If you don’t think rape & sexual assault are a societal crisis, it’s time to wake up…

If you’re reading this I’m sure, like me, you’ve seen all the news headlines recently about Russell Brand, David Walliams and whoever is gonna be exposed next and have been horrified. The abuse that these rich and famous men have been able to carry out over many, many years is sickening.

I bet you’re not surprised though, right?

And if you’re reading this and you’ve been one of those in the Facebook comments saying “Why are they only coming forward now?” “Where is the evidence?” “These women knew what they were letting themselves in for” then YOU are part of the problem. You see we live in a culture, a society that enables sexual assault, that turns a blind eye to sexual harassment and is more concerned about the future of the men being accused of rape, than the lives of the women that have been raped.

And if you think this is only a problem in the entertainment industry, then get your head out of the sand and listen to the women around you.

Every single woman I have ever spoken to has either been sexually harassed, sexually assaulted or raped by a man in her lifetime. Every. Single. One. I’ve had grown men in a work van wolf whistling at me walking down the street at 16 years old. I’ve worked with men who made comments about my boobs, spoke about getting us a hotel room for the night and these were men that were 20 years older than me, some of them married. My mum speaks openly about when she first started working at 16/17 and being told not to sit next to the boss during the meeting as he’d put his hand on your leg or up your skirt. It’s everywhere. And not only is it normalised. It’s ACCEPTED.

In 2014, after finishing up on my night out a friend and I (male friend) got into a taxi that had pulled up outside the bar we were leaving and made our way home. We both told him where we were going and off we went, we were both drunk and not really paying attention where we were going. We arrived at my friend’s home, where he got out and left me a £20 to pay for my onward journey. Not long after my friend left, did I start to feel really uncomfortable. The taxi driver that had previously been silent was now very chatty and wanted to ask me lots of questions. “You’re very beautiful” he commented.  “How old are you?” He asked. I started to sober up as I felt my heart rate pick up. I lied and told him I was younger than I was (I was 23) mistakenly thinking that it might make him back off. “You really are beautiful you know” he says again. I smile and say thanks, not knowing what else to do other than get my phone out and text my mum, praying that she’d still be up like she usually was. She could never sleep until I got home. I then realised he’d taken a route through an industrial estate and he kept slowing the car down as if he was considering stopping and then changing his mind and this continued for a while. My mum replied “Yes I’m awake what’s up?”.

“I’m in a taxi on my own and the taxi driver is making me feel really uncomfortable. I’m scared.”

“Tell him you’re not going to our address anymore, tell him you’re get out there, go to the McDonald’s nearby. I’m on my way to get you now”

By this point I was completely sober. My heart was pounding in my chest.

“There’s been a change of plans I said. My mums actually gonna pick me up so I don’t have to go all the way back to mine so I’ll get out here please. How much do I owe you?”

The words he spoke next made my heart sink.

“It’s not money that I want from you.”

He turned around to look at me and then reached over into the back of the car to touch me. The car was still moving slowly and I knew I had to just get out. What am I going to do if this door is locked? I panicked but there was no time to think on it, GO!!! I pulled the handle and it opened, I threw myself out onto the pavement and I could hear him shouting. I slammed the door and I ran. My god I fucking ran!!! In my millennial heels that I could barely walk in, I sprinted as fast as I could down the road towards the McDonald’s in the distance that my mum had told me to head for. I threw myself down the grass embankment and under the barrier next to the McDonald’s and burst through the door, terrified and gasping for breath. “Can I sit in here please and wait for my mum?” I asked with tears in my eyes.

They let me wait. I have never felt such relief in all my life. I waited for my mum and within minutes she was there, in her pyjamas looking terrified herself.

We got home and my mum phoned the police. They came out and asked me about what had happened. They said because he hadn’t physically touched me or done anything to me they wouldn’t be able to arrest him, but said they would go to the taxi rank, try and find him and threaten him. They advised my mum to ring up the local council and speak to the licensing department, tell them that there was a taxi from a local firm that had picked passengers up who hadn’t booked and that the driver had tried to sexually assault a passenger.

The police never found the driver. The taxi rank ‘didn’t know’ any drivers of the same description who worked for them, driving in the car I had described. They weren’t concerned. They didn’t care.

When Monday morning came around my mum was straight on to the head of the taxi licensing department, an ex police officer. She told him about the incident. “Well why did your daughter get into a taxi that she hadn’t booked?” He chimed back. “Aren’t you more concerned that you’ve got a taxi driver that’s picking people up that he shouldn’t be?” Replied my mum. Then came the next line which is an absolute favourite amongst rape apologists. “Well was your daughter drunk? Why did she get into a taxi on her own, if she was that intoxicated?”

Isn’t that the reason why most people get into a taxi? Because they’ve had a drink on a night out and want a safe way to get home? If you get into a taxi drunk does that mean you forgo all your human rights and whatever happens to you after that is YOUR fault? Why is it that all the questioning l, all the blame is directed at women who come forward about what happened to them but the men get the benefit of the doubt?

If you know my mum, you’ll know she didn’t stop there and she absolutely wiped the fucking floor with this guy from the council, put in a massive complaint about him and got the whole thing investigated. He was still never found though.

I was lucky on that night back in 2014. Lucky that my mum picked up. Lucky that the door wasn’t locked. I feel sick when I think about how differently that could have ended. Not everyone gets lucky.

And can you imagine being absolutely terrified? The worst thing imaginable happening to you? Finding the courage to speak out about what’s happened to you? Answering questions about what you were wearing, how much you’d had to drink, why didn’t you scream? And then people saying you’re a liar, that it’s your own fault, questioning your motives, saying you have no evidence. That is why people don’t come forward. Because we’ve woven a society where perpetrators of sexual assault and rape get treated more favourably than the survivors.

This shit happens every day to the women around you. It happens all the time. And it’s not always the creepy men lurking in the bushes you’ve been told about, it’s taxi drivers, it’s teachers, it’s paramedics, it’s someone’s husband, it’s someone’s dad, it’s a boyfriend.

So if you think what you’re hearing about in the news are isolated incidents, it’s time you wake up and starting acting on it. Our boys deserve to grow up forming healthy relationships, respecting boundaries and understanding consent. Our girls deserve to be free from harassment and abuse. It’s as simple as that.

I applaud all of these women who bravely came forward and relived those horrific experiences. I commend Lucy Beaumont who stood up and said no more where others have turned a blind eye. And to all those out there who have suffered in silence, who haven’t got the justice they deserve, who are still living in fear I pray that we succeed in dismantling these structures that value the people that have hurt you, more than you.

Let’s watch it all come tumbling down together.

Rachel x