This is a long and involved story that started about two years ago, but I will skip all the details to get to what is bothering me. The summation is that my dear friend, myself, and three other girls that we know of had questionably consensual sex with the same guy at different times. I say questionably consensual because there were many different mitigating circumstances (alcohol, emotional manipulation, persistence etc) that when taken one at a time are just a one night bad mistake but taken in context of all five of us create a pattern.
I have been calling what happened to me rape for a year now. I have mentioned it to a few friends, and cried drunk about it with a few other friends. I was scared to call it rape without prosecuting, but it's an important part of my healing process to admit that it was rape and talk about it with my friends who I trust. This was all well and good until last week. My friend mentioned above was drinking with a group of girls she trusted and let out the R-word accidentally in a very small group and immediately refused to talk about it and told everyone to forget about it. Two days later she received a letter from the offender claiming that the three girls in the room (one of whom was another victim of his) had informed him that she was spreading the false claim that he raped her and that that was sexual harassment and that she was informing her to stop before he took legal action. He had approached our professors and our university judicial marshal. After a long talk and a lot of support, my friend and I have consulted our support networks on campus and have found out that his claims of legality are false.
It's not the letter that even bothers me, it's that someone in that group of three girls, through misinformed rage or from malice, told the offender (I call him Voldemort, childish I know but it helps) what my friend had said. I can't help but selfishly get scared of the implications of my use of the term "rape" when healing with my friends and I can't believe my friend has to go through this. It's been a year since it happened and it's so hard to believe that she, as the victim, now must go on the defensive with her professors and friends.
This is just terrible and I don't know how to help her, protect myself, and get this guy out of both our lives. I know that this is kind of a weird place for this kind of plea, but I am at my wits end. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.
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I don't have any good advice, but that is messed up. Maybe you can get better advice from some service that deals with this kind of thing, like a rape crisis center, women's center, or lawyer...
Would your student health care center be able to direct you to a victims' advocate or something? Good luck!
I don't know what you and your friends should do, either.
I don't know if he's done anything that could realistically be prosecuted, but what you've described is a sexual predator who is trying to get away with as much as he can without actually going to jail. He probably doesn't see himself as a rapist because, if there was, as you put it, "questionable consent", then he can use that to justify his actions to himself. "Questionable consent" or not, he's clearly been hurting people and is in need of an Attitude Adjustment[TM].
Regardless, he's got no idea what he's talking about when he's threatening to sue you. Accusing someone of rape isn't sexual harassment. At worst, it's slander or libel, and I don't think he'd have a chance in hell of winning such a case.
Yeah, even if he's not a rapist in a prosecution sense (different from actuality) he is definitely a predator.
And, this is off topic, but I'm not sure I like the word predator when describing people who use coercion to get sex. (I'm not attacking you, Doug, or your use of the word predator because I just realized this as I was typing.) But the word calls into play the predator/prey dichotomy which gives the impression that the "prey" is helpless. It also makes me think of some fierce animal ripping into a baby deer or something, which is a very forthright image when a lot of times, this type of "predator" is much more subtle. (Case in point, the fact that too many people - i.e. more than zero people - would call having sex while drunk or emotionally unstable a stupid mistake rather than rape or at least sexually predatory behavior.) I dunno, I guess maybe I think the term gives too much power to the rapist and takes too much from the survivor/victim? But then rape is about power. It's interesting to say that rape is about power because I bet a million dollars the guy in this case doesn't think about it like that at all. I bet that if he even considers what he does to be immoral at all, he thinks it's all about sex.
Anyway, charlotte, I hope you find a way to give to this guy what he's got coming to him because he is absolute scum. I don't care if that comes off as judgmental or righteous, he's still scum and you have all my support and sympathy.
Prey is not necessarily helpless. There are plenty of animal videos where the prey fights back.
The point of using the word predator is to describe the RAPIST, not the potential victim (I thought of saying survivor but if they haven't been attacked yet they aren't a survivor...). It is describing them as someone who goes around thinking about ways to attack someone and get away with it. Not every rapist is like that-- saying someone is a predator describes a pattern, a goal. Its a useful term.
"would call having sex while drunk or emotionally unstable a stupid mistake rather than rape or at least sexually predatory behavior."
I think its predatory behavior if its a pattern.
I don't know if this is a good idea or not-- check with some sort of counsellor who knows the ins and outs of this type of thing-- but maybe you guys could get a lawyer of your own and send HIM some sort of official cease and desist letter?
Just piping up on the legal issues with my new shiny law degree (well, coming in a month in the mail), haha:
1) Don't worry about him suing you. He doesn't have a right of action against you, period. You're safe. All that would happen is that he pays some lawyer who takes the case for some unknown reason and you laugh as he drains his bank account.
2) Even if it's not rape, you do have options in terms of taking legal action. I wouldn't necessarily recommend trying to get him prosecuted, and I definitely wouldn't recommend suing him (very expensive), but if you're interested in pressing charges you can check out your state laws to see what the lesser sexual assault offenses look like, if any. He also may be violating a municipal ordinance, or a university policy against sexual harrasment/assault. If you don't want to pursue legal action or university action against him, you can still get a restraining order. Of course, that won't help his potential future victims. I definitely recommend talking to people with the university or residential life if you're comfortable doing so, because they may have some form of mandatory counseling for complaints like this, or at least something where they notify campus RAs, etc., that there has been a complaint so people are on the lookout.
*caveat: This is not legal advice, and I am not licensed to practice law yet. I'm just suggesting some options, but I'm not qualified to tell you to do A, B, or C. Try student legal services if you need someone who is :-)
The best I could say is to read some feminist books about rape and sexual assault (maybe yes means yes? or flirting with danger? i'm recommending books ive haven't really read yet) so that you can get some support and validation that it was RIGHT of you to use the word rape. I think being able to name what happened (and not fear that it isn't because you arent taking it to court) is important.
If you felt like it, you might also talk to people at school who could start a class for guys and girls on appropriate sexual relations. ch 2 of yes means yes is GREAT for this. It talks about how we think of sex as a commodity but we should talk about it as a performance and that would change things.