Men: Don’t Just Say You Protect Women. Speak Up for Us.

Men, Speak Up. Especially When It’s Your Friend.

I want to ask something of the men reading this.

When a woman tells you another man sexually assaulted her, please do more than tell her you’re sorry.

Listen. Take what she tells you seriously. And if the man she names is someone you know, don’t let your friendship become the reason her experience gets dismissed.

I know that is a harder conversation.

It is one thing to condemn a stranger in a headline. It is another to question someone you have laughed with, trusted, and liked.

But that is exactly where we need men to speak up.

And we want you to speak up earlier, too.

When your friend ignores a refusal. When he keeps pressuring someone. When he makes a degrading comment and looks around to see who will laugh.

You do not have to wait for a woman to tell you she was hurt before you decide what behavior you will challenge.

I know what it feels like to make that phone call afterward.

To tell someone you trust what his friend did to you.

And to hear him explain why everything is apparently fine.

A Sexual Assault That Happened to Me

(Content warning: sexual assault)

The story I’m about to share is true.

It happened to me in 1987.

It was one of three sexual assaults I experienced while I was in high school, one of which was a rape. For years, I thought of this particular assault as somehow “not as bad” because it wasn’t the rape.

But trauma creates strange hierarchies like that.

This was still one of the most terrifying sexual assaults I experienced, and what happened afterward taught me something I would carry with me for decades.

It was the fall of my junior year, and my mom had just bought me some new clothes.

There was one thing I was especially excited about.

A jean skirt.

It was the first one I had ever owned.

There was nothing particularly remarkable about it. It wasn’t a miniskirt. It came to just above my knees. I simply thought it was cute. I thought it looked flattering on me, and I remember being excited to finally have weather cool enough to wear it with one of my new sweaters.

That Friday, I put it on.

I felt pretty in it.

I think that detail matters, although probably not for the reasons we have historically been taught to think a woman’s clothing matters when we talk about sexual assault.

What I was wearing did not cause what happened to me.

The skirt matters because it mattered to me.

Before that night, it was simply something that made a teenage girl happy.

Earlier that Friday, we had a pep rally at school. As I walked past one of the popular senior boys, he complimented me on my skirt.

I remember how good that made me feel.

Someone had noticed.

Someone else thought it was cute too.

It was such a tiny moment, the kind of thing that probably meant absolutely nothing to the boy who said it and yet remained tucked inside my memory all these years later.

Maybe because I needed something to feel good about right then.

The previous few weeks had been miserable.

A boy I was dating had gone away to college. My mom had encouraged me to break up with him because she didn’t think a long-distance relationship would be healthy for either of us.

I had reluctantly listened to her.

And I had been sad about it.

I didn’t want our relationship to end simply because he had gone away to college.

Then, about a week before that Friday night, he called me.

He missed me.

We decided we were going to keep seeing each other. Somehow, we would make the distance work.

I was so happy.

It felt as though something I had lost had suddenly been handed back to me.

So that Friday felt like the beginning of something good.

My boyfriend and I were back together.

Fall had arrived.

I had new clothes.

I had my new jean skirt.

I was a teenage girl heading into a Friday night feeling hopeful again.

When a friend invited me to a party, I happily accepted.

When I arrived at the house, though, there weren’t many people inside. Someone mentioned that everyone was at a bonfire in a park behind the house.

At some point, I went to use the bathroom.

When I came back, my friends were gone.

I assumed they had gone down to the bonfire, so I went looking for them.

There was a paved path leading through the woods behind the house.

It was dark.

Really dark.

The pavement was black beneath my feet and the woods surrounding me seemed almost black too. At first, I had trouble seeing where I was going.

I remember wishing I had a flashlight.

But I could hear people somewhere ahead of me.

Voices.

Laughter.

I could smell the bonfire too, woodsmoke drifting through the trees and mixing with the smell of crisp leaves in the cool fall air.

Everyone sounded close.

The path curved through the woods, disappearing around one bend and then another. There was something almost fun about it.

A little adventure.

I was following the smell of a bonfire and the sound of my friends through the woods on a cool Friday night.

As I walked, my eyes adjusted to the darkness.

I began to see the pavement more clearly.

My steps became more confident.

Then I rounded a corner.

There was someone coming toward me.

At first, I could only make out a large, hulking figure approaching through the darkness.

Then he got closer.

I recognized him.

And I wasn’t frightened.

That matters too.

He wasn’t a stranger.

He was a friend of my boyfriend’s who had already graduated. I had met him once before.

I wondered what he was doing there.

As he approached, I said hello.

