We need to get over the myth that men are invulnerable to sexual victimization at the hands of women says Hugo Schwyzer.
On Thursday, an Ohio judge sentenced Stacy Schuler, a popular high school gym teacher, to four years in prison for having had sex with at least five male students, including at least two members of the football team. During her trial, Schuler’s defense lawyers suggested that her judgment had been compromised by her vegan diet, irritable bowel syndrome, and anti-depressant medication.
Schuler’s case raises a familiar debate, one that’s been going on at least since Mary Kay Letourneau became a household name fifteen years ago. (For those who’ve forgotten, Letourneau was a 34 year-old middle school teacher when she began a sexual relationship with a 13 year-old student named Vili Fualaau. Sentenced to prison for second-degree child rape, she bore two of Fualaau’s children – and ended up marrying him after he turned 21.) The debate hinges on fundamental questions about the differences between the sexes – and about what it really means to be abused. What it boils down to is this: are sexual relationships between grown women and underage boys as harmful as those between adult men and underage girls?
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Because women are much less likely to sexually abuse teens than are men, those rare cases that do feature female defendants tend to attract lots of media attention – particularly when the woman involved is relatively young and conventionally attractive. Invariably, someone will suggest that the boys involved were lucky, and that rather than being abused, they had lived out every straight teen guy’s fantasy of nailing the hot teacher. When, as in this Ohio case, the boys involved are described as distraught at what had happened to them, there’s often a sense of disbelief. How could normal red-blooded American boys be upset about the fact that they got laid?
The myth that men are invulnerable to sexual victimization at the hands of women is a powerful one. It sits alongside several other myths. For one, we have a hard time believing that grown women could be attracted to adolescent boys (while we accept as normal the idea that grown men are sexually fixated on teen girls.) Second, we have a hard time acknowledging that guys are every bit as emotionally vulnerable as their sisters, just as easily traumatized by a predatory adult. Young men may indeed be horny (as are more young women than we sometimes admit), but a strong libido doesn’t functional as psychological armor.
But perhaps the most enduring myth brought up by cases like this is the idea that pleasure is incompatible with victimization. Real victims only feel pain, never arousal – or so far too many people still believe. An erection, or better still, ejaculation, functions as proof that a boy wasn’t really harmed. Most predators who molest children and underage teens know this; many sexual abusers go to great lengths to try to arouse their victims. The child’s pleasure functions as a kind of absolution in the mind of the abuser; “I can’t be that bad if I made them feel good!”
But of course, an orgasm isn’t evidence of consent. As decades of research have shown us, a surprising number of male and female victims of sexual abuse do report having experienced some physical pleasure while they were being molested. That memory of arousal can lead to greater feelings of guilt, as it seems proof in a child’s mind that he (or she) was somehow complicit in what happened. “Part of me enjoyed it, so I must have wanted it,” the thinking goes. Some therapists who work with survivors of abuse say that these cases are often the most difficult to treat.
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By not taking the sexual abuse of boys seriously, we perpetuate toxic myths about men and women alike. Muscles and high testosterone levels offer little protection against emotional violation; even football players can be profoundly injured by a sexually irresponsible adult. We need to acknowledge that young women don’t have a monopoly on psychological vulnerability, just as young men don’t have a monopoly on intense lust. And we need to remember that when it comes to relationships between adults and teens of either sex, desire and pleasure are never evidence of consent.
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photo: Joseph Gray / flickr
About Hugo Schwyzer
A sexual predator starts w/ easy targets, all sexes,all ages.Happens in every bar in the world, unreported.Sexual predators are well on their way to a lifetime as psychopaths capable of anything. Psychopaths cannot be reformed. Their goal is to destroy people,break down identity, enslave the victim. Some victims get away. Some don’t. Listen to divorce cases.
Sex is not ownership.
At the age of 7 I too was an easy target by a perp that was my neighbor. While I was outside alone (family in the house) on my bike, he approached me and asked me to go to the store with him as he made false promises to coerce a broke, lonely lil’ boy with no real father figure in the household at the time. I bought the lie and went only to be deceived. He detoured from the store’s driveway entrance and proceeded to the back school yard playground. Slid up and down the sliding board is where he started and ended. My last slide down turned to a nightmare for me. After it was all over he left his evidence on the robe I was wearing. When I arrived home, an older sibling asked,”Freddy, What’s that on your housecoat. Because I was too afraid to tell the truth, She repeated the question and just covered her face and wept hysterically. Perps aren’t ever aware of the mental anguish caused by their forceful actions upon others and I understand now why jeffrey dahmer ended up doing what he did because he never had a chance to get the help he needed to deal with what happened to him as a child. When I saw the movie A Time To Kill” I was grateful that I never told my mother before she died about the rape and I was angry with dad because he wasn’t in my life at the time so I guess you can imagine where that left me. In the Navy, while on active duty I tried to get help with alcoholism and was denied. If anyone asked me then why was I drinking in the first place, there was no way I could have known at that time that drinking was just the beginning of me searching out Coping Mechanisms. I also Now understand what KD Lang was singing about” the “Constant fucking craving”
I see that now TGMP is again deleting comments critical of Schwyzer’s change in position.
