Why I proudly marched in the Auckland Slutwalk

The uproar of negative response toward Slutwalk is very much an indicator that it hits on something sensitive to many. I have had a lot of people tell me: ‘I don’t really agree with the cause’, without seeming to understand what the cause was. I have had people outright tell me that I am an idiot for having anything to do with it. Before reading this, I suggest reading the information about why it started, and maybe watching some footage of the protest:

And this

A Christian take on Slutwalk:

Slutwalk has become a world-wide phenomenon because the issue it tackles is global. Rape occurs everywhere, and the stigma put on women who are raped is a world-wide problem. Slutwalk is about breaking down the myth that women are more likely to be raped when they dress ‘like sluts’, and shifting the onus from the victim to the rapist.

We are conditioned in how we think about gender and sexuality from a very early age. I can remember at around age 5 being told by my father ‘Don’t let boys touch you’. It was never put into any kind of context, and when I asked why I was just told ‘Don’t.’ From the age of 5 I knew that if a boy touched me, it was my fault because I shouldn’t have let him. My dad wasn’t being a terrible parent, he was trying to keep me safe. I’m sure this style of parenting was pretty normal. It is not easy for parents to talk to their kids about sex.

My parents never openly talked about sexuality. We were absolutely educated about sex from an early age. We read ‘Where Do We Come From?’ and knew all the basics, and we definitely knew about stranger danger. But aside from a talk about puberty, there was never any open dialogue about sexuality, desire and our bodies. I knew that my body was taboo and that it was important that I didn’t let boys touch it. I didn’t know why it was important and when I was sexually assaulted around the age of 11, I said nothing because I assumed it was my fault because I 'let' a boy touch me.

In retrospect, the problem with my not saying anything was not only that it affected me, but that it also let this boy know that this behaviour was ok. He probably knew deep down it wasn’t but there weren’t any consequences for his actions. I imagine this is not an unusual event. 90% of rape/sexual assault cases go unreported. In accepting a society where the onus of sexual assault is on the victim, we are also accepting a society where our boys think its ok to sexually violate girls.

I have been told that dressing in revealing clothing is like; ‘hold(ing) a piece of steak out in front of a hungry lion’. From reading backlash to Slutwalk in the papers, I can see this attitude is prevalent. In saying and believing this, we are saying to our boys not only that it is within their nature to rape women, but also that it is understandable that they assault women who dress or act provocatively. Those who support this notion say it is a form of rape prevention. To me this seems more like an open invitation to punish women who dress or act like ‘sluts’.

Despite this, there is no evidence to suggest that women who dress provocatively are more likely to be raped than women who dress conservatively. As my friend Lucy bluntly put it the other night ‘If that was the case, you’d be getting raped all the time’. I am not getting raped all the time. This is because rape is about power and control, vulnerability and opportunity. It is not about sex. This myth reinforces the idea that women who are comfortable, confident or proud about their sexuality should be punished. It reinforces the double standard of the ‘slut’ and the ‘stud’, which is widely accepted as an antiquated notion. This is not any kind of equality.

I have read much backlash from women from the earlier generations of feminists about this series of protests. I have read that: ‘Slutwalk has set the women’s movement back 50 years’. I always thought feminism was about gender equality and women’s rights… The problem clearly, is with the name, and the concept of claiming back the word ‘slut’. In claiming back the word ‘slut’, we are claiming back our right to exist as sexual beings. You don’t need to dress ‘slutty’ to want or understand this right. There is nothing wrong with modesty. What is wrong is for women to feel shame about their bodies and about having sexual feelings. A woman should feel comfortable as a ‘slut’ or a ‘prude’, and should not be judged for choosing to be either or anything else on the scale between. I am very sad that many women can’t see past the word ‘slut’ to the truth that we are fighting for the same cause.

One in four women and one in eight men are likely to experience sexual violence in their lifetime. That is a lot of people. Those people are people you know. Within my extended family I know of five women over a range of generations who have been raped, or sexually assaulted. Statistically, there are probably more. In every case I know of, the offender was someone they knew. It is not just people with severe mental issues that are sexually offending. Think about those statistics and then think about how many perpetrators of sexual violence you probably know. It's not a very nice thing to think about. Something has to change.

We live in a culture where sexual violence is a hidden, but common thing. To me, this is absolutely unacceptable. We need to change that culture, and we need to back it up with policy that supports victims of rape. In New Zealand around one out of one hundred rapists will serve any kind of penalty for this crime. We can change this culture by making small changes. We can change what we are teaching our children and how we think and talk about women. We can create a safe environment so that people can report their rapists without fear. We can stop saying ‘she was asking for it’, because by the very definition of rape, she wasn’t.