I wasn’t sure he would remember me, so I introduced myself as his friend’s girlfriend, hoping it would help him place me.

Then I started walking past him.

I cheerfully told him I would let my boyfriend know I’d seen him. I’d tell him hello.

I was already passing him.

Then he turned around.

“Oh yeah. I remember you.”

He mumbled something about me looking hot.

And grabbed me.

There was no gradual transition between those two realities.

One second, I was a teenage girl walking through the woods talking to someone I knew through my boyfriend.

The next, his mouth was on mine.

He was kissing me violently.

My brain couldn’t keep up.

I didn’t understand why he was doing this.

I couldn’t even fully register what was happening.

I remember the disgusting taste of cigarettes and what I believe was chewing tobacco or dip.

I remember his tongue trying to force its way into my mouth.

I remember trying to pull away.

And then I was falling.

He pushed me backward with tremendous force.

My body slammed onto the pavement.

Hard.

I remember hitting my head.

But almost immediately, even that pain became secondary to something else.

His weight.

He was on top of me.

He had been a wrestler in high school. He was still fit, extremely strong and very heavy.

His weight seemed like a thousand pounds pressing me into the pavement.

I couldn’t move.

I pushed against him.

I tried to get out from underneath him.

I tried to scream.

He kept forcing his mouth against mine, muffling me.

Whenever there was enough air, whenever I could manage to get words out, I pleaded with him to stop.

He didn’t.

I pushed.

It didn’t matter.

I said no.

It didn’t matter.

I begged him to stop.

It didn’t matter.

Then I heard his belt.

There are sounds that attach themselves to memories.

For me, there is that sound. I still have trauma around that sound.

His hand moved down.

I heard his belt coming undone.

And suddenly, through all the confusion, one thought became terrifyingly clear.

Oh my God.

He’s going to rape me.

He’s going to rape me.

I panicked.

My heart felt as though it were going to explode out of my chest.

I was pinned beneath him, and nothing I was doing could get him off me.

Even now, I sometimes wonder whether that experience is connected to how intensely I dislike feeling physically trapped and to my claustrophobia. I cannot know that for certain.

But I know exactly what trapped felt like that night.

It was knowing that all the strength I had in my body wasn’t enough.

There was another human being on top of me who had decided that what I wanted no longer mattered.

My fear didn’t matter.

My rejection didn’t matter.

My pleading didn’t matter.

My no didn’t matter.

I felt like I was a means to an end.

And I thought I was going to die. I felt like I was dying.

My mind began desperately searching for something that could save me.

There were people nearby.

I had heard them.

How could I get their attention?

How could I make enough noise?

How could I make somebody hear me?

But his mouth kept covering mine.

I could barely get sounds out.

And somewhere inside my head, that belt buckle seemed to keep echoing.

Then I heard something else.

Laughter.

Close.

Two people were coming around the corner.

I don’t think I have ever been so grateful for the sound of another human being laughing.

Someone was coming.

Someone was going to see me.

Someone was going to make this stop.

He heard them too.

And suddenly he moved.

The enormous weight disappeared from my body.

Before those people rounded the corner, he jumped up, pulled his pants up, and walked away.

He left me lying on the pavement.

That moment would become important later.

Because I would eventually be told that he had been drinking and didn’t know what he was doing.

I cannot know exactly what he was thinking.

But I know when he stopped.

My no hadn’t stopped him.

My pushing hadn’t stopped him.

My begging hadn’t stopped him.

He stopped when other people were coming.

I don’t know how long I stayed on the ground.

I don’t really know how I found the strength to stand.

I felt beaten up.

Bruised.

Terrified.

My memory becomes much less clear after that.

I don’t remember much about leaving the party.

I don’t remember much about getting home.

Somehow, I did.

Looking back, I think I may have been dissociating. Regardless, it was a blur.

I knew only that I wanted to get home.

And that I needed to tell my boyfriend what his friend had done to me.

I was terrified to make that phone call.

But not for the reason someone might expect.

I was afraid of how angry my boyfriend was going to be.

I was certain this would destroy their friendship. I imagined him finding some way to get home from college. I imagined him confronting his friend. I imagined violence. I was actually frightened that he might end up arrested for assaulting him.

I was already worrying about how to contain the next disaster.

But someone had to know.

So I called.

When my boyfriend answered, he was happy to hear from me.

I couldn’t return the emotion.

I couldn’t even fake it.

I burst into tears.

I sobbed so hard that I could barely get the words out.

I was terrified of people finding out.

I didn’t know what they would think of me.

And already, somehow, there was a part of me wondering whether anyone might think I had encouraged it.

So I tried to make everything absolutely clear.

