There’s a strange difference between how we talk about male and female sexual predators.
As with many things, men’s sexual violence comes with accountability and agency, and rightly so, whilst women’s seems twisted with a strange sense of innocence and taboo naughtiness – and that’s if it’s discussed *at all.*
It’s an uncomfortable double standard.
We’re seeing this right now with the Ghislaine Maxwell trial, who ‘had sex with girls as young as 15’, whilst Jeffery Epstein raped them.
And it gets worse still when it’s a boy who is the target, as he’s often even considered “lucky” to be put in such a position by a woman.
You see it the comment sections, you see it in the headlines, you see it in the news.
“Ahhh what a lucky guy!”
It’s everywhere, and it has to change.
The world is undoing so many harmful gender stereotypes, and I’m glad to see it happen.
We accept women can be CEOs and political leaders, and they certainly can be, but who will dare say that women can be paedeophiles too?
That’s a ad campaign we’re still waiting for @ogilvy!
Because women can be good or bad, that’s literally what autonomy means.
And if we cannot acknowledge that, then we are leaving boys and girls vulnerable, and failing those who we vowed to protect.
Is it time to change our perceptions of sexual violence?
Is it time we undid all gender stereotypes?
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Washington Post https://tinyurl.com/ywh6swp5
“Lucky Boy”, Public Perceptions of Child Sexual Offending Committed by Women https://tinyurl.com/y8z83267
Images by Gryffyn M, Jana Sabeth, Amador Loureiro and Ali Jouyandeh from Unsplash.