Does your Outfit Make you a Rapist?

Amid all the revelations of abuse by people like Matt Lauer, Roy Moore and others in the news, I can't help but think of all the abuse going on within the church. There is no less abuse going on in the churches than there is in Hollywood, politics and the news media outlets, it's just kept even quieter.

While there seem to be many reasons this is so blatantly common, there is one common thread that will ensure it will continue: blaming the victims. One person described what she considered provocative dressing as "reverse sexual harassment." She said that women who dress "like current celebrities" are "just as guilty of sexual misconduct as men."

This equates dress with rape.
Wear the wrong outfit and you're guilty of rape, abuse and violence against women??
Oh, my.
NO!

This is wrong.
This attitude is part of the problem.
This attitude fuels a culture of abuse.

As long as men are given this type of pass, they will continue to abuse. Dress doesn't matter in the least. Women in Burqas are raped and abused all the time; it's rampant. Nuns in Habits have been raped and abused.

As long as people in your church have this attitude, you can be sure abuse is going on behind some closed door somewhere in the building, or behind a car in the parking lot, or in a quiet hallway after a youth meeting, and it will continue to go on. I guarantee it. It's happening every single week. And just like ABWE*, church leadership - all made up of men and men, only - will blame the victim. This guarantees it will continue. These men have to keep the women out of leadership in order for their abusive ways to continue.

Get your head out of the sand, people.

The problem is not how women dress. The problem lies with the abuser, in this case, men. The problem is patriarchy, a system that forces women to share part of the blame for the sins of men.

I don't care how someone is dressed, no one has a right to rape, abuse, touch, intimidate and threaten them.

Those who blame the victim on any level are part of the problem.

Fixing this culture of abuse starts with educating our sons that they are entitled to nothing....that sex is not a need....that aggressive behavior will not be tolerated.....that they are not better than women and God did not give them exclusive rights to leadership.

It also starts with teaching our daughters that they are the boss of their own bodies, even after marriage, and they do not "owe" their husbands sex. We have to teach our daughters that their relationship with God is not filtered through their father or husband, that they should have a voice in their church and can refuse to be part of a church that will not allow it, and that they, too, can be leaders.

I have to speak out against this kind of thinking lest any victim anywhere would think I agree with the idea that any victim is partially to blame.

People in prominent positions in conservative Christian organizations try to silence me on this all the time.

(*ABWE is the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism whose prized doctor, Donn Ketcham, created an entire system of abuse in Bangladesh to fuel his pedophilia, abusing nationals as well as fellow missionaries and their children. When the children grew up and started telling their stories, ABWE blamed them, tried to silence them, and wouldn't listen to them, yet exalted the doctor and allowed him to go into private practice in the States with no disclosure. There, he was given free reign to abuse even more victims and is only now, in his eighties, facing the charges. ABWE keeps going as though nothing happened, leaving the victims in their dust and calling themselves righteous.)

~Tricia

More on Fitz. At First Baptist.

I recently wrote a blog post about something that happened to me at First Baptist Church in Laurel, MD. If interested, you can read that post here.

I want to follow up and say this:

Please, for the safety of your children and even your own privacy, be aware that no one there seems to think it's bad that Fitz is not uncomfortable being alone in a ladies room with a woman he does not know.

I was called out over this. I was told I "treated him like trash" and am "hurting the church" by speaking out about this.

Every single decent man in my life has said they would be embarrassed to find they had walked in on a woman in a ladies room. Every single decent man in my life has said they would very quickly leave the room if they walked in on a woman....that it would make them uncomfortable and they would feel terrible.

Did you catch that?

They would leave.....very quickly.....
They would be uncomfortable....
They would feel terrible.....

Not Fitz. He was not a bit uncomfortable.
He didn't feel terrible.
He felt victimized, telling others I "treated him like trash."

He stayed.

I left.

I left while a man stayed in the ladies room.
Doesn't that seem odd and not quite right to you?

He expressed ZERO embarrassment.
He had ZERO discomfort.

He literally stood there, smirking at me.
I had to walk within six inches of him in order to get out....he was blocking the door....he would not move....he stood there smirking.
And, apparently, "I'm hurting the church" to speak up about this.
Nah, the church doesn't need my help; they are hurting themselves just fine.
A "church" that further victimizes a victim while touting the Gospel has missed the Gospel message altogether.

Is he going to walk in on you .......or your daughter...... next?

~Tricia