Day 4,083—Still Hot II—

 

I didn’t start until a couple of hours after I woke up. Not a habit I like getting into, but at the same time, I was productive this morning, and when I went to run, I stayed off the main roads as much as possible to avoid the noisy traffic.

         I was still thinking about the Ohio State sexual abuse scandal documentary I watched last night. It is the only documentary I have ever seen that focuses on men being sexually abused. What makes me so mad about the whole thing isn’t that it happened, but the way that men who come forward with sexual assault claims are treated. No one believes them, and on top of that, they are mocked for “letting” it happen. When I was younger, I wouldn’t have believed that I could be sexually assaulted because I was a man and the way society's norms impacted my perception of who I am.

         The only reason Michael Jackson got away with it is that he abused boys. The only reason that the Boy Scouts and the Catholic Church got away with it for so long is because they abused young boys. Our society does not have the same sympathy for boys who are abused as it does for girls and young women. I’ve had multiple conversations with people who have told me with a straight face that they don’t believe that a man can be raped by a woman. The disparity blows my mind, which leads to those who are abused to live lives filled with drug addiction and mental illness, but what else does anyone expect when they come out about their abuse, they’re shamed for not being “men” and “letting it happen.” It is truly disgusting. If Michael Jackson had abused young girls, his legacy might have actually been tarnished, but abuse 100s of boys and no one cares. And society cares even less about men who are sexually abused. The patriotic and social norms are bad for men, just like they’re bad for women. People have to wake up and realize that these cultural biases hurt everyone and only help the abusers.