions have consequences, that we won’t tolerate these crimes regardless of how good the man is at sport, or whether he’s the President of the United States. Until this happens, nobody can feel safe.