Difficult Conversations
Difficult Conversations
I Hate My Parents?
Trigger Warning: This episode talks about sexual assault. Listener discretion is advised.
We explore SA within the community, discussing its prevalence, the impact on survivors, and cultural responses to this pressing issue. We engage in open dialogue, addressing misconceptions and fostering awareness around trauma-informed care.
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The information on this podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered professional mental health advice. Assalamu alaikum, welcome to Difficult Conversations. In our topic today, we are going to be discussing sexual assault. I've kind of gone down a rabbit hole of Muslim Reddit, of Muslim Reddit and like there are a lot of like crazy stories out there and really sensitive stories.
Speaker 2:You name it.
Speaker 1:You know one story that caught my eye in particular this girl. She said she was 19 years old and her title was I hate my parents. And she goes on to talk about how, you know, she has been trying to love her parents for a long time and and she said you know how, like, islamically, the respect that we were supposed to have, her parents and stuff like that. And she goes on to say that her mom, you know, is physically abusive to her and you know all the stuff that she does and that her dad is very like, distant towards her. And there was an incident that had happened to her when she was eight years old where her cousin had sexually assaulted her and the family basically just threw it under the rug. You know they almost blamed her for it and she was saying how that when it happened she was eight years old. She's currently 19. And she just posted the story on there to say you know what advice would you guys have for me? And she hasn't sought out therapy yet because she said it was really expensive and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:And I think that you know stories like these they're not single instances and I know to have in your profession. We've talked about this before and how you have clients that have gone, you know, suffered from these situations, whether it's, you know, a family member in some cases, whether it's like, you know, the father situations, whether it's, you know, a family member in some cases, whether it's like, you know, the father, the grandfather, the uncle and stuff like that. So I kind of want to dive into this issue and talk about what, what in our community, what in our, um, you know, east african community. Why, how prevalent is this, first of all, and why is it so prevalent?
Speaker 3:I think I want to talk about from a frame of trauma and I think for me, probably one of those areas that, as a therapist, that I am much more familiar with and hear about it, and here's a lot of stories, a lot of similar stories that this girl have shared on Reddit, on their on Reddit, but the prevalent is that in Oromo community, for example, specifically, I don't think we are in that space to talk about anything else.
Speaker 3:Like in this podcast, we talk about a lot of difficult conversation in our community, the way that affects all of us, but this is also another one things that people don't talk about and they haven't even conversation around that in a way, to frame it, to talk about it, to kind of consult the victims, to create a safe space for the victims and then also navigating around, how do you handle the perpetrators and how do you create that distance and make sure that that person is no longer in the space of any children, not just alone the person who's happened to, but any other children.
Speaker 3:And I think that conversation is not around because people intend to hesitate for many reasons. One, it can be shame, it can be guilt, it can be lack of knowledge, ignorance, it can be a nuance that we don't even understand in how to talk about sexual assault in general, and there is many ways of it, and so ways that in therapy I focus as a therapist is that I'm trauma-informed therapist. I intend to focus on that area and when it comes to sexual assault is to make sure that each individual person who comes to my office are feeling seen.
Speaker 1:Let's back up a little bit. From a therapy point of view or in your profession, how would you describe sexual assault to somebody? Because I feel like you know we have those words that are thrown around a lot Sexual assault, is it the same as rape? You know we have those words that are thrown around a lot Sexual assault, is it the same as rape? You know what I mean, so just define it for us?
Speaker 3:Well, sexual assault is any unwanted touch that is happening to individual right, anything, whether it is, you know, any different part of body part For a girl it can be their chest, for boys or girls it can be private areas, or even the touch is not just to them or the person making them touch them right. And so it needs to happen either to them and then somebody's kind of forcing. That that's the first beginning aspect of it, and then we have to talk about rape itself, right, but if we're going to talk about sexual assault, it's that any unwanted touch that's happening to an individual, whether it's to them or, and then it happened by force, by somebody else making them touched up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it doesn't have to be specific to the private areas, or you know, it's any, any, any touch that is indication to a sexual behavior, right? So if someone is touching you on the back, on your back, like you know, not necessarily your bottom, but your back, and it has a connotation that is making you feel uncomfortable and they're doing it with that intention and it has a connotation that is making you feel uncomfortable and they're doing it with that intention, that is also sexual assault, you know, because there are times when people are, like you know, patting someone's like forearm in a way that is seductive or that is, in a way that is promiscuous, right, like whatever, so, like any part of your body. I just want to make sure that there's that clarification that just because they're not touching your bum or your private area, it doesn't mean that it's not sexual. So, no, any, any, any touch onto your body, any violation onto your body, any part of yeah any part of your body um is is going going to be considered sexual assault?
