His head is like a balloon trying to escape his body

One time there was a trending twitter hashtag that was like “political sitcoms” or something and I came up with “Gillibrand’s Island” and I just feel like the internet has never given me enough credit.

It’s very simple. These two are expecting a baby, and these two are engaged. What don’t you get???????

Lots of women stay with their abusers. That doesn't mean there wasn't abuse.

I did that too mine was “i guess i’m not a virgin anymore, thanks for that.” Grownup me is so sad for the little me.

This is exactly why I never reported.

they’re not accusers, they’re witnesses.

It doesn’t matter if she consented or not—you can’t consent to abuse under Canadian law. If it’s abuse, it doesn’t matter if the person wants it or not—it’s a crime to do it at all.

that email makes it sound like she was cool with and consenting to future instances of the same type of encounter.

Because Gomeshi isn’t claiming that he asked for consent. That’s not even a material difference between their stories, as far as I know. He’s saying she liked it, she’s saying he wouldn’t know because he didn’t actually ask. I don’t think an e-mail that implies consent after the fact negates his failure to ask for…

I apologized to my rapist after he raped me. It makes me sick to think about now, but that’s how it happened. As someone else said, trying to normalize the assault in your own mind to make yourself an active participant (or even the guilty party) instead of a victim is very common.

I think the whole point is that it’s not. We have a narrow and false view of how “real” victims are supposed to act, and we question their victimhood when they defy that rather than noticing that some “weird” behaviors of victims are actually common, and that there really isn’t a “typical” response to being assaulted.

Not really. Many victims try to normalize the experience in order to redefine it. A “fake it til you make it” post assault consent. I know others who have done it and I regretably have done this myself. Also, it never works.