MEN CAN BE RAPED

Yes, men get raped too and most of them suffer in silence.

This heartbreaking post about a man who was raped by his uncle for years as a child will make you shudder.

“My uncle was giving me a bath when I was 7 years old, and that’s when it first happened. He forced me to give him a blow job and proceeded to have anal sex with me, multiple times. At that point, I didn’t know what was happening to me, whether it was ok, whether it was normal. I got so used to it, I would enter his house and lie down on the bed, just wanting it to get over as soon as possible. At 12, I began to get gang-raped by his friends, and I would bleed but keep quiet…because what if I wasn’t considered ‘man enough’ to not bear the pain? My childhood went by having two worlds where I would not remember the rape until something triggered it and then I would cry endlessly. I would not enter a male washroom because I was scared that I would be raped again…I grew up having no self-esteem.

It was when I was 17 or 18 that I began to understand that what had been happening to me for so many years was wrong–so one day when he came to jump on me, I kicked him and said no. For the first time in 11 years, I said no to being raped. When I told my mother, she was in shock–she asked me why I hadn’t told her. I told her I had given her signs, that I had tried but she never picked up on it. She said, ‘I never knew such things could happen with boys’ and that was the time I realised that boys and men are the forgotten gender. We get abused, but we have no right to voice it because we’re supposed to be the protectors. The victims of ‘masculinity’ are men themselves. I have been bullied for many years for my sexual orientation as well, but when I told my story the same classmates who laughed at me became my biggest strength and helped me to cope with my childhood. A part of me believed that I’m gay because of the abuse I went through and it devastated me, but I know now that that isn’t true.

We tried to get some legal help but we realised that there’s no law against child sexual abuse for boys in the country. By the time I was 18, no laws applied to my case — so there was no justice. That’s when I decided that I would make the motto of my life to protect other children from sexual abuse.

So I’ve been through 11 years of hell but I don’t think the world is a bad place. I thank my bullies because they got me here — where I have the opportunity to touch others’ lives. I believe that hate only destroys the hater, not the hated — so I don’t think I hate my uncle. To me, he doesn’t exist. In fact, If I could, I would send a therapist to help him. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life waiting for him to suffer– I can never get those 11 years back, but I do have a lifetime ahead of me to protect the rights of children, women or the LGBT community and that’s the path I’ve proudly chosen.”

In India, the rape of males is rarely, if ever, addressed. Sadly, there is no strong legal framework to help male rape survivors.

Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code does not include males as rape survivors. A male survivor can only hope to find justice through Section 377, the country’s controversial anti-sodomy law if he is assaulted by a male attacker.