Speaker 1:Yes, so the other thing I want to get into is the concept of consent, right? So we? What does that look like and what? What are like certain categories of people where, even if they give the consent, it you know it's not considered consent. You know what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 3:Well, I mean, I'm going to try my best. So please, everyone who's listening to this be listened to like from a place of open-minded, because I'm trying to say Well, I mean, I'm going to try my best. So please, everyone who's listening to this be listened to like from a place of open minded, because I'm not an expert on this part specifically. I'm just understand the traumatic aspect of this. Consent is anything that two parties are mutually agreed to doing something together. Right, it's not going to be manipulation, coercion. It's not going to be, you know, if I do this for you, if I do that for you, then I can. You know you have to do that for me. It's just something that voluntarily, with somebody's state of mind agreeing to want to participate in anything. Right, that's how I would define it as like, if you are clearly understand, right now I'm consenting to something that.
Speaker 3:I'm alert right right, I'm mentally here to understand what I'm doing because I want to do it, not because I I'm doing it for you, or because I want something because I'm afraid, or because if I don't do this for you, you're not going to like me, right? That aspect of thought mindset should not even be present in that situation. It should be mostly like hey, do you want to do this? If a person even said, maybe, if they're, if they're hesitating, you should back off, right?
Speaker 2:that's how I identified it as yeah, I just, I just wanted to also kind of find um the definition of uh, like the actual, you know, dictionary definition of sexual assault, and we were pretty much on top of that um, except with the addition of threat. So, like the idea that if you, like the habe, said, if you don't do something for me or if I'm threatening your safety, um, then that is even though they haven't done it yet or they haven't touched, they haven't, there's not physical contact yet.
Speaker 1:Um, the idea of the or the threat of, you know, bodily harm or harm to anyone else around jews also could be uh, if you don't, you know, provide sexual um favors or sexual contact with that person, then that could also be considered sexual um assault, yes, so um, yeah, so I think, going back to, I think what I was going with that question was that it has to be clearly and freely communicated, right and so in certain situations, even if the person agrees to it, you can't consider it as consent, like if the person's underage, you know, if they're not conscious, and if there's a power dynamic you know, like if you're a boss to an employee or something.
Speaker 1:So those situations you know. You can't consider it as consent as well, because there's authority difference and there's a role difference in that sense too. Completed rape and I know rape is part you know not necessarily that all sexual assault is rape. Rape is part of sexual assault, but rape is a form of sexual assault. So, coming back to that, I know there's no specifics in terms of East African community Specific data.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the specific, not specific. Yeah, specific data and statistics. What do you guys think not allows or helps these situations around community? But do you first let's start with do you think this is a prevalent issue for both of you?
Speaker 2:Oh yes, and also I was doing a lot of research over the last couple of days about, like, why our community? And there's this idea of um, there's the cloak of silence around this and you know, and everyone there's, as someone speaks out about it or when someone talks about it, it's like shock, like how this happens.
Speaker 2:this doesn't happen in our. That's because there is a history in in our community of this actually being sexual assault, rape being an accepted form, and it's accepted and it was accepted in some form for a very long time, until very recent years, which is Talafah. In Amharic it's called Talafah, I don't know what it's called in Oromifa. It's when they take the, when you, when the guy likes a girl, he calls his brothers, he calls his friends, and then they basically carry her and take her kidnap her, is that?
Speaker 2:what it's called Buta right, yeah, so they kidnap her, they take her and they basically keep her, and then they send the family either like an offer, like they rape her, right, so that way, now she's his yes, and then, after they rape her, they're like okay, now we have to marry her, and the family has to agree for this girl to be married to him, because this guy has already taken her virginity.
