MEN ALSO CRY

The issue of rape has become a highly sensitive issue in our society, and most times we see men as villains in cases like this because of the wide perception that men are the instigators of rape. What we fail to consider is in as much as these men have a bigger part to play in rape cases, there are also men that are victims of rape. This might seem absurd and hard to believe, the fact is majority of our men have been raped at one point in their lives. Consent they say is very important before sex occurs. The truth is most men had sex for the first time before the age of sixteen and there was no consent, which also means rape has occurred. One thing I discovered and considered repugnant is that these female pedophilias are people they know like maids, cousins, aunties; these young boys are used in the most vile way possible and they do this disregarding the traumatic experience they would have to pass through in future. Most of these boys do not even understand that they are being raped, they are brain washed by these women who make them feel like they are helping them grow into men.

Our society especially our families have made us believe that for a boy to be considered to be a man, he must be strong at all times, no matter the situation he should never show weakness, and these boys grow up with that notion, that even when something bad like getting raped happens they don’t have anyone to confide in because of the fear of being called weak or the fear of being ridiculed. I once read the story of a man that told his uncle about his rape experience and his uncle laughed and told him not to tell anyone again that he was raped, that it sounded demeaning and went ahead to tell him to be lucky he became a man at that age, this uncle did not consider the feelings of the man who was also silently suffering from the encounter that had happened years back, an experience that made him hate sex. Raping young boys has a long lasting side effect, one of this side effects could either be addiction to sex or hating on women.

As humans the place where we begin our learning process is in the family, we should teach our boys to open up, we should make them understand that showing emotions does not make you weak, it makes you human. We should also try to bring them up in an environment that is lively and teachable, as parents make them look up to you for advice. Also we should try to understand that rape cases is not limited to women only, men also get raped, only that the stigmatization they would pass through is the reason they are scared to open up. If a man finally opens up to you about being raped as a child or an adult, instead of laughing or making jest, give them words of assurance or encouragement, be sympathetic with them, because it takes a man a lot of courage to open up about being raped.