Ioana Andrei

The Police Blamed Me When I Reported My Abuser

2020-12-14

Photo by Sofia Alejandra from Pexels

The other night, I dreamt my mother died.

It felt real and surreal at the same time.

I've had many dreams of my mother being at risk. Almost as many as I've had of myself in danger.

I've dreamt about being kidnapped, chased, locked in intricate mazes. I've even dreamt Satan facetiming me through an iPod nano.

I'm sure Freud would have many thoughts on this, but my interpretation is simple.

I feel in constant danger.

The Background

It's not something I am consciously aware of. If you stop me at the supermarket and ask, "How's it going?" I won't say, "Oh you know, just fearing for my life, how are you?"

It's a bit more subtle than that.

You see, it starts in childhood.

Parents tell us not to talk to strangers.

If we're born as girls, they tell us not to pick fights with boys because boys are stronger.

Girls get princesses, prams, and kitchen sets. Boys get action heroes, toy guns, and cars.

We sneak peeks at violent movies where people (mostly, men) blow each other up.

As they hit puberty, young women get various degrees of warning, according to culture. Some get told not to speak to boys at all. Some are cautioned not to get raped, or it would be their fault. Most girls around the world are told what to wear, what to say, and how to protect themselves so that men don't assault them.

I wish it got easier with age. It doesn't.

Because when you're educated to expect abuse, it's harder to challenge it when it happens. And those meant to protect you have an easier time downplaying and normalizing it.

The Incident

A few months ago, a highly troubled man moved into our building. He was consistently rude to residents.

Once, I heard him shouting abuse at my female neighbor. I grabbed my phone and started filming. When I saw him getting physically near her, I planted myself in front of him, at a distance.

I filmed his whole raging episode.

Fast forward 3 hours. Two police officers arrive after my 999 call.

They watch the first 5 seconds of the video and say, "I'm not gonna watch a 5-minute video."

"But he threatened to hit me."

"Where did he threaten to hit you?"

Well, um, in the video. That's the point of watching.

Two police officers watch a fit 60-year old white man escalate from,

"Look at you, with your bleached hair and your painted nails" to,

"Bitter, twisted girl. No wonder you haven't got a boyfriend" to,

"Let me hit her!" (the latter while being restrained by his housemate).

They hear the neighbors' account of him grabbing me and following me up the stairs to call me a "pathetic little bitch".

Police conclusion: "Can't do anything."

The Verdict

A couple of days later, it appears the officers marked the incident as "no offense".

How do I know this? From another police officer, who comes into my home just to let me know that I'm already wasting his time.

He watches the video. He asks, "So what's the offense?"

"He threatened to hit me."

"No, he didn't."

"Yes he did, look."

"He said, 'Go away before I hit you'. That's not the same as 'I will hit you.'"

Internally, my guts knot and my head feels like a hot air balloon.

The policeman continues, "You aggravated him by going down the stairs. He got upset because you were filming him. Why were you filming him? It's clear that you don't like him."

Never mind that the video shows I said nothing to the dude, apart from asking, "Why is this relevant?" when he enquired on my relationship status.

I accuse the officer of victim-blaming. He remarks, "I'm telling you he wasn't being aggressive."

Thanks for letting me know.

The three juniors brought along to intimidate me took a short statement about him grabbing me. Then they walked out, leaving behind a heap of mud and a shattered heart.

Three weeks later, the neighbor gets sent to prison for my assault and for a subsequent attack on the residents in the middle of the night.

The sergeant that led the team in the second incident apologized for the lack of judgment shown by previous officers.

The Bigger Picture

My first encounter with the London Metropolitan Police was a disappointing one.

I learned that:

The same police force that brutalizes Black bodies allows white delinquents to roam free.
Women abused by white men are belittled, ignored, or blamed for their attackers' behavior.
Unless you keep pressing charges and follow up relentlessly, your case gets covered in cobwebs.
Police discretion goes as far as Incident Response Unit officers contradicting each other over whether they can arrest a perpetrator (spoiler alert: they can).

I should count myself lucky for being white and female. I was never at risk of being harmed by the police. Apart from psychologically.

There is a big spectrum of police violence against its citizens. I was at the very light end, and it still hurt like hell.

Hearing that I was responsible for someone calling me a bitch and trying to hit me.

Having a panic attack as officers were interrogating me about my actions and cutting me off from my statement, scolding me for interrupting them.

Hearing the words "no threat", "no aggression", "no offense".