I told my boyfriend that I had literally identified myself as his friend’s girlfriend.

I had said hello.

I had told him who I was.

I had started walking away.

And he attacked me.

The words came out awkwardly and slowly between sobs.

When I finally finished, I waited for the explosion.

It never came.

My boyfriend sounded calm.

He told me he was going to call his friend.

Then he would call me back.

I was surprised, but I thought surely he was going to confront him. At the very least, this man was finally going to hear from someone who could physically put him in his place.

About fifteen minutes later, my boyfriend called me back.

He sounded almost cheerful.

I remember how strange that was.

Then he told me everything was fine.

His friend hadn’t realized who I was.

He had been drinking.

It was just a misunderstanding.

A misunderstanding.

My body was still bruised.

My head was still throbbing.

The tears on my face weren’t even dry.

I could still remember his weight crushing me into the pavement.

I could still hear his belt.

And everything was apparently fine.

Because he hadn’t known who I was.

I felt sick.

Something inside me seemed to shut down.

I had called the person I thought would understand, and suddenly I found myself having to convince him that what had happened to me mattered.

“It doesn’t matter that he didn’t know who I was.”

And besides, he did.

I had told him.

My boyfriend said his friend had been drinking. Maybe he hadn’t even known what he was doing.

But that explanation did not account for what I had experienced.

He had ignored my resistance.

He had ignored my pleading.

And he had stopped when other people approached.

So I tried again.

My pushing him away wasn’t enough?

My pleading wasn’t enough?

My saying no wasn’t enough?

What part of this aren’t you understanding?

Where aren’t you hearing me?

But he dismissed it.

Everything was fine.

His friend had been drinking.

It was a misunderstanding.

There was no anger that I saw.

There were no repercussions, other than a few weeks later I broke up with my boyfriend.

And after that came my silence.

I didn’t tell anyone else.

Because I had just learned something almost as frightening as what I had learned on that pavement.

I had learned what could happen when I told.

Someone who knew me, someone who cared about me, someone whose own friend had attacked me, had found a way to make what happened somehow not count.

Why would anyone else be different?

Maybe they would blame me.

Maybe they would search backward through the night looking for something I had done.

Maybe eventually they would arrive at the skirt.

The jean skirt.

The first one I had ever owned.

The one my mom bought me.

The one I had been so excited to wear.

The one that made me feel pretty.

I never wore that jean skirt again.

I don’t even remember what happened to it.

It had been such a simple thing that brought me happiness.

And suddenly I couldn’t put it on my body anymore.

After that, I started covering myself.

Oversized sweaters.

Oversized shirts.

Clothes that hid my body.

I hated the thought of attracting someone.

Somewhere inside me, I think I was trying to make myself less visible.

As though enough fabric could guarantee that nobody would ever decide my body belonged to them again.

It couldn’t, of course.

Because my clothing had never been the problem.

But I was the one who changed anyway.

He didn’t have to.

Years later, during the #MeToo era, I reconnected with people from that old friend group, including my former boyfriend.

I told him how much it had hurt that he had never understood the seriousness of what his friend had done to me.

I think that may have been the first time he realized how badly he had handled it.

He immediately unfriended him on Facebook.

Years after I had needed him to understand.

Years after the bruises had disappeared.

Years after that skirt had disappeared from my life.

It was an acknowledgment.

But it couldn’t travel backward in time.

My old boyfriend from back then has since passed away. But I’m glad he was able to finally acknowledge what happened.

Later, I told another friend who also knew the man who attacked me.

He said he was sorry.

He said he hadn’t known.

And then his friendship with him continued.

For years afterward, I could see them laughing and interacting together on Facebook.

And that is what I thought about when another sexual assault story exploded across the news.

Because we have created a very comforting story about dangerous men.

They are strangers.

Bad men.

Monsters.

Men lurking somewhere outside the boundaries of our ordinary lives.

They are the men our fathers warn us about.

The men our brothers are supposed to protect us from.

The men our boyfriends and husbands would supposedly beat senseless if they ever laid a hand on us.

There are the good men we know.

And then there are those men.

Except sometimes the call is coming from inside the house.

Sometimes he’s already in the friend group.

Sometimes he’s at the party.

Sometimes he’s in the yearbook.

Sometimes he’s somebody’s best friend.

Sometimes he’s the guy everyone describes as hilarious.

Sometimes he’s the guy your boyfriend trusts.

Sometimes he’s the man your friends are still laughing with decades later on Facebook.

And that is where things become uncomfortable.

Because it is easy to condemn a man in a headline.

It costs you nothing.

It is different when a woman tells you that your friend sexually assaulted her.

