Girlgirlgirl
Bronze Member
NOTE: I DO NOT MEAN OFFENSE TOWARDS ANYONE'S RELIGION, IF YOU ARE CHRISTIAN OR ANOTHER RELIGION & DON'T LIKE CRITIQUES, READ AT YOUR DISCRETION. I AM SIMPLY LOOKING FOR PEOPLE TO RELATE TO ON THIS TOPIC.
I do not like religion after being sexually assaulted & raped. I kind of didn't prior, and was already toying around with atheism. But I feel like being sexually assaulted & raped makes me even more disgusted with religion than I otherwise would be (talking patriarchal, Abrahamic ones, for me, I was raised very conservatively Christian).
This came about by me having been sexually assaulted & raped as a virgin (although virginity is a social construct), which was symbolic in a way, for me. (I consider myself to have lost my virginity to the first consensual encounter, however). I was surrounded by purity culture in Christian schools my entire life, and after the sexual violence, I have seen how purity culture translates to rape culture.
I feel kind of weird about it in some ways, and a lot of therapists have told me it is a misinterpretation. Obviously, people who have not experienced sexual violence have the privilege of saying it's a misinterpretation. But, to make a long story short, I was sexually assaulted & raped also as a person with a substance use disorder, and people with substance use disorder often unwillingly engage in behaviors "higher risk."
To make a long story short, people have: Not believed me, accused me of making it up because I want to hide my slutty behavior, and blamed me in horrific ways. I have noticed too, that the more conservative Christian people, especially males, feel the need to blame me or not believe me more so than other people. From what I know of rape culture, this comes from the idea that some women are "unrapeable", purity culture promotes the idea of women being responsible for men's reactions to women's behavior (such as clothing), or me caring about being "a slut" enough to want to lie about being raped. There are rampant gender roles, double standards, etcetera within these types of religions. Slut shaming and victim blaming have the same roots. If you hold only women accountable when they participate in consensual sex, why wouldn't it then translate the same to rape? Victim blaming stems from this idea, of holding women to double standards-and I have DEFINITELY seen double standards in abrahamic religions.
It sounds weird, but I am now literally triggered by religions that are patriarchal in nature. The most retraumatizing person I have come into contact with after being sexually assaulted & raped was my recent therapist, who was a very conservative Mormon. He destroyed me mental health entirely & blamed me & traumatized me in ways no one else ever had.
The sexual violence was not even that bad. The bad part was people's response towards it & I've seen their response towards it correlated with more extreme/conservative Christianity. As a result, I definitely can never participate in any patriarchal religion or be around them. It's kind of hard, since my family is pretty religious, but I don't know-I could maybe participate in it, but I also see how if it creates these types of reactions than it will probably hinder women as a group politically, which it does. another problem I have with it, is when I tell therapists this, they just say it's a misinterpretation, which is essentially gaslighting-they do this instead of accepting that their religion supports rape culture and then changing that aspect of it-it makes me kind of more disgusted with the religion-that they can't even accept their part in perpetuating violence against women, since victim blaming results in fewer convictions for perpetrators-making the world less safe! I have tried to go to church, but it pisses me off that the pastor is always male and they like to throw in that abortion is wrong-women's rights issue-hello! I don't know-has anyone else experienced anything like this? if so, what's your experience!
I do not like religion after being sexually assaulted & raped. I kind of didn't prior, and was already toying around with atheism. But I feel like being sexually assaulted & raped makes me even more disgusted with religion than I otherwise would be (talking patriarchal, Abrahamic ones, for me, I was raised very conservatively Christian).
This came about by me having been sexually assaulted & raped as a virgin (although virginity is a social construct), which was symbolic in a way, for me. (I consider myself to have lost my virginity to the first consensual encounter, however). I was surrounded by purity culture in Christian schools my entire life, and after the sexual violence, I have seen how purity culture translates to rape culture.
I feel kind of weird about it in some ways, and a lot of therapists have told me it is a misinterpretation. Obviously, people who have not experienced sexual violence have the privilege of saying it's a misinterpretation. But, to make a long story short, I was sexually assaulted & raped also as a person with a substance use disorder, and people with substance use disorder often unwillingly engage in behaviors "higher risk."
To make a long story short, people have: Not believed me, accused me of making it up because I want to hide my slutty behavior, and blamed me in horrific ways. I have noticed too, that the more conservative Christian people, especially males, feel the need to blame me or not believe me more so than other people. From what I know of rape culture, this comes from the idea that some women are "unrapeable", purity culture promotes the idea of women being responsible for men's reactions to women's behavior (such as clothing), or me caring about being "a slut" enough to want to lie about being raped. There are rampant gender roles, double standards, etcetera within these types of religions. Slut shaming and victim blaming have the same roots. If you hold only women accountable when they participate in consensual sex, why wouldn't it then translate the same to rape? Victim blaming stems from this idea, of holding women to double standards-and I have DEFINITELY seen double standards in abrahamic religions.
It sounds weird, but I am now literally triggered by religions that are patriarchal in nature. The most retraumatizing person I have come into contact with after being sexually assaulted & raped was my recent therapist, who was a very conservative Mormon. He destroyed me mental health entirely & blamed me & traumatized me in ways no one else ever had.
The sexual violence was not even that bad. The bad part was people's response towards it & I've seen their response towards it correlated with more extreme/conservative Christianity. As a result, I definitely can never participate in any patriarchal religion or be around them. It's kind of hard, since my family is pretty religious, but I don't know-I could maybe participate in it, but I also see how if it creates these types of reactions than it will probably hinder women as a group politically, which it does. another problem I have with it, is when I tell therapists this, they just say it's a misinterpretation, which is essentially gaslighting-they do this instead of accepting that their religion supports rape culture and then changing that aspect of it-it makes me kind of more disgusted with the religion-that they can't even accept their part in perpetuating violence against women, since victim blaming results in fewer convictions for perpetrators-making the world less safe! I have tried to go to church, but it pisses me off that the pastor is always male and they like to throw in that abortion is wrong-women's rights issue-hello! I don't know-has anyone else experienced anything like this? if so, what's your experience!