Cases like this are not as rare as Schwyzer and others would have us believe. Anecdotally speaking, i know of at least three guys I went to high school with who had had sex with teachers. One of them with almost a different teacher every year until his senior year.
And this was in a small town of just under 4000. One wonders what a big city school would be like where the rumor mill is less agile
The purpose of the article was to state that cases of woman on boy rape seldom if ever happens.
I guess I have tuned in to the wrong station because I can’t say personally that i understand or have experienced that. I do think of those guys being some lucky bastards because they’re not forced to deal with intrusive thoughts of constantly craving COCK 28/7 in a given day. AT LEAST the gender Order was proper even though the act/incident was improper. For the guys who’s been ramrodded against their will (esp. childhood years) by another male, sucks really bad. Honestly we’re the one’s who have been robbed of divine natural ATTRACTIONS a man should have towards a woman. I can recall an encounter once with a female that put me in a position where as I had to think about an opposite sex partner who I thought I enjoyed being with just to get an erection to sleep with her. That’s not normal. I do wonder now if all the guys who wer molested by women classify themselves as being Bi/straight/gay???
It’s really hard for me to grasp that it would not be consensual especially between a man and a woman if neither of them has never been victimized by the same sex. If the woman is butch and develope an overwhelming craving for some dick then I could probably see a glimpse of probability. I am curious to know do these guys who claim to have been raped/molested by women end up solely reversing the role or just holla a whatever?
I am truly sorry for what you’ve been through. I hope that you have been able to find both sobriety and treatment to help you through this. There really is safety and peace away from your nightmare if you find a good therapist to work with.
My best.
Some of the most effective treatment that has brought me true success to help me through it all was, simply, Taking the risk of talking it out and often times in the company of complete strangers. The benefits Thus Far has been nothing but beneficial. What’s really strange is that I was more comfortable with the strangers than my psychiatrists, counselors, psychologists, and countless others,and including a prison inmate.
Excellent article, especially the shame factor over assault-arousal response. I posted the following on Hugo’s blog:
Having treated both boys and girls and women (few men) who were survivors of sexual abuse and rape, I can tell you the “arousal/orgasm” factor is absolutely the most difficult piece to address and work through. Sadly, even some of my colleagues will get sidetracked by that factor and, depending on the age of the survivor, wonder if there was an element of consent involved.
One aspect of my work I’ve found fascinating are the number of young women I’ve worked with who told me that it was easier to work through it with me than female therapists they’ve had.
Whether that is due to my presence and therapy style or more a function of needing to work through it with a man, I don’t know. I haven’t seen much research on success rates for female vs male therapists, but I think that may be due to male therapists being cautious going into that arena.
Men being cautious about going in that direction Should do so, especially in today’s society. Why would a woman want to talk a man about women issues without a hidden agenda except to get her appetite fed. To me the very thought is sickening and maybe that was because I was raped by a man. Til this day, at my age, I do not feel comfortable with a woman checking me for prostrate cancer maybe fearful she’ll attempt to take advantage of me and be dissatisfied miserably. It has been very helpful for me to talk to another male because a prisoner once taught me how powerful that was to address your issues with one of the same(ethnicity has no place here) . Sad reality is that there isn’t much therapy available in the civilian except “talking it out(prayerfully) with someone else you may/may not feel comfortable with. I’ve found the latter very effective in addressing it and gaining some victory.
By the way, for me at the age of seven, DEFINITELY none consensual. I’ll admit myself Now, as I look back, Had one of my male teachers( whom I secretly thought were very handsome men and Well built) had approached me to engage in sexual activities that were not harmful to me or violent in nature, with them, HELL2THAFUCKINGYYEEEAAAAHHH! Got Butter!
I think the article might be a bit of a white wash, the modern research is showing that sex criminality is not gendered and most male rapists were sexually abused by women in their childhood, which like the truth about domestic violence, its very threatening to feminism in its current ideological form.
