Have you ever been sexually assaulted?

Just answer honestly so we might get a rough idea what the real incident of sexual assault is. The relevant discussion is in this thread: False allegations and attrition.

As assault does not need to have been completed but should clearly have been with the intent to force one to have sex.

Yes. By my mother. Not a joke.

Edit: Actualy it was more like being molested.

Male. Never been sexually assaulted.

Is this poll supposed to have some merit in a discussion? Judging by the threads this seems to be spawned from, I'd think that it's an attempt to demonstrate that males are more likely to sexually assault than females; or that females are more sexually assaulted than males, and thus indirectly proving the aforementioned conclusion. Is this correct?

Outside of my vulnerability as a child, I fail to see how I can be sexually assaulted by a single female, outside of using various knock-out drugs. There seems to be a big difference between the capabilities of one assault vs. another, however. Not to mention other biological realities.

I have been sexually assaulted but it was not a successful assault. Once I was a dumb teenager walking home from a friend's at night. Some guy I never met started up a chat and shared a beer with me as we walked. He tried to make his move, I said no, he complained he bought the beer as if that meant I owed him sex, the creep. He tore my clothes but I screamed and some people came out of the house we were in front of and he ran off.

There were two other times guys came close to date rape but gave up before actually going through with it. These were not some questionable 'girl said no' instances, they involved clear intent to assault.

I have no idea how common this really is. I have never been afraid to be out and about where some might find it more risky to be. Maybe that was the reason though certainly I take no responsibility other than being naive.

I can honestly say, Skeptigirl, that if I was anywhere near the attempted sexual assaults made on you, the man that attempted to do it would be decked out onto the floor if I had half the chance.

Just want to make that clear. I know this makes me seem pretty violent (and goes a ways towards proving you right about us men), but I think the situation would warrant it. One needs a way to say "no" to such people that sticks to their memories.

Lonewulf said:

Male. Never been sexually assaulted.

Is this poll supposed to have some merit in a discussion? Judging by the threads this seems to be spawned from, I'd think that it's an attempt to demonstrate that males are more likely to sexually assault than females; or that females are more sexually assaulted than males, and thus indirectly proving the aforementioned conclusion. Is this correct?....

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No, not at all. I just wanted a sample to see if it correlated with the claims [X] number of women are sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. I've never found the claims 75% or 66% of women will be raped in their lifetimes to be plausible.

OTOH, I almost was. I was just curious what data an anonymous poll would show.

Why not include males in the poll if we want to get a reasonable picture of the data?

skeptigirl said:

No, not at all. I just wanted a sample to see if it correlated with the claims [X] number of women are sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. I've never found the claims 75% or 66% of women will be raped in their lifetimes to be plausible.

OTOH, I almost was. I was just curious what data an anonymous poll would show.

Why not include males in the poll if we want to get a reasonable picture of the data?

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Okay, I understand now.

An anonymous online poll isn't very reliable, I feel, so I'm not sure if you'll really get a reasonable picture of the data no matter how you select; you're already dealing with a selected section of the population (namely, people that join this skeptic site), and the numbers can very well be incredibly different from what more thorough studies would show.

I'm sure that you're aware of that, of course. Just my 2 cents, adjusted for inflation.

Lonewulf said:

I can honestly say, Skeptigirl, that if I was anywhere near the attempted sexual assaults made on you, the man that attempted to do it would be decked out onto the floor if I had half the chance.

Just want to make that clear. I know this makes me seem pretty violent (and goes a ways towards proving you right about us men), but I think the situation would warrant it. One needs a way to say "no" to such people that sticks to their memories.

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This thread has to do with Fiona's thread, not the thread on men vs women's violent behavior.

For what it is worth, I think most men are decent. The people who came out of their house certainly were. One was a man. They yelled at the guy who was attacking me.

