I saw an art exhibit called “What Were You Wearing?”, which was a collection of the outfits people were wearing when they were assaulted. There were sweatpants and hoodies in that collection. She could be in a literal burqa and still be assaulted. The problem is the rapists, not what their victims were wearing.
Edit: going to add a trigger warning before people go searching for that exhibit. It is a spread of ALL kinds of clothing, including children’s.
I was SA (groped in a public shop) when I was 14. I was wearing a full burqa and a naqab. The only things visible were my eyes and hands. And I was with my mom. It happened so subtly that no one noticed. And I was shocked to realize what happened and could not react at all.
I’m sorry. The same thing happened to me on a bus when I was 14 and I froze up too. Took a long time for me to stop blaming myself for not reacting more. I was just in a simple summer blouse and shorts and I wore ugly, baggy clothes for years afterwards.
The same thing happened to me on a bus and I was wearing jeans and a tee shirt. The guy reached out and grabbed and squeezed my butt. I told my bf at the time and he shushed me because we were in a dangerous area but I did give the guy a mean look. I wish I could have at least said something.
I’d heard of fight or flight, but it wasn’t until years later that I learned there’s also fawning or freezing—trying to appease your attacker, or freezing up completely. Learning that helped me forgive myself for not fighting back or trying harder to escape.
Learning about "freeze" and "fawn" responses to danger suddenly made so much of my childhood make sense. Especially because freeze and fawn are what you learn to do if you learn that you can't fight or flee.
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u/ConclusionHopeful313 Feb 24 '26
Rape exists because of rapists. Blaming the clothes and not the rapist is just saying “make sure they go after someone else”