Denying a woman sex is rape, #WhenHeSaysNo

Cassidy Boon is a 20 year old feminist who wants to educate people on an often ignored form of rape

I can’t believe more people don’t know about this. It makes me sick that people are living in the dark about this experience that literally hundreds of women go through every day. I want to hurl when I think about how some men think this is a perfectly OKAY thing that they can just do without any consequences whatsoever. More people need to know about this form of oppression, and as a feminist, I feel it is my job to educate the stupid masses about what’s really going on in our society.

Well, feminism has really come a long way recently in broadening the definition of rape. We have taught everyone that it is mostly fathers and friends raping their daughters as opposed to rapists just popping up in dark alleyways and raping women with force, and we’ve made women wary that every man is a potential rapist who is ready to pounce when they least expect it. We have also managed to blur the definition of rape when it comes to alcohol and I am happy to say, that women are to be blamed if they are have sex when they are drunk and then regret it. Personally, I have also labelled a new type of rape called #saverape, wherein men rape women in the process of saving them from a certain dangerous situation, something that actually happened to me. But there’s one form of rape that I don’t feel gets the attention it deserves - maybe because it doesn’t happen that often. I call it “denial rape” and no, that doesn’t mean a woman initially denying the man and then getting raped, DUH, that’s just rape – no It’s refers to the rare times when the man refuses to have sex with a woman. I was raped in this way last week. I was at this totally awesome party in New York (Yeah, I am on vacation in New York, deal with it) and was having a blast, drinking, dancing, mingling. It was my friend Liza’s cousin’s party and it was like in this huge apartment. It was really empowering being there. So anyway, I spotted a really hot guy like halfway through the night. He was so hot and had like the hottest tattoos ever. I caught him looking at me and I have to admit I got really tingly – I really wanted him. So I went up to him and like asked him to have a word with me in private. He said “Yeah” in this really hot voice and I took him by the hand and walked into this empty bedroom. I instantly slid down and began unbuttoning his pants, this was going to be a great lay. But then, out of nowhere, it was like, “What the fuck, what the hell do you think you’re doing? This is extremely inappropriate, get the hell out of here before I call the cops!” Thinking he was joking, I grabbed his crotch, but he jolted and pushed me away, screaming, “Get out, NOW!” Humiliated and shocked that a person could do such a thing I walked back out, grabbed my stuff, and went home, leaving my cousin Liza worriedly looking for me.

He made me feel so dirty—how dare he deny me sex? I was a horny woman who really wanted to have sex and this douche just refuses to fuck me? Wow. Just. Wow. Who does he think he is? How do you think that makes me feel? That’s right, violated. He’s not a real man.

You can’t possibly understand how hard it was. Here I was, wanting to have sex, and the guy I wanted to have sex with was denying me what I wanted. It was so bizarre; I’d never experienced anything like it. I couldn’t believe it, I had shown such courage by taking sexual initiative only to be turned down? DISEMPOWERING!! Denying me sex was his way of trying to regain patriarchal power over me, he was no doubt intimidated by a strong woman like myself, saying no was a desperate attempt to try to show that he was the boss. That’s as much a Patriarchal power move as rape—in fact, it is rape. Denying a woman sexual fulfillment is rape. He didn’t force me to have sex with him, but he forced me not to have sex with him when I really wanted to—this is obviously just as bad.

NO MEANS NO UNLESS YOU’RE A MAN; THEN YOU ARE DISEMPOWERING ME WHEN I WANT SEX.

I have obviously contacted the police and I will make sure that that fucking scumbag spends a good part of the rest of his life rotting behind bars for violating me like that, even if I have to tweak the story a little to account for our fucked-up legal system. No one will believe his side of the story LOL.

I had to go to therapy and everything cuz I’m really traumatized. I’m going to have to live with this for the rest of my life.

Fellow feminists, it’s time to start talking about this side of the rape coin too before more fall victim to it. I am now starting a hashtag called #WhenHeSaysNo, under which people can discuss this phenomenon and come out with their own stories of being denied sex.

This is Cassidy Boon, your favourite feminist, signing off.