Sexual Assault: Focus on Male Victims, part 5

I’m dealing with a topic today that pushes buttons for a lot of people.  It’s always amazing to me how quickly a misbelief can become rock solid truth in our minds, with very little knowledge, research or experience to back it up.

So.  Have you ever heard this one? “If a boy/man is sexually assaulted, it’s because he is or will become a homosexual.”

Ranks right up there with “If a woman is raped, it’s because she was asking for it.”

Evil compounded on evil.

If we’re going to follow that logic, then it would have to be true that if a lesbian is raped by a male, it’s because she wanted to/will become heterosexual.

No, it doesn’t make any sense to me, either.

I’m not going to even try to deal with sexual orientation issues here.  That’s not the point.  The point is what we believe about a boy or man who has been assaulted against his will; who has possibly been seriously hurt in the process; who had no way to prevent or escape the assault, and who is probably dealing with at least some, if not all, of the symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Why we want to victimize these guys further  is just beyond me, same as it is with women.  They’ve been through enough, already.

The simple truth is, there is no research, there are no statistics, that support the idea that males who are sexually assaulted become homosexuals or were homosexuals before the assault.  So let’s just get this out of the way:  Does it ever happen?  Yes, of course. And here’s the reason why.

Sexual assault is not just an assault on the body.  It touches the heart and soul of the victim. Please remember that the very first thing Adam and Eve noticed after they first disobeyed God was that they were naked.  It had never bothered them before, but now their minds and hearts were polluted by sin, and what God had created to be pure and beautiful in a loving relationship was also corrupted by sin.  Human sexuality was the first thing Satan touched with his scaly finger, and it’s been a problem ever since.  Our minds are so twisted up and polluted by sin, especially in matters of sexuality, that we fail to think biblically about the issue.

I’ve said it before and I’m about to say it again:  Sexual sin is NOT the unforgiveable sin!  That sin is to deny the deity of Jesus Christ, which is blasphemy. Look it up in Matthew 12:22-32.  We, not God, are the ones who have elevated sexual sin to THE WORST SIN YOU CAN COMMIT.  I agree, it’s awful.  It offends our holy God, and it ought to offend us. But, as I’ve also said before, if there had never been sexual sin, Jesus still would have had to die.  I wish we were just as concerned about lying, or coveting, or using God’s Name in vain as we are about sexual sin.

Anyway.  Please pardon the rabbit trail.  I get churned up sometimes 🙂 Back to the issue.

A boy or man is just as confused and full of self-doubt as a female victim is.  His negative self-talk will include things like this:

“Why did that guy pick ME?  Am I really a homosexual?  I must not be very manly. I must look or seem weak.  I must seem like I WANT to be abused!  Something about me attracted him.  Maybe it’s the way I walk.  Maybe I really do seem attractive to other men.  Does that mean I’m really homosexual?”

One of the most distressing results of sexual assault on a male or female child is that it robs the person of the right to discover sexuality as a loving, wholesome, and binding experience. Childhood sexual assault almost always leads to a host of other problems, including other sexual assault episodes.

What we forget in all this is that the rapist is the one to blame.  The rapist is the one who feels entitled to force himself on someone else. The rapist is the one who breaks the law and creates no end of ongoing grief and sorrow for the victim. Why we seem to so quickly shift the blame to the victim is just amazing to me.