(2017) Consigned to silence

Long Story Short for Manila Standard

published 5 February 2017

TWO 15-year-olds were on their way home one evening. It was later than usual because they came from the wake of their friend’s brother after school. One of the girls was seated beside a thin, elderly man who had on his lap a plastic bag of rice.

She felt something brush against her chest. She was horrified to see the man’s right hand wandering over it. She looked at the man and asked: “Tatay, hindi po ba kayo nahihiya sa ginagawa nyo?” (Aren’t you ashamed of your behavior?)

The man muttered some words angrily. The girl could not make out what he was saying although his tone implied he was denying doing anything out of the ordinary. He clutched his bag of rice more tightly and glared at the girl.

The girl, shaking, pulled her friend’s shirt sleeve even as it was not quite their stop yet. When she got home she immediately took a bath in an attempt to wash away the memory of everything that had taken place.

Yet another girl, with yet another friend, were in yet another jeepney. They were seated near the entrance. It was the rush hour, so some male passengers took the risk of riding “sabit” style.

The girl was jolted by her friend’s nudging her arm. “Why,” she asked, but the friend would not speak. Tilting her head to the right she saw that the “sabit” man had unzipped his pants and was playing with his genitals.

The two girls shouted together: “Para po!” and practically jumped out of the vehicle. One of them later remarked: “Why did we not think of pushing that pervert out of the jeep?”

***

And then, on a bus traversing Edsa one summer afternoon, a girl was traveling home from a workshop she was attending. She was tired, and was on the verge of dozing off when she felt a hand brushing her thigh. She looked at her seatmate, a man who looked like he was in his mid 30s, carrying a backpack. It seemed he was on his way to, or home from, work.

Now this girl is feisty, so she flung her pouch at him and cursed him. “Manyak!” she shouted, attracting the attention of all the other passengers. “P*ina mo, lumayas ka dito…tingnan nyo po yan manyak po yan!” The man stood up and alighted on the next stop.

But she was not so feisty, after all. When the girl got off on her stop and met up with her mother at a coffee shop near their home, she burst into tears.

This week we heard about a college student who found herself in a similar situation inside a UV Express van. The circumstances are as told by her brother on his Facebook account. The entire issue, especially the school’s resolution of the case, is now the subject of talk on social media, but here I prefer to zero in on how she dealt with her abuser.

The first reaction was denial. Perhaps he was not really touching her. Perhaps he, too, was sleepy and not aware of where his hands were. And then, self-doubt. The girl did not want to make a scene inside the vehicle. Maybe they would think she was presumptuous for saying he was making a pass at her.

In the end, the girl took a photo—a blurred one, she insisted to her brother—and posted it on Twitter, telling other commuters to be careful when they take public transportation.

Alas, some people did recognize the fellow in the photo, and it reached the authorities of the school where, it turns out, both of them were enrolled. After an investigation, the girl was found guilty of falsely accusing another student of wrongdoing and was made to apologize to the very boy she said touched her.

***

But how should someone react to abuse?

It is easy for people to say she should have done this, or said that. Slap the jerk, shame him, curse him to the high heavens as Feisty Girl did above.

Call on the attention of the other passengers to do the same. Grab him by the collar and drag him to the police station.

And why take pictures when the unwelcome hand was where it should not be? If at all, should not the picture have been shown to school authorities instead of being posted online?

Perhaps her pants were too tight?

These questions and suggestions are precisely why the culture of victim blaming persists even in a society that claims to be modern or progressive.

Nobody will ever know what it feels like to be abused unless one has experienced it. Whatever goes through the mind of the abused, and whatever she decides to do out of impulse, fear or intimidation—she has her reasons. After all, in such situations, the mind is likely to go blank.

The only way we can arm ourselves ­—our daughters and our sisters and perhaps even our sons and brothers—against predators in all shapes and sizes, is to contemplate the scenario beforehand. What should they do if this happens? Why should they not cower? Why should they not entertain the thought they are, even at the slightest degree, to blame? Why should not the word “victim” carry the stigma of being weak or stupid?

Only then can we give these predators, and the dangerous thinking that enables them, what they deserve.

adellechua@gmail.com