Most male rapists were sexually abused by women in their childhood?? Say what?
“Most male rapists were sexually abused by women in their childhood?? Say what?”
Just that. There are a number of studies that show most male rapists have been sexually abused by a woman as a child.
A question to ponder. Could it be possible that the woman that supposedly raped a boy was trying to do him a favor in effort to convert him back to normality due to prior damage possibly already had been done by a male figure?
Great article. This area is really murky to me, even as a feminist with relatively well-established beliefs around sex and sexuality. I guess that, raised within the society I was, I have a very hard time picturing what the situation might have been like between Schuler and the boys she abused…….
This area is really murky for men and boys, too, Juliana. We males are never supposed to not want sex. Yet we do end up on the business end of creepy situations, and some of those do involve women as the perpetrators. And just as with women victims of rape, the rape apologists inevitably show up and claim that the boy or man must have enjoyed it, so it can’t be rape.
I also wish it were as rare as Hugo states. It is not.
One of the better compendiums of the scientific literature on the subject can be found at
http://female-offenders.com/bibliography.html
If you have been a male victims, I suggest you visit http://www.1in6.org or look at the materials Dr. Jim Hooper (affiliated with Harvard Medical School) has posted on his website.
Also, I must respectfully disagree with Dr. Schwyzer’s comment that most of these cases hit the press. There are websites with the photos and factual reports concerning hundreds if not thousands of female perpetrators of sex crimes. Very few of them make the press beyond the local market.
Consider, for example, the case of Julie Green, a 38 year old Astoria, Oregon woman who plead guilty in March, 2011 to getting a 14 year old boy drunk and then raping him. According to family members the 14 year old boy was emotionally devastated. She was sentenced to 30 days in jail. To my knowledge, the mainstream press accounts did not extend beyond the Portland, Oregon area.
Another commenter noted there is evidence that male victims of sexual abuse by female are more likely to become rapists. If readers are interested in the scientfic literature in this area, I would recommend the work of Dr. David Lisek, an expert on both male victims of sexual abuse and male rapists. He has a number of compelling presentations available online.
One other note.
I find it fascinating how quickly apologists in these cases conclude that 12-15 year old boys have sufficient emotional maturity to consent to and handle a sexual relationship with an adult woman.
In my experience, boys of that age are usually less mature than girls of that age, and only crackpots (and the Legislatures of a couple of benighted states) would claim that a 14 year old girl is mature enough to give consent to sexual relations.
Me, at the age of fifteen(as I look back) those thoughts of being with girls that way didn’t excite me at all. On the same note(especially after I was raped by a man), could not understand why the ones I di encounter they all wanted me in that way but the Feelings(sadly) were not mutual. We got along so well as friends. I couldn’t understand why at the age of 15 or so, I all of a sudden developed a sexual attraction to older men. OOH maybe because of the bastard that raped me when I was seven(that son of abitch).
What that female teacher did was coercive and out of bounds because of the power imbalance, not so much the age discrepancy.
Those boys were students at her school, which means she was in a power relationship over them, which by itself is inappropriate, no matter what their ages. Even if they didn’t feel coerced, even if they were old enough to consent, there is an inherent power imbalance there. It’s the same as having sex with someone under your command as a military officer — even if there could be consent, there really couldn’t be full consent.
Bear in mind, though, that those boys were technically above the age of consent. What she did was not rape like in the Letourneau case. She was on trial because she violated an Ohio state law that made it illegal for teachers to have sex with students even if the students were over the age of consent. I wouldn’t say those young men were victims and only victims. The judge referred to “children,” but that’s not quite what they were either.
You could have a case where someone did something illegal and unethical and still not have clearcut victims.
Interestingly enough, she did not defend herself with the argument that those boys were old enough to consent, and she didn’t defend herself with the idea that the sex was consensual. Is that because that would be too controversial, or because it would have made no legal difference?
Wellok, if I heard the press reports correctly, at least some of the males were plied with alcohol beforehand. If we can agree that intoxicated college women cannot legally give consent to sex, I would hope we could agree that intoxicated high school males cannot legally give consent either.
Rape is rape.
I didn’t know about the use of alcohol. If someone is too intoxicated to consent, then there is no consent, and it’s rape. I agree, it should be the same whether the victim is male or female. It is possible for a man with an erection to be raped, if the sex is coerced and not consensual. (An erection can be an involuntary response, not a clear sign of consent. And you can be deeply drunk and still get an erection. Well, some people can….) I was trying to say their age alone was not enough to show that they were rape victims, or at least not only rape victims. Giving alcohol to people who cannot legally consume it adds another level of criminality to the whole thing. They were old enough to consent to sex with a woman her age but not old enough to consume alcohol, at least under American law.