Speaker 1:In most cases it's like that also happens when the two can agree, but the family has said no. That can be an issue too.
Speaker 3:So basically, but because there's that history, but it can be also used as a form of a blackmail to the family, like you said. Not always, but that does happen to you.
Speaker 2:But instead. So why I say that there's a sense of acceptance around it is because, instead of the family saying you just kidnapped our daughter and you raped her and therefore there's no way in hell or high water that you're going to marry our daughter and keep her, and therefore there's no way in hell or high water that you're going to marry our daughter and keep her. You know, because the value of her virginity and the what, what will people say? And if she, if she's not virgin and if she's raped, then she won't ever be able to get married. That's more important, right? So they are just like, okay, like you know, and then that that guy gets what he wants. So there's that history of it.
Speaker 2:And then, in addition, when we also we have this idea of community and then authority that we put on age, right. So, oh, respect your elders. You know your elders could do no wrong. My, you can't speak up, speak to like, speak against your elders, all these things. So when we have an elder, not maybe in our generation, but previous generations, right.
Speaker 2:When we have an elder doing something inappropriate to a person that's younger than them, that person, there's an um, a power dynamic that that doesn't allow the child to be heard. In our community children are just supposed to be seen, not heard. They're supposed to be quiet and there and demure and the idea also, what is polite? What is a good child? A good child is a quiet child, a demure child, a boy or a girl that doesn't make too much of a fuss, that's not disturbing, that't um put the family in problems, you know, even if that's not their fault.
Speaker 2:So there's no distinction, like if you get raped or if you went and had a consensual sex. There's no distinction. Your maga could be ruined and there's a value in that maga. That's so. That's put on over the safety of the children at some points. You know this is not a universal thing, this doesn't necessarily apply to every family, every parent, every Oremo person. But there's this connotation and there's this context, historical context, that kind of sets precedence to what's happening now. Right, yeah, kind of sets precedence to what's happening now, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think there is that silence aspect of, like I said earlier at the beginning of the episode is the ignorance and is fear or shame. So something that I want to address on this is that what Bonnie just brought it up is that the idea of blaming the victims and covering up for the perpetrator I want to talk about from the trauma point of view of what that looks like to the victim. Right, because I can only speak for the victim and this experience is One of the three things that happened to that individual. One is that the traumatic experiences of this insult itself. That is something that is harsher to recover from. The second part is that the shaming, the guilting, the embarrassment that is being put on the victim. Where are you, what are you doing?
Speaker 2:What are?
Speaker 3:you wearing.
Speaker 3:All this ideology. And then the third part is that the lack of community family trust on believing that victim. That happens. So, when that happens, a lot in my form of the work that I do, because, in that sense, is that not only that. Now we have to work with this pain this individual have faced. Now we have to work on this person trusting themselves, validating themselves, believing themselves that this actually took place. Right, because the environment around them constantly reminding them saying you're the liar, you're the one who made it up, you're the one who put yourself in that situation. You did not know that. You know you're not supposed to be in that space.
Speaker 3:Right, everybody did that to that person. They isolate that victim. And now the victim is unable to even see themselves in the community form, because one of the things that, if they do speak up, where can they go? Who can they rely on? Because everybody's going to question their intention. Regardless, the one thing that a lot of times is that it happens to kids too. They tell their parents this happened to them, like this girl in the Reddit story, is that the parents, they don't know what to do, but they're like that's not true. Why are you still holding on to that. You should get over it, right, yeah.
Speaker 1:This happened a long time ago, right, and I think we like that's where we as a community have failed, right, because we put these people in these situations, like kids or, you know, young girls, uh, where, like, when boys do and boys, when people come over, we're like, oh, you know, this is your uncle, you know, and stuff like that, we expose them to these things. And when, when they do, you know, when these unfortunate situations happen, we, instead of you know, talking to the older person and saying, hey, confronting them, we blame the victim. Yeah, so this is where, as a community, I feel like we failed these victims.
