April is...
There are many wonderful things to be said about the month of April. Spring arrives. Flowers bloom, butterflies return, birds start to sing again.
April is also Sexual Abuse Awareness Month. Sexual Assault and Abuse is not something, hopefully, that we as civilized people associated with happy times. Assault and abuse are things that we’d rather sweep under the rug. Abuse is something that we’d love to be able to close our ears and eyes and hearts to and make it go away.
But it doesn’t go away. It’s a very real part of our society, and it won’t go away on its own.
As writers, we often choose to write about the happy things. We write about things that make us and others feel good. But many of us have other stories to tell. We recognize the need to draw attention to the ugly parts of life. And by drawing attention to them, we hope to bring them under the scrutiny of the rational mind. We must, as human beings, take a stand and say, “no more. No longer will we ignore the harm that is being done to the people around us. No longer will we glorify the violence and the abuse that threatens to tear us apart. No longer will we close our eyes and pretend that it only happens to people ‘who ask for it’ or to ‘those types of people.’” Because we know that it does happen to those types of people and those people are our brothers and our sisters and our mothers and our fathers and our sons and our daughters and our neighbors and our friends. Those types of people are us.
Writers of sex stories quite often glorify violence in sex. They find a way to convince readers that a rape victim will, given enough chance, enjoy the experience. They titillate the reader with the release, the orgasmic delight of causing harm to another person. The writers below have chosen to take a more realistic stance. The stories below are ones of survival, of escape. The stories below are, for the most part, the stories of the victims. They’re not happy stories, although some of them have happy endings. They are all well-written, well-told tales. Necessary stories. Eye opening stories.
I thank you, the reader, for exploring these stories. And I thank the writers for sharing them. Perhaps someday they will no longer be necessary, but until that time I continue to say, “Please, no more.”
If you have any suggestions for additions to this page –either story links or links for information and assistance – please e-mail me at ealexisseifert at yahoo dot com.
Thank you.
Alexis Siefert
You can send e-mail to eAlexisSiefertatYahoodotcom, or use the handy form below.