Obvious this is going to require a very tight content and trigger warning for mentions of incidents pertaining to the Cornell 7 and discusses topics that some may find triggering.
CW/TW
Disclaimer: I am deliberately changing some of the details and direct connections to protect the identities of the survivors involved.
I wish that I could say that I’m shocked by the Cornell Seven, but I am not.
I’m not shocked by the frat culture of rape culture because this is something that has gone on for far too long.
For the past 26 years, I spent trying to agitate for justice for the victims of a man who was associated with a particular fraternity and friends group — he was notorious for sexually assaulting, unconscious women at frat parties.
Mind you, much of this happened before I had met this person and for those few months before I found out what he was like he seemed like a decent person after which I have always referred to him as TRM, which stands for 'That Rapist Motherfucker".
Rewinding by a few years, I had found out that a friend of mine had been sexually assaulted at a frat party and years later when she told me the name of TRM -- I was in shock a this man had been to my home and to many of parties that I hosted as well as having been at many parties that I attended at other people’s houses and this particular fraternity. To my greater horror, I remember pouring a very drunk friend into his car for a ride home after a party. I later spoke to her to make sure nothing happened to her. But, what happened to my friend was a pattern and they were not the only one.
I brought this to the attention of the people I was closest with in this friend circle some of which were unaware, but others knew. What did I find out? She wasn’t the only one — wasn’t the first wasn’t the last I knew at least several others who had very similar experiences with this person. This was out of people I knew and was comfortable talking to about this. I can only assume that there were probably many more.
It would seem to be that reasonable thing to do when a rapist is outed in your friends group is to ostracized and the rapist. Perhaps I’m a bit autistically naïve in thinking that the most logical course of action however, I was wrong.
I’ve heard all the excuses — oh everyone was doing drugs. Oh everyone was drunk... Everyone was high and you know these things happen you know gray areas of consent.... oh, it’s too hard to oust him from the friends group... or buyers remorse of a subpar drunken hook up. I heard the same excuses year after year and those years bled into decades, but it’s OK. He found Jesus and got married and apparently stopped raping people. I wonder if she knows?
It goes deeper, though, those from that friends group that were the closest to him would harass some of his known victims for “lying” about being sexually assaulted by this fine upstanding citizen. I don’t know what the situations were for the other victims of this person, but the lengths that were gone through to protect that rapist motherfucker are astoundingly tone deaf at best and horrifically, enabling unsafe situations in which women were harmed and then made excuses about it.
Now, if you know me, you know that I’m not one to keep my mouth shut about anything so I made it known to him that I knew I knew what he did to my friend. I knew what he did to those women. I stood my ground. I wanted him to be uncomfortable and that I had shifted the power.
Then there was one party sometime after and I was standing in a room with at least eight other people in a circle in which that motherfucker dead ass looked me in the eyes and said “I could fuck you anytime I want and there’s nothing you could do to stop it” and no one said a goddamn thing and they all knew that they looked the other way — that is called being complicit. I was threatened with sexual violence by a known predator and no one said a goddamn thing. I spent the rest of the party with a close male friend who was talking me down from my will to unalive him right then and there. Many years later when I told him why - he said something to the extent of 'shit if I knew I would have helped you hide the body if I hadn’t done it myself."
While he never showed up another party that I hosted -- I did have to unfortunately share spaces with him in which he would show up at shows and parties, but nothing ever changed. I’ve agitated time and time again, and even after I moved out of the city I still agitate about it, even though I’m not connected with most of those people anymore I still agitate about it. I still want him to face a single damned consequence with regards to his victims or like maybe make amends for threatening me with sexual violence?
Seeing people talking about the Cornell 7 acting like it happened in a void when they know that they willingly protected a fucking rapist over his victims. Now generally speaking, in my experience as a party host and party girl most people don’t pass out at parties buck ass naked so these women were fully clothed. He had to remove their clothes to assault them. That took some semblance of cognitive decision making, effort and intention.