We’ve had cases on our campus of both partners in a student couple giving consent while drunk, then the woman turning in the man the next day. This should be unenforceable.
I’d just like to see the actual video footage on that one. With two people smoking crack and consenting, should that be unenforceable too? That one I’say, Hell ya. People drinking together, ya never know Unless you were there. As much as I hate to give credit to the level of honesty when it comes to a crack smoker, they tell you right UP Front what they expect Before you drank their beer or you watch them smoke. Sad reality is that neither one knows why they’re getting high or drunk in the first place.
Is that because that would be too controversial, or because it would have made no legal difference?
No, it is probably because she plead not guilty by reason of insanity. If she tried to claim that the boys were of the age of consent, she would essentially admit that she knew what she was doing when she did, and could therefore be held culpable. Luckily, the judge bought Schuler’s nonsense “Zoloft made me do it” argument (although I am sure Schwyzer does).
Good point. I hadn’t thought of that.
She was too impatient. She couldn’t wait a year or two until they graduated and everything would have been totally legal?
Come on Ohio…. FOUR YEARS IN PRISON ????
By all means, fire this teacher. Ensure she never teaches again. Counsel the boys on norms of sexual behavior and appropriate boundaries. However, I can’t believe that these cases cause any long-lasting psychological damage to the boys concerned. What a waste of time and resources… somewhere out there, there are some real criminals committing actual crimes.
GMP this is despicable. You allow this comment to stand while silencing the voices of real victims.
Shame on you.
Pat, you are a disgusting apologist for female privilege. Seek therapy and stop damaging the world with your warped views.
(CO) Brenda Lynette Harding, 30,
babysitter – Gets 90 days jail for sex with boy, 15, who committed suicide,
At long last, Schwyzer writes an article where women are actually held responsible for their actions.
With any luck this will continue.
No statistics to quibble about here!
http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=39783
Go for it.
When people hit puberty they should be able to consent to sex. The focus here should be on consent and not age. A fourteen year old should be able to consent to have sex with a 30 year old if they are able to consent to sex with another 14 year old. Ridiculous. The idea that social awareness, intelligence, and moral functioning track with age is ridiculous. A sizable minority of 17 year olds are more childish than the majority of 14 year olds. Age is a nigh arbitrary quantifier as regards the psyche. There are so many ‘adults’ who are really scared, jealous, and selfish children. In fact, it is the majority (currently.)
I have to agree, because you’re absolutely right. And more so that,’ if the seven year old was already prepped to take it up the ass against his will before he turned 14, you damn right he/she has the right to consent to be with someone more mature than they are. The real truth is they(we) learned already against our will by an older person ANYFUCKING way what it felt/feels like to be stuck with those feelings, They stay with you until You decide to disarm those feelings and desires you’re having SECRETLY. That’s hell itself when you believe for you, it;s unnatural to feel that way. Again, IT IS WHAT IT IS! All cases are not valid, because I know now If I was 14 and my fine ass history teacher, my hot ass science teacher(get my point) would have even HINTED to me that he wanted to give me some dick at that moment, I WOULD have said,”where will we go to do it at!!!!!!!Keeping It too real because it’s healthy, Tell the fuckin truth, It ain’t hard.