As this time in my life unfolded, I felt the pain of all the women grilled in interrogation rooms as they press charges for rape.

I know rape and common assault are not the same (let me say that again, in italic: I know.) But the victimization strategy is.

Victimization has been used to shame and silence women into submission from the times of Adam and Eve. To the extent that, to this day, people are against giving women painkillers during labor because we must pay for Eve's sins in Paradise.

And the worst part is, when you cry "Victimization!" you get an extra shot of it. On the house.

The Outcome

Angry man goes to prison.

Angry man is old and has vulnerable status.

Angry man keeps his social housing and comes back home.

What?

You would think that ex-offenders have a hard time keeping hold of public-funded tenancies when they go around attacking people.

You would think there are loads of homeless people who'd make more courteous neighbors.

But the angry man is white. Those who complain about him are women.

Of course, it's more complex than that. As the local council keeps tooting, "there are laws and regulations in place to protect the vulnerable."

Sure there are. But the definition of vulnerable is as white and patriarchal as it was 200 years ago.

My Response

I don't care who I piss off, so long as I get things done. Get the wolf out of the sheep zone.

"Aggressive!"

"Arrogant!"

"Bitch!"

I've heard this cacophony more over the past three months than over the prior 27 years.

From the way I write my emails, to being too composed when I'm angry, to simply standing on my own two feet. It seems I attract expletives.

A voice in my head is saying, 'Get used to it. Powerful women must be prepared to receive backlash. It's just how the culture is.'

Another voice is saying, 'Fuck the culture. Change the culture. Speak out. Get harassed. Speak out about getting harassed.'

I guess both voices are right, but why do they have to speak on top of each other like a couple of black-headed gulls? (They are really noisy.)

Social Change

In 2016, the UK force at Nottinghamshire Police was the first to treat misogyny as a hate crime.

In 2020, Labour MP Stella Creasy is campaigning for the government to make misogyny a hate crime nationwide.

She explains in The Guardian, “Misogyny drives crimes against women – recognizing that within our criminal justice system will help us detect and prevent offenses including sexual assault, rape and domestic abuse."

As expected, some media outlets call this the "arrests for wolf-whistling" law, suggesting that it would bring mounting charges for trivial incidents.

Crucially, this law would help data-gathering and understanding misogynistic patterns more deeply.

Charities Citizens UK, Refuge, and Women's Aid say the law will "not create any new crimes but would provide critical data on the link between hostility to women and the abuse and harassment women experience."

Furthermore, there is proof that including misogyny in hate crime will increase the likelihood of women reporting abuse, thus decreasing gender-based violence long-term.

Perspective

x% of women and girls experience sexual assault compared to y% of men and boys.

Imagine you're an alien from a faraway galaxy and you have no idea what the values x and y are.

You would be equally concerned for each and every victim, regardless of gender identity.

But if you were summoned to Planet Earth to understand the causes of sexual assault, you would look at each percentage and ask, "Why?"

Why do people abuse women, and why do people abuse men?

What is preventing us from bringing each of these numbers down?

Surely, we can't use the same soil to grow rice as we do to grow potatoes?

I could easily pull out the numbers x and y. But you can do that yourself.

Personally, I'm much more interested in the unofficial x and y. The reports not being made, the voices not being heard, the officers dissuading victims from pressing charges.

Have you seen the series "Unbelievable"? It's a great piece of art, yet its plot is painful to watch.

If you do watch it, please let me know if you think Toni Collette is awesome. I think she is. She's awesome.

"Unbelievable" shows how easy it is for authorities to:

not believe,
blame, and
traumatize women and girls, particularly if they're in a vulnerable position.

The miniseries closely follows a 2008 US case in which a rape victim was coerced by the police into retracting her statement.

Thankfully it has a happy ending. But let me tell you, I was not happy after watching it.

The Grand Finale

What do you expect me to say?

That I've got a magical solution which will end police intimidation and abuse against women?

That I've got more numbers to convince you to write to your representative?

If you're reading this, you're either way past Feminism 101, or you're headed straight for the troll comment section.

I write about my experience with abuse and injustice because the more we hear about it, the faster we solve it.

The more vocabulary we have to protect values such as equality, kindness, and resolution, the better the lives of our children will be.

The time to accept abuse and think some knight in shining armor will save us has long passed.

I say we stick up for ourselves and for one another.

To stick up, we need to speak up.

If you're in the UK, support the Misogyny as a Hate Crime Bill.

If you're in the US, support the Equal Rights Amendment.

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