Now believing what happened may require something from you.

You may have to reconsider someone you genuinely like.

You may have to confront him.

You may lose a friendship.

Your social group may become uncomfortable.

You may have to reconcile the person he has been to you with the person he was to her.

And sometimes people choose the easier path.

Maybe he was drinking.

Maybe he misunderstood.

Maybe he didn’t realize who she was.

Maybe that’s just not the guy I know.

Maybe there are two sides.

Maybe it wasn’t really that serious.

And with enough maybes, everyone gets to go back to normal.

Except her.

That is the part I think we miss when we talk about the culture surrounding sexual violence.

It isn’t always loud.

It isn’t always someone announcing that sexual assault is acceptable.

Sometimes it looks like loyalty.

Sometimes it sounds like an excuse.

Sometimes it is silence.

And decades later, for all the outrage, awareness, and promises that things have changed, I still see far too much of the same culture that taught me that night how easily a woman’s trauma can be acknowledged in words and dismissed in reality.

At this point in my life, I would say I'm fairly healed from what happened to me all those years ago. It isn't something I walk around thinking about or hurting over. Every once in a while, something in the news finds that remaining triggers and brings some of it back to the surface.

And honestly, what affects me now isn't only what happened to me. It's seeing how often sexual assault is still minimized, excused, defended, or simply not fully acknowledged when the person who did it is someone people know, like, or care about.

Something Changed After I Shared This

After reading my article, the friend I mentioned recognized himself in what I had written and reached out to me.

We talked honestly about it, and what moved me most was that he really heard me.

There was no defensiveness or minimizing. There was care, reflection, and a genuine effort to understand something from my perspective that he hadn't understood before.

Looking back, I wish I had told him how I felt instead of carrying it quietly. But his initial response had served as another reason not to speak.

That does not mean it was my responsibility to find the perfect words before my hurt deserved consideration. It means I am glad we finally had the conversation.

Sometimes something good really can come from saying the difficult thing out loud.

And I want to acknowledge that.

Because this is what I am asking for: a willingness to listen, to reflect, and to reconsider something you thought you understood.

He did that.

It mattered to me.

Men, Speak Up Before Someone Gets Hurt

Please don’t let “I would never do that” be the end of your involvement.

Pay attention to what happens around you.

You do not have to deliver a speech. You can name the behavior you are seeing and ask your friend to stop.

If he keeps pursuing someone after she has declined:

“She said she’s not interested. Leave her alone.”

If he keeps trying to wear her down:

“Stop asking. She already answered you.”

If he touches someone who pulls away or tells him to stop:

“She’s pulling away. Stop touching her.”

If he blocks her path or won’t let her leave:

“Move. Let her leave.”

If he brags about pressuring someone into sex:

“If you had to keep pressuring her, that’s something you need to take seriously. I’m not going to congratulate you for it.”

If he makes a degrading sexual comment and waits for everyone to laugh:

“That’s disrespectful. I’m not laughing at that.”

And if he responds with, “Relax. It’s just a joke,” you can say:

“I heard you. I still don’t think it’s funny.”

You can use your own words. They do not have to sound polished.

But make your objection clear.

And don’t undermine it five seconds later by laughing along.

Don’t add your own degrading comment. Don’t help him keep pursuing someone who has refused. Don’t repeat the story as though pressuring someone were an achievement.

You can care about your friend and still tell him his behavior is unacceptable.

If directly confronting him would make the situation more dangerous, get help from someone nearby who can intervene, such as a host, staff member, or security. You can also check in with the person being targeted and ask whether she wants help leaving the situation.

The point is to help, not turn the moment into a performance or a fight.

When Impressing Other Men Becomes Part of the Problem

There is another part of this conversation we need to have.

Sometimes a man’s behavior toward a woman is also a performance for other men.

The degrading comment. The sexual bragging. The story about how he kept pushing until she finally gave in.

And then the look around the room.

Who’s laughing?

Who’s impressed?

Who thinks he’s the man?

Research has linked perceived pressure from male peers to have sex, and perceived peer approval of coercion, with sexual aggression. That does not explain every assault or tell us any particular man’s motives. It does give us a reason to pay attention to what men encourage in one another.

Because when someone uses a woman’s body, attention, or humiliation to impress his friends, she becomes a prop in a performance she never agreed to participate in.

A story to tell.

Something to boast about.

Proof of his status.

Where is her experience in that story?

Did she want what happened?

Was she comfortable?

Did he care?

Research has also found associations between men’s objectification of women and self-reported sexual and physical violence in relationships. That does not mean every degrading comment leads to assault. It means treating women as objects deserves to be taken seriously.