“Because women are much less likely to sexually abuse teens than are men, those rare cases that do feature female defendants tend to attract lots of media attention ”
Categorically INCORRECT. First of all, it is NOT rare. And second of all, the MSM bends over backwards to avoid reporting incidences of female pedophilia. Here is a listing from just ONE MONTH (Nov 2011):
(AL) Amanda Watkins,
teacher – Guilty of rape of boy, 15. Sentencing TBD,
(CA) Chrissy Ann Dunn, 31,
neighbor – Sentenced to year in jail for lewd act and oral copulation of boy, 14,
(CA) Patricia Ann Serrano, 43,
neighbor – Accused of sex with boy, 12,
(CO) Terah Allyn Rawlings, 32,
teacher – Accused of sex with boy, 15,
(CT) Tricia Coccomo, 38,
teacher – Supreme Court reinstates convictions and 12-year prison sentence,
(FL) Amanda Cooney, 26,
teacher – Accused of interfering with missing boy, 16,
(FL) Sheryle Lynn Vanlandingham, 42,
neighbor – Gets 5+ years prison for sex with teen boy,
(IL) Melissa Calusinski, 25,
daycare worker – Guilty in death of boy, 16 months. Sentencing date TBD,
(IN) Katherine Cervantes, 35,
neighbor – Accused of sex with boy, 14,
(KS) Cathleen Balman, 42,
teacher – Accused of indecency with boy, 15,
(KY) Amy Noles, 38,
teacher – Accused of sex abuse of male student,
(LA) Heather N. Daughdrill, 28,
Bible camp teacher – Accused of carnal knowledge of boy, 13
(MI) April Patzkowsky, 32,
teacher’s aide – Gets seven years prison for sex with male student, 14,
(MN) Tameshia Leeann Allen-Hodges, 23,
teacher – Accused of pimping disabled female,
(NC) Megan Trainor, 24,
teacher – Accused of indecent liberties with male student, 16,
(NC) Yolanda Shonta Williams, 23,
teacher – Accused of sex with student,
(NY) Claudia Tillery, 42,
teacher – Accused of sex/alcohol offenses involving 6th-grade boy,
(OH) Sarah Hickman, 37,
teacher – Accused of contributing to delinquency of student,
(OH) Shannon Hurley, 41,
neighbor – Accused of liquoring up and having sex with two boys, 14 and 16,
(PA) Lhonda Kanode, 41,
neighbor – Accused of sex assault of boy, 15,
(PA) Gabrielle Suzanne Marvelli, 39,
teacher – Guilty of sex with male student, 17. Sentencing date TBD,
(SC) Erica Mae Butts, 25,
neighbor – Sentenced to life in prison for death of girl, 3,
(SC) Carole Ann Hope, 36,
teacher – Accused of sex with student 11 to 14 years old,
(TN) Cindy Garner Clifton, 41,
teacher – Accused of rape/contributing to delinquency of 11 boys, aged 11 to 14,
(TN) Jeana Lynn Gunter, 35,
neighbor – Gets probation for sex with boy, 15,
(TX) Lori David, 38,
neighbor – Gets no jail for online solicitation of boy, 16,
(TX) Amanda Lynette Logue, 25,
teacher – Accused of improper relationship with student,
(TX) Kaci Pomerenke, 31,
teacher – Gets three days jail for sex with male student, 14,
(TX) Cynthia Stewart, 43,
guidance counselor – Accused of sex offenses involving boy, 15,
((WV) Summer Lynn Burford, 34,
neighbor – Accused of sex with boy, 14,
Very interesting article and interesting conversation, I’m surprised there is so much minimization of the sexual abuse of boys by women. As a female survivor of sexual abuse (committed by men) I have no equivocation about the validity of sexual abuse experiences of young men who have victimized by mature women.
Rape need bot be defined entirely by the physical aspects of the event; it is more defined by the emotional and personal boundaries that are first violated for the abuse/rape to occur. The power imbalance that exists between a young teen or a child and an adult is great and is the over-riding factor in such cases. The stereotype that only men can rape certainly gives power to the legitimizing women who overpower their young subjects using sex as their tool and disempowers the victim. I am sorry for those victims. As a woman who suffered under the rule of a very mysoginist household growing up and never had my experiences validated, I have some idea of how horrible it feels to have a horrible and shaming experience completely minimized, ignored or worse, to be blamed for it happening.
Additionally, as the article states, the physical responses to sexual arousal are entirely physiological and not within our control. Again, the stereotype that a woman cannot abuse a man because she must stimulate arousal to consummate a sexual relationship and therefore must engender the males’ consent is rubbish. Manipulation and gentle seduction all gain the victims consent temporarily, but not to gain mutual pleasure or to participate in an egalitarian and sharing relationship, but usually as a pattern learned, of giving in to pressure from an authority or performing sexually to avoid a perceived threat (bodily, emotionally) or to gain another unrelated favor (money, food, security).
Its all sexual abuse and is a crime.
As a male victim of a female paedophile, I couldn’t agree more.
Its all sexual abuse and is a crime.
My boyfriend is 21. When he was a virgin and at the age of 17 he was raped by a friend of his mother. A woman who worked in the school he attended. They had more than a few sexual encounters. His mother never found out. Since then he has always been attracted to older women (I’m 30). He has a hard time maintaining an erection, he thinks because of guilt and fear that he would get her pregnant as he didn’t use a condom. He is also very depressed. Works full time but sleeps a good 3 hours when he gets home from work.
I believe it is all connected to his first sexual experience. Is there anything I can do that would help him? I’ve encouraged him to see his doctor and think counselling is essential. At the moment he seems reluctant, although definitely not unwilling.
It’s all very sad.
But accusing Hugo of rape isn’t a personal attack? This is not the place for that.