When Everyone Knows and No One Says

I don’t really understand what alt lit is. I think I’m too old for it. But I sure as fuck understand how fucked up it is when someone is like “Some one, who I’ll call ‘Stan,’ did something really fucked up to me” and everyone is like “Oh, was it so-and-so?” and they all guess the same guy.

The thing I most “admire” (I wish I could think of a better word, like “admire” but with repulsion.) about dude’s approach is evident in the comments. Any woman who’s older than 25 knows that, if a dude invites you to stay with him and share a bed with him, when you don’t even fucking know him, he’s a creepster. That knowledge may not be enough to help you when you need someplace to stay because you have to make connections and you’re desperate and he’s a “famous” editor and you really want to be a writer. But at least it’s knowledge you have.

And it’s hard to remember that it wasn’t always knowledge that you had. But I slept with people non-sexually in high school. Churches had lock-ins where you non-sexually got to sleep with people! Or you fell asleep on the couch together. Or whatever. You went to camp. You slept in close quarters with people you didn’t know. You sleep in the same bed as friends on trips. Whatever.

You literally don’t yet know that there’s a great luxury to an empty bed, that strangers don’t want you in their luxurious empty beds just so that you can have a soft spot to rest. That a stranger trying to get you into his bed doesn’t have platonic designs, no matter how much you make it clear that that’s all you have.

So, there’s this choad, hiding himself in that vulnerable spot for young women–finding women just out of high school–and then sitting back and letting even other women be all “But how could they not know what he was up to?”

Here’s the important thing, though. And I’m glad Sophia Katz was willing to write about it in such detail, even if it meant people were going to be all “How could she not know?” Because the one thing that’s obvious from her story is that her non-consent was an important part of it for him. He got off on “pushing through her resistance.” He kept setting up situations where she would say “no” and he would keep going. And I’m sure he enjoys seeing people take his side, like she should have “understood” what he was up to from the moment he invited her into his bed.

But, really, no matter what, when you’re invited into someone’s bed, even if you think you’re going to have sex with them, you don’t expect them to rape you. But it’s clear from her story that he wanted her to turn him down–that was part of the ritual for him.