The last time I saw this person was at a mutual friends funeral several years ago and it’s an odd place to be in a place of mourning someone who died suddenly and unexpectedly and then also wanting to beat the living shit out of that rapist motherfucker or at least pull his wife aside and tell her. He also arranged the after funeral gathering for friends and family. I could not attend for the obvious reasons. I’m not gonna drink, even though person is married and found Jesus I ain’t trusting that shit.
And this is something that has been re-triggered through the me too movement or believe women. They were just hashtag optics and we learned nothing. the literal rapist fuck fest that is the United States government and now the Cornell seven amongst a whole host of other things that have happened over the decades, and I still sit here, asking myself asking you…
If someone came up to you and said, I was sexually assaulted by this TRM person and your responses to deny it say that person’s lying — you’re complicit. When you brush it off as it was a party time, everyone was drunk and doing drugs and these things happen -- You are complicit. When it’s too hard to ostracized someone from a shared friend circle of which a lot of those people knew what he did and others were agitating for it to -- yep complicit. I’m wasn't the only one, but the choice was made that it was too hard to ostracized the TRM from the greater group -- you are complicit.
And a lot of these arguments seem to fall back on victim blaming that’s the oldest one in the book. What was she wearing? Oh, she was drinking well she went to that party. You know blame blame blame the victim not the rapist like what the fuck?
The most common argument, I see amongst people debating this usually men is the assumption that if one woman has lied about being sexually assaulted then all women have lied about being sexual assaulted and that is the one little thing that will balance the or tip the burden of proof into the side of the perpetrator. I know a lot of people who have been sexually assaulted, molested and raped, and in all those instances, only one was fabricated.
Until the day that rapist motherfucker breathes his last breath, I will carry this with me and upon his death, I will celebrate. I don’t say that lightly nor easily.
The pervasiveness of the rape culture undercurrent affects us all in our communities, and that includes Witchcraft, Occult, New Age, and Metaphysical communities across the spectrum. This is very predominant in the Left-hand Path where particular men associated with a particular group and platform, deny spousal abuse and welcoming known sexual predators and pedophiles turning everyone in favor of the abuser and against the abused and ostracizing them from the community over and over again
I love the Left-hand Path, but there’s a reason I’m a solitary practitioner with my partner. There’s way too much toxicity in any of the communities and the things that are allowed and the things that I have seen the men in those communities will always protect each other at the detriment of the women. I’ve seen it time and time again of abuse allegations and the women are the ones run out of town while the abusers are still platformed and protected by their mindless simps and masses who would rather cancel an abused woman, then a predator who happens to be a man.
Much of this is why I disassociated with a large swath of the Left-hand Path communities as a whole -- it’s a boundary. It’s a protection and it’s me standing my ground saying I will not tolerate this. I will not be subjected to this abuse and again if you know me, I’m not one to shut up at any given time
When I stood by a colleague who left an abusive marriage and watched as her abuser trashed her reputation to the point, she left the community entirely, but those of us who stayed friends with her. We’re villainized. I was now a "fat feminazi" for continuing to be friends with her. Did anyone call out that toxic behavior in my defense? or for her? No! did anyone do anything to protect an abused woman? No -- what happened was what always happens in these situations the abuser is protected, and the onus of the events falls upon the abused, and those who stand up for them because somehow in this equation, we are the problem, not the rape culture that allows these things to pervade and persist it’s those of us fighting against it speaking out we are the problem apparently.
These are things I wanted to talk about they’re hard for me to talk about at times, but all of our stories connect a tapestry that illustrates time and time again that rape culture exists, and there is no measure to protect us from it so we have to protect ourselves by any means possible because. And that’s not a threat to any particular person just saying, but if they happen to find themselves taking a long-term dirt nap again, I will celebrate as I will celebrate the demise eventually of that rapist, motherfucker. Do I feel good and celebrating this? No, it’s not the kind of celebration that brings you joy it’s the kind of celebration that brings you closure and peace and feeling safe.
And what this says of me? I’m the type of friend that will fight for your justice even if you don’t know about it or if we haven’t seen each other in decades. I won’t forget nor give up.
Until then WE ARE ALL JANE DOE.