25 Sep “Think About It”

Being on exchange at San Francisco State, I am obviously a new student. Every new student is obliged to follow an online course to prevent sexual harassment and rape on campus. When first opening the course called “Think About It”, students are shown a video of Luoluo Hong, the Title XI coordinator at San Francisco State University. What motivated her to become the Title XI coordinator, is that she is a survivor of campus rape herself. I find it so important that she mentions this, as a statement like this de-stigmatizes survivors: You should not feel ashamed of something that happened to you. Another important aspect of this video is how Hong encourages all students to actively participate in ending sexual violence, instead of just taking the easy way out and feeling like the problem has nothing to do with you. 

The course asks you a few very personal questions that may be triggering for some people. This is definitely a downside of the program: Everyone is supposed to take it but for some individuals it may be very tough to be confronted with their past experiences in this way. However, a few very important themes are being touched upon, for example the course explains how emotional abuse is a form of control that your partner is installing over you. The course acknowledges the influences of traditional gender roles on power dynamics in straight relationships, the symptoms of toxic relationships, and how abusive relationships shouldn’t be seen as a work in progress but should be left as soon as you can safely do so. It also introduces the idea of rape culture, which I believe is a vital term to know if you really wish to understand how to go about rape accusations and victim blaming.

In the middle of the course, some very valuable points are made: Students are provided with tips regarding helping your friends who might be in an abusive relationship. These are the ways in which you can help a friend going through an abusive relationship:

1. “Speak up. Let your friend know that you care and are concerned about their safety.
2. Respect their agency. Understand that you cannot force your friend to get help.
3. Listen without judgment. Do not dismiss their concerns as invalid or foolish.
4. Connect them to the outside. Try to get them communicating and engaged in activities with other friends and family.
5. Help them to find resources. Connect them to information about the signs and symptoms of abuse.
6. Be there for them. Support your friend during and after the breakup. A strong support system is essential to recovering from abuse.”

Another very important part of the course was the segment about consent. Consent is a concept that can be difficult to grasp, as sexual experiences and situations can be very different and call for different understandings of consent. The concept “acquiantance assault” is introduced in this part, which ties into the concept of consent very well. Acquaintance assault means assault committed by someone the victim knows personally. In cases of acquaintance assault, the actor mistakes the familiarity with intimacy and feels entitled to sexual action. Oftentimes, the victim is desensitized with the familiarity: “This occurs when the target feels comfortable with the actor and has come to regard the intrusive actions as less threatening. The target of the desensitization may feel somewhat uneasy but convinces themselves that the feeling is unfounded.” (quoted from the course material)

Not only does the course engage in prevention of sexual assault, it also reacts to victim blaming which is a topic that is largely overlooked in discussions about sexual assault. The experiences or survivors are fortunately prioritized and it creates a feeling of being understood and acknowledged. The course states, for example: “Survivors of sexual assault often feel a ton of conflicting emotions, especially if they knew their attacker. Some people may even maintain a relationship with their attacker as they try to come to terms with what happened.” Also, a number of hotlines are mentioned that could help survivors deal with what happened. For me the course was helpful and important, but sometimes very intense. Some things felt familiar and this made me react in an emotional way.

Even though the questions and articles included in the course were confronting, I realize how incredibly important this online course is and how much I missed this at my home university. Reaching out to my other friends back home in The Netherlands, they told me they also had received insufficient information about this matter from their university. I feel very motivated to see how I could change that! I made a poll on the Instagram page of my zine, to research how much my peers in The Netherlands would appreciate better education about sexual harassment. As a next step I’m going to look into the organization of my University, and see who I can contact about this matter.

Written by Tessel ten Zweege