I don't think all violence is bad. Obviously self defense or defense of another is not bad violence. But I do wonder why any adults threaten violence to settle a dispute. That seems uncivilized to me. On the whole, I don't have some hangup about violent men or anything like that. I do, however, think it's silly in the other thread that people are arguing women are as violent on the whole as men.

And no, I don't expect the poll to give us scientific data. I was just curious what we would see among the members here who chose to answer.

skeptigirl said:

This thread has to do with Fiona's thread, not the thread on men vs women's violent behavior.

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Okay.

For what it is worth, I think most men are decent. The people who came out of their house certainly were. One was a man. They yelled at the guy who was attacking me.

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Alright.

I don't think all violence is bad. Obviously self defense or defense of another is not bad violence. But I do wonder why any adults threaten violence to settle a dispute.

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Violence against a violent offender is self defense for another person, the way I see it.

And I see little other option, in such a short space of time, for making the person afraid enough to avoid committing another attempted assault later.

That seems uncivilized to me.

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Civilization bongo bongo bongo comes to mind when I hear uncivilized.

On the whole, I don't have some hangup about violent men or anything like that. I do, however, think it's silly in the other thread that people are arguing women are as violent on the whole as men.

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Perhaps.

I think it's silly how often people post petty pith in that thread and seem to believe that they have all the answers, personally; for instance, the explanation that most of men's violence comes purely from testosterone. But meh.

Maybe men are naturally violent. I hesitate to draw that conclusion, however, for several reasons. I think that there's too much static to make a sure conclusion overall.

Anyways, off topic.

No, but I've prevented a few (on others).

I have felt "threatened" by excessive sexual advances however I was a lot stronger than her so I was able to control the situation and they stopped.

I was seduced at 14 years old. Not exactly a "graduate" moment but not unpleasant. She was my friends Aunt. Funny thing is, every time I tell the story she gets better looking and i enjoyed it more, Truth is she was horrible in every way, I was more bemused than anything else. Not sure how old she was, I would guess, late thirties.
On a more serious note I hope she didn't repeat it with someone who wasn't just bemused. It was assault.

Lonewulf said:

Skeptigirl said:

For what it is worth, I think most men are decent. The people who came out of their house certainly were. One was a man. They yelled at the guy who was attacking me.

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Alright.

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What the hell?

I guess I'm more awake now. Why did I say that?

What I feel I should have said:

It's good to hear that someone came to your aid; it really is. Yelling at the man was probably the best thing to do -- fisticuffs might just have escalated the situation anyways (although certainly would make him pay a higher price than simply having to burn some energy...). I'm also glad that you got away from him.

There's some real scum out in the world.

It was not violent, it was coercive and manipulative, and it affected me more than I would have believed. It caused a highly distressed emotional state that lasted for a long time and that I have not experienced as a result of any other situation: even the death of a family member was easier to 'move on' from.

Never been seriously assaulted, but as a teenager was subjected to a fair bit of sexual harassment at work, nearly always from drunk female customers. (Was working as a waiter.) One particular incident involved a table full of women groping me every time I went near them and laughing uproariously when I told them to stop. I complained to my boss, who thought it was funny, and told myself it was nothing serious and I should just laugh it off.

Even now I feel embarrassed at my reaction, as if I shouldnt have been upset, but I really was. One woman at the table put her hand down my pants and grabbed my genitals as I was pouring wine. I was a polite and shy young fellow, and probably hadnt been forceful enough in my previous demands that they stop, and I probably shouldnt have gone back to the table. Anyway, I YELLED at her to take her hand off me and tried to break free, which tore my pants. The rest of the table thought this was the most hilarious thing they had ever seen. The woman would not let go and I had to grab her hand and prise her fingers off me, at which point she got quite angry at me, as if I was doing something wrong.