And peer approval is only part of the picture. Research also identifies hostility toward women, sexual dominance, acceptance of violence, and beliefs that excuse rape or blame victims as associated risk factors for sexual aggression. There is no single explanation for every man who harms someone.

But none of those explanations removes his responsibility.

Wanting your friends’ approval does not entitle you to disregard another person’s boundaries.

And being his friend does not require you to provide the applause.

You don’t have to laugh.

You don’t have to ask for more details.

You don’t have to congratulate him for wearing someone down.

You can say, “Why are you telling this like it’s something to be proud of?”

Or, “You said she didn’t want to. Why did you keep pushing?”

Or simply, “That’s not okay.”

What men think their friends approve of also matters when they decide whether to intervene. In one survey of male college students, perceived peer attitudes predicted their stated willingness to step in against sexual aggression, even after researchers accounted for their own attitudes. That study measured willingness, rather than actual intervention, but it highlights why clearly expressing disapproval matters.

So if you disagree, let your friend hear it.

Don’t leave him with your laughter when what you actually feel is discomfort.

And if you have laughed along before, you can acknowledge that too.

“I know I’ve gone along with this before. I shouldn’t have. I’m not going to keep doing it.”

You are allowed to change how you respond.

You are allowed to expect better from the men you care about.

And a woman should not have to be in the room, defending her own humanity, before someone remembers to consider it.

I Know Speaking Up Can Cost You Something

I want to acknowledge what I am asking of you.

Because it would be easy for me to say, “Just speak up,” as though there were never any consequences.

You may be questioning someone you have known since childhood.

Someone who showed up when your father died.

Someone who helped you through a divorce.

Someone who has been a good friend to you.

That history matters to you. I understand why it would be difficult to reconcile it with what a woman is telling you he did to her.

You may worry about being wrong. About what to say. About whether confronting him will accomplish anything.

You may also know exactly what you want to say and be afraid of what happens afterward.

Maybe he gets angry.

Maybe the group turns on you.

Maybe you stop getting invited.

Maybe you lose a friendship you thought you would have for the rest of your life.

I am not going to pretend those losses would be painless.

But I want you to consider whose pain gets protected when avoiding that discomfort becomes the priority.

In my case, I told someone I trusted that his friend had assaulted me. After their phone call, I was told everything was fine.

I was the one left trying to live with something that apparently did not require anyone else to change.

That is what I am asking you to sit with.

You can care about your friendship and still take what she tells you seriously.

You can acknowledge uncertainty without dismissing her.

You can say, “This is difficult for me to hear because I’ve known him for years. But I’m listening.”

And you can tell your friend, “Our friendship matters to me. That’s why I need to address this with you.”

You do not have to solve everything in one conversation.

Start by refusing the easy excuse.

Ask the question you would rather avoid.

Be honest about the behavior you witnessed.

And accept that you cannot guarantee he will respond well, no matter how carefully you choose your words.

I also want to make room for something my recent conversation with my friend reminded me of.

A difficult conversation does not always end a relationship. In our case, it made room for understanding that had been missing.

He listened. He reflected. He reached out with care.

That mattered.

So yes, speaking up may cost you something.

It may also give someone a chance to recognize harm, take responsibility, or change how he responds.

You cannot control that outcome.

You can decide whether keeping everyone comfortable is worth leaving the person who was hurt to carry the discomfort alone.

And When She Tells You What Happened

Let her finish.

Take her account seriously.

Ask what support she wants.

She should not have to defend her clothing, explain why she went to the party, or convince you that being friendly was not permission.

Respect her choices about who knows and what she does next. Speaking up does not mean sharing her story without permission or taking control of decisions that belong to her.

And if the man she names is your friend, be willing to ask difficult questions.

“He’s always been good to me” does not answer what she has told you.

You can have years of good memories with someone and still need to reconsider his behavior.

I am not asking you to threaten anyone or respond with violence. I spent that night afraid my boyfriend might do exactly that. I did not need another frightening situation to manage.

I needed him to take me seriously.

I needed him to stop calling what happened a misunderstanding.

I needed his concern to last beyond the phone call.

And the recent conversation with my friend reminded me that listening can still make a difference, even years later.

You can reach out.

You can acknowledge what you missed.

You can say, “I’m sorry I didn’t understand. I want to listen now.”

Then follow through.

If you want women to know you take sexual assault seriously, let that show in the conversations you have with other men.

Challenge the excuses.

Refuse to join in.

Speak up when you see someone crossing a boundary.

Ask the uncomfortable questions.

Be willing to reconsider a friendship.

Especially when it’s your friend.

That is when we need to hear you.