Speaker 2:Yeah, also, one of the few things that I was picking up on when you were speaking was that one the child is getting re-victimized by the community, and so the perpetrator is not only violating the person's body, the child's sense of safety within their body, but then they're also taking away these essential people from them, right? And then it's also sad and I've witnessed this working in schools and also within the community is that sometimes the community and the family of the victim it's themselves put the safety and security of the perpetrator above the victim. For example, let's say, for example, an uncle that has wife and children rapes or victimizes their nephew or their niece Right, their niece right. When the parent finds out, instead of taking care of their child by believing them and prosecuting the the uncle, they will say this uncle is the provider of these children. They have a family.
Speaker 1:We can't ruin that person's life right, yeah, or you can't put them in the hands of you know the people?
Speaker 2:yeah and all of these things. In addition, one thing I've also noticed, uh, that could be possibly unique to the diaspora children, is that when we, when, um, they have parents of that are older, they tend to think that the older parents tend to think that the, the children that are born here or that came here very young, are just, uh like, mind washed by a brainwashed by the western society that, like that, everything that they think is sexualized. So this uncle that might not be thinking to do something sexual, but the child has been so sexualized and misread it, and they've been so influenced or like liberal, liberalized, liberalized that they are reading into the situation right.
Speaker 2:So that's that way they. They tend to dismiss it easily. Oh you know, this is a culture. Like you can, kissing you is, it's okay, but they don't understand what the uncle is doing when they're not there right um, and, and those are the things is that when, when?
Speaker 2:what parents need to understand again. I've worked in middle schools, I've worked in high schools and I've had multiple conversations with people that are Muslim, that are Oromo, that are Somali, that you know from all walks of life and all different from fifth grade to 12th graders. I've gotten a chance to speak with Parents when they do that, when they shush their child, they are teaching their child not to trust their instincts and then also, maybe it's not even, it hasn't even gotten there yet there are kids. Kids have an innate sense of like, an innate sense of safety, so, like they know how their body feels around something that's not OK. So, teaching their kids to be like even something as benign as like oh, this is your uncle, you know, say hi to them, give them a hug, give them a hug, yeah, and the kid, if? When the kid says, no, there, go. Oh, no, don't be rude, don't be like go do it, do it, do, hug your like how does that sound like?
Speaker 2:yeah, you know and or kiss your uncle, or kiss your aunt or you know, sit on their lap or, like you know, it's just, it's just yeah, so that kind of escalates. In addition, when it comes to the perpetrator side Right, this is something I can speak from a personal experience, people, men I can speak only to men, men from our country, men from East African community there is this idea that no does not mean no, yeah, no means maybe, no means yes, if I just push hard enough if.
Speaker 2:I just I'm a little bit more smoother and maybe she just doesn't know what she wants. Yeah right, she doesn't know what she's gonna get. So there's this idea that I just need to keep pushing and then eventually she'll crack. And when she cracks she'll want me, and then that goes into that. That. When there's that culture right of like um, of chasing, like a chasing culture very unhealthy chasing, yeah, and the boundary of what that chase, where that chase ends, is specific to that individual.
Speaker 3:If that individual has morals, they stop at like a certain an okay level of okay right and then if that person doesn't have self-control and they don't have morals, they will be like after I rape her, well, they don't consider rape right after I have sex with her, then she's gonna want me yeah, yeah, I mean, this whole aspect of it is very difficult conversation in many ways that, and I think is something that we have to kind of constantly expand on it and talk about a different point of view. You know, unfortunately this is a definitely difficult conversation for a lot of us to have and I understand that for many people there might be afraid to have this conversation and I'm just wondering what would that look like as far as community Afshar, you were going to say something earlier.
Speaker 1:Go. So I think, you know, in an ideal situation, I think, first off, instead of going back to our culture, we always go back to the deen. We always go back to what Allah says. We always go back to the deen, right, we always go back to what Allah says. And in situations like these, where you know something unfortunate has happened, um, every individual is responsible to, if they're able to, to change something with their hands. You know um. If not um, you uh change it with your mouth. If you're not, then you hate it in your heart. You know um, but what?
Speaker 1:for me, what that looks like is when you are made aware of a situation, then you report it yes, you know, yes, the authorities, um, you report it to people that are directly involved and not caring so much about.