I was more angry than I ever remember being, and just called the police. At the time I thought I was probably overreacting, now I think it was the right thing to do. Two cops arrived, took statements from all concerned, and the woman readily admitted what had happened. She was absolutely dumbfounded when she was arrested and her friends were outraged. They could not see that they had done anything wrong. One of the cops asked if it would be OK if a male diner stuck his hand down a waitress' pants, groped her and refused to remove it. The woman said no but that was totally different. They said things like: "We were just having a laugh" and "get over yourself". which really made me feel better . Anyway, the woman was later let off with a caution but she did have to spend Saturday night and all day Sunday in a cell. I got a letter of apology from her too.

The main thing this incident did for me was raise my conciousness to milder verbal forms of sexual harrassment which I had been guilty of myself and had accepted as part of the work culture. Fortunately this incident made me adopt a zero tolerence policy towards inappropriate behaviour in work, which has stopped some bad situations for other people before they got serious.

Carnivore said:

Anyway, the woman was later let off with a caution but she did have to spend Saturday night and all day Sunday in a cell. I got a letter of apology from her too.

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I am really glad you reported her to the police.

Even though it was just a caution, it stays on her criminal record, and she will have some explaining to do if she applies for a job that requires a criminal record disclosure.

Personally, I was just about to vote "I'm female and I've never been sexually assaulted" when I remember a local pedophile fondled my breasts when I was about 10 (I started developing rather early) under the pretense of helping me climb down a tree.

A definition might be appropriate.

In most states, as in ours, there are a variety of crimes and levels of those crimes.

We have, at the lowest level, "sexual abuse". Sexual abuse includes inappropriate touching, groping, and so forth. It is divided into first, second, third degree.

Then there is "sexual assault", again in degrees.

And finally rape, which must by legal definition involve penetration. Rape may be aggravated by use of a weapon, or if accompanied by physical battery, and so forth.

I agree with Bikewer. What counts as sexually assault?

I voted that I haven't been sexually assaulted, but I was sexually harassed by a fellow worker at an amusement park to the point that I had to go to management. It culminated with him slapping my ass; that incident was what made me go to management. It occured to me after that this could be considered assault although I only thought of it as harassment.

Male and not really sure how I should answer, I must have been about 10 or so when sleeping over a friends (about the same age) house and he began to get rather touchy feely with me. After repeated requests to stop he just kept at it. At the time I wasn’t that concerned and simply went to sleep somewhere else away from him. It was only later that I realized what his intent might have been and come to the conclusion that he had most likely been sexually assaulted at some point and was just acting out. I had a girlfriend once who expressed to me that in order for her to have or enjoy sex she felt she needed to effectively be raped, unfortunately I was not able to accommodate her in that regard (as she seemed to be requesting) and we drifted apart. Again after sometime I came to the realization that she too might have been sexually assaulted at some point. As the attempt on me was never completed and I did not perform what was apparently requested of me I’ll have to answer as male, never assaulted.

:hug:

Agree with the above poster.

I can honestly say, Skeptigirl, that if I was anywhere near the attempted sexual assaults made on you, the man that attempted to do it would be decked out onto the floor if I had half the chance.

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I have friends who are rape victims. I'm disgusted by the attitude towards rape among so many people (the trivializing, the joking, the blame-the-victim mindset) and I'd love to come across a rape once just so I could vent some of my anger.

And Carnivore reflects another problem of mine - that even to the most frothing, fanatical feminist, it seems sexual harassment is a problem only when done by guys, to girls. Guys harassing guys, no prob. Girls harassing guys, no prob. Girls harassing girls, no problem. It's disgusting.

Lonewulf said:

Outside of my vulnerability as a child, I fail to see how I can be sexually assaulted by a single female, outside of using various knock-out drugs. There seems to be a big difference between the capabilities of one assault vs. another, however. Not to mention other biological realities.

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You could easily be sexually assaulted by a single male or a well-armed female, not to mention groups of either sex or mixed groups. Biological realities are no obstacle to penetrating a male. There are plenty of alternatives to erect penises. I haven't got any statistics to hand but am pretty sure, from what I have read in the past, that men are most commonly raped by heterosexual men.