Thank you, Cass, for spearheading this effort and creating a space where writing like this can be shared.
What this experience brought home to me is how attention can feel like care when we are young. I think many of us learn to tell the difference far too late.
It also left me wondering what it would take to give young people a stronger sense of worth before the world starts assigning value to their beauty, desirability, or usefulness to others. Not by promoting a culture of image, status, gratification, and attention, but by helping them become rooted in something deeper.
This essay is a reminder that adults shape the moral atmosphere young people grow up in. We owe them more honesty, more protection, and better examples of what care actually looks like.
To the anonymous writer: thank you for being so honest. I hope that sharing these experiences helps you feel heard, valued, and met with the genuine care of those reading.
More women need to expose how our culture had aided and abetted the sexual exploitation and abuse of females starting in our childhood. Mine began at age 4.
Well... She *was* a teenager being preyed upon by grown men... From what you say about your own experiences, it sounds like you were maybe more aware of what you were doing and were more conscious going into it. I actually come from a similar place as this author — she says she grew up with an angry father and that she craved love, and I was also emotionally damaged by a broken family and just wanted real affection. I don't know her whole story and she doesn't go into the emotional details of each encounter, but I know from my own experience that girls with that kind of emotional damage and hunger for love are easily preyed upon, and that it's a pattern that plays out largely unconsciously. I think her anger is warranted towards the men who used her... I would be curious to know how what she thinks of my explanation and if it fits her own experience.
Have written a response to your note here in private messages, as I don't want to have a discussion about this with others that read these comments. But I'd like You to hear my response, and hope that's okay.
Thank you, Cass, for spearheading this effort and creating a space where writing like this can be shared.
What this experience brought home to me is how attention can feel like care when we are young. I think many of us learn to tell the difference far too late.
It also left me wondering what it would take to give young people a stronger sense of worth before the world starts assigning value to their beauty, desirability, or usefulness to others. Not by promoting a culture of image, status, gratification, and attention, but by helping them become rooted in something deeper.
This essay is a reminder that adults shape the moral atmosphere young people grow up in. We owe them more honesty, more protection, and better examples of what care actually looks like.
To the anonymous writer: thank you for being so honest. I hope that sharing these experiences helps you feel heard, valued, and met with the genuine care of those reading.
More women need to expose how our culture had aided and abetted the sexual exploitation and abuse of females starting in our childhood. Mine began at age 4.
I'm so sorry. You're absolutely right. The abuse is horrendously ubiquitous.
Well... She *was* a teenager being preyed upon by grown men... From what you say about your own experiences, it sounds like you were maybe more aware of what you were doing and were more conscious going into it. I actually come from a similar place as this author — she says she grew up with an angry father and that she craved love, and I was also emotionally damaged by a broken family and just wanted real affection. I don't know her whole story and she doesn't go into the emotional details of each encounter, but I know from my own experience that girls with that kind of emotional damage and hunger for love are easily preyed upon, and that it's a pattern that plays out largely unconsciously. I think her anger is warranted towards the men who used her... I would be curious to know how what she thinks of my explanation and if it fits her own experience.
Have written a response to your note here in private messages, as I don't want to have a discussion about this with others that read these comments. But I'd like You to hear my response, and hope that's okay.