Speaker 1:Like, what are people going to say? The kanyaanya and stuff like that. You know, and I know that because a community that is tight-knit like ours we do, we are like, oh you know, namnamal nanjada and stuff like that. But at the end of the day, we have to realize who are we obligated and who are we responsible and who is going to do that questioning to us. You know, and that's Allah SWT and that's who we are responsible to first and foremost, and it's. I think it's well, it's such a hard situation if you do find yourself in that, but I would say, definitely us having this conversation and raising awareness kind of lifts that um takes the cover off of it you know, because a lot of people, they would rather just push it under the rug, they would rather be like okay, that's something that's not happening in our community and, you know, don't go on and don't speak about it.
Speaker 1:but these things need to be spoken about because there's people's lives, um, that are being ruined every day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the boogeyman doesn't look like a monster, it's not a stranger, it's not a random person that's going to break into your house and do these things to your children. Actually, on my drive here, I was listening to a study that was done very recently. It was done in europe and the united states and um, one other country I can't remember, oh, canada, sorry, europe, canada states in canada, and they did a study, uh, and asked uh, like, I think it was like 42 000 men, um, from different races, different genders, different, not sorry, different races, different races, different genders, different, sorry, different races, different, obviously, different countries and sexual orientations or whatever, and in socioeconomic classes. And they asked them if 100% secrecy was guaranteed, if they would be interested in having sexual interactions with children from the ages of 8 to 14.
Speaker 2:And I think it was I might be wrong with my statistics about 41% said that they would do it, they would interact in. I think it was 41% or something like that from the 42,000 that they was interviewed in. I think it was 41 or something like that from the 42 000 that they was interviewed, um, and it might be higher actually, and I can pull it up later on and correct myself, but I think it was 41 of men that were interviewed. They said if 100 of secrecy was guaranteed that they would be they would get themselves involved with a child between the ages of 8 and 14 yeah, and this is what they feed off of is the secrecy aspect of it.
Speaker 2:And so it's not. And then they said there was also another narrower question that was asked if they already have someone in their life that they feel sexually attracted to in that age group, and then that number also was about 40 percent that the men that said that, yes, they already have a child in mind when they're answering that question 42 000 people men asked.
Speaker 2:So this is not a boogeyman, this is not a stranger, this is not the odd person that's on the tv that all the time being caught. It is in our communities, it is in our, in our families. You, just, you can't trust your child with anybody. You have to trust your child, you know. You have to trust and then also you have to um know the cues, because sometimes, because of, maybe, the precedence that we set in our, in our households, sometimes it's not even just the fact that we are not open, but sometimes the child feels shame. Maybe that's not due to us, but because of what happened to them, that they are not going to communicate with us, they're not going to tell us, right, so being able to read your child, being able to understand If they're more withdrawn.
Speaker 2:Seeing the clues, like if your child used to be a bubbly, happy, outgoing person that is, you know, welcoming to everyone, and all of a sudden this child is severely detached from one family member or from one gender in general. Or if they are, they used to be just a normal child and they're overly sexual. All of this added right. It could go one way or the other, if either the child will be afraid of anyone that look, that's like any. If it's a girl, maybe the girl might be afraid of any men that you know she might be interacting with it's very slow though, yes, very slow, before you can get to anything, all the stuff that you're mentioning.
Speaker 3:It's very slow, yeah, and when the the shock down, then the aspect of what you're mentioning comes up. So to notice it it might be hard, but just know your child. Yeah, get to know your child.
Speaker 2:Create a space where your child can have these conversations with you. In addition, if you are a parent, please educate yourselves in these kinds of situations of like what does a victim's attitude look like? How to notice symptoms in a child. Not even just that, but also to teach your children. There was this beautifully done classroom demonstration that I saw um lead on classroom uh demonstration that I saw I think it was in india or pakistan, where this teacher is teaching her um, her students, how, like, what's what's okay to be touched, what's okay not to be touched in your body?
Speaker 2:If a person comes and shakes your hand, is that okay? Yes. If the person comes to your hand and pats your head, yes. If the person comes to your hand and like even the different types of pats right. So if a person comes and says this is it your head? Yes. If the person comes in your hand and like even the different types of pats right. So if a person comes and says this, is it okay? Yes, okay. If the person comes and does doing this for a longer time, is that okay? No, you understand, yeah. So, like kind of walking their child through yes or no, and they it's not necessarily this means this, because that might be too traumatic for a four-year-old or a five-year-old to understand. Right, just the yes or the no part.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember Madia was watching this Omar and Hana show episode and I thought they did a really good job and I was really surprised because they I don't know if you know, but they're like, oh, you know what is safe touch and they made it into like a whole song.
Speaker 2:And I was like wow, that's. You know what is safe touch and they made it into like a whole song and I was like, wow, that's, you know like it's, it's super prevalent when you can see, when you see it on omar and hannah, yeah, so yeah, okay, well, that's. There's no good way of pivoting from there.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, yeah so I think I just want to end it on some constructive um steps. You, as a therapist, when you have, you know, clients that are like OK, this is what I'm involved in, I think you had mentioned earlier some, some stuff that you would tell them, what is like one or two action items that you usually tell your clients and you want to say your thought and then we can go there.
Speaker 2:Okay, no, I was also just going to bring it back a little bit to current events and past events that are in our community that I've noticed and that I wanted to address just because there is a history of that is that one is when the idea of everybody loves their family members right and because right now we were talking just for the parents and the victims and I want to talk to the families that could be family of the perpetrator Right, just to put it out there everybody loves their family member, everybody is protective of their family member and it's OK to feel protective of your family members.
Speaker 2:It's OK to love your family members, it's OK to want to defend your family members, protective of your family members. It's okay to love your family members. It's okay to want to defend your family members, but just to a certain degree, making sure you take a step back a little bit, a little bit, taking the step back to understand, to hear the whole situation. And I say this even you know I I say this knowing how hard it could be right. Imagine if it, if it's your like, if your father that's being accused or your brother that's being accused or your uncle that's being accused of these things and I understand the need to come out, gangbusters and being like no, I know my family member, they would never do such and such things.
Speaker 1:That reminds me of the hadith where the Prophet he says help your brother, whether he is the oppressed or he's the oppressor, and you help him, you know, as an oppressor, by stopping his oppression, because you know, when you are like, okay, this is wrong, then he can start to get help, yeah right, and maybe mend his ways. But if you just let him keep on doing what he's doing, um, you're buying him a ticket to, you know, to to Jahannam in the Akhira.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and help doesn't always mean, like you said, clapping for the other person. It just means it could also means holding them accountable and holding their feet to the fire.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you have to ask that question again. So so, like I said, you know I want to end it on a. I mean, I think there's no good note that you could end this conversation on, and you know we are not saying this is the end all be all conversation about this. We just wanted to get the conversation going and at least start it somewhere and we want people to continue in the comments and, you know, have conversations like this with your friends, you're, you know, if you have kids, and just being super hypervigilant about it. But I wanted to just say what is one or two things that you usually tell your clients who you know say okay, this is the situation I find myself in, or they, it's happened to me before, or or anything like that. Just I know I don't know if you can even boil it down to one or two things. No, no.
Speaker 3:I don't tell them anything. I really don't but I do make them the space that feels safe enough that their story and their truth are being heard and being noticed and they feel validated for their experiences, for their own truth, because there have been many people before they came to me that they try to tell the story and there has been so many people before they came to me where they felt questioned, judged, shamed. All has been filtered for them. But my job is to always create a safe space for people and not be judgmental in any aspect of it. And so I don't know for me as a therapist, as a human being, as someone who believes in Allah and want to make sure that you know that person's feeling taken care of. I just create safe space for them.
Speaker 1:Okay. So just create safe space for people and and believe them. You know, when somebody comes you with a situation like this, um, just give them the space to just talk and listen, without any bias, without you know saying, have you tried this, have you done this, have you done this? Definitely don't solve it. Yeah, and listen, and with that we'll leave you with this heavy, heavy conversation.
Speaker 2:This has been Difficult Conversations Assalamualaikum.
Speaker 1:Waalaikumsalam.