Let's Talk About How We Talk About Sexual Assault

It's not easy to talk about sexual assault. It's a charged topic that rightfully carries so much weight, so much history, and so much emotion. But as Jill, Laiya, and Aja mention in this episode, it's likely that you know or are a woman who has been sexually assaulted. We have to have an honest conversation about how we talk about sexual assault and treat sexual assault survivors.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

RAINN

National Sexual Violence Resource Center

"Are Prisons Obsolete?" by Angela Davis

"Ain't I a Woman?" speech by Sojourner Truth

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to jay Dot, a production of I Heart Radio.
Here everyone content morning before we start the show. This
episode contains a lot of discussion about sexual violence. So
if there are children around or you're sensitive to this
subject matter, please take caution or skip this episode. Peace
of love, y'all. Jill Scott presents Jay Dot. IM with

(00:27):
my sister queens Age and I'm Jill Scott. What's up everybody? Uh,
today we're gonna talk about some heavy shit, y'all. Who're

(00:49):
gonna talk about some heavy shit? Yeah? We are going
to talk about what ladies? Damn? Is it another way
to say this? But I guess not. Um, We'll be
talking about the mechanics around sexual assault and the evolution

(01:09):
because things are changing. Better keep keep up with the
rules sexual assault. Okay, so first of all, let's define it?
What is it? What defines sexual sexual assault? This is
according to the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline. The overall
definition of sexual or indecent assault is an act of physical, psychological,

(01:31):
and emotional violation in the form of a sexual act,
inflicted on someone without their consent, and can involve forcing
or manipulating someone to witness or participate in any sexual act.
May I destroy you? I may destroy you? Why do
I always mess it up? Yeah? Yeah, I mean so

(01:53):
I may destroy you. Was on the HBO, you know,
and it focuses on the aftermath of what happens in
the mind of a sexual assault victim. And it also
talks about the many ways in which consent can be
violated and definitely talks about the the aftermath of sexual
assault and what happens like emotionally and mentally to victims.

(02:13):
But it also discusses some of the gray area around consent.
And I would even say gray area. It's just helping
us to further understand the word consent. I personally feel
that we have just really scratched the surface on this conversation.
We and my opinion, are the first generation out of
the emergence of a natural conversation around what rape or

(02:37):
rape culture is. So there was no way for us
as a generation to even get this totally right. We're
just too close to the cut off to where no
one talked about women at all. Two, they just begin
to talk about women. We were the date rape era.
That was like our evolution of rape. But that's when

(02:58):
they decided that you could be on a date and yes,
it will be rape. That's what our generation very interesting.
Can you think about it? Well, they we just started
talking about that. And here's the thing. I'm born in
seventy eight and in nineteen seventy nineteen seven. Between nineteen
seventy and seventy seven, you're talking about around that that
that decade, that's when you first started getting even black

(03:19):
domestic violence shelters like that's those are. That's how late
to the game the conversation has been around women and
violence in this country, and then we don't even want
to talk about what it is about Black women and
violence in this country and particularly being victims of our
own men. Hello. So yeah, a lot. But the consent thing,

(03:43):
I think is the order of the day. M hmm,
what is it? What does it look like? I think
I was just watching a futuristic show where they they
actually decided that It's like it's part of getting your
birth control. I can get what I was watching sex
and they take a pill and they say I can sit,
and then the birth control comes out so they can
use it. Yeah. Yeah, I just don't show on Hulu uploaded.

(04:08):
I think it might have been uploaded. Yeah. Wow. At
this point It's like you have to make a video
or a voice recording or something where you both say
that this is what we want to do and this
is what we're going to do. Because remember, Jill, even
if you decide this is what you're going to do
it now we have to agree that I want to
do this actual act. Right if you do an act

(04:29):
on me exactly, if you do an act on me
that I didn't want to do, that is again a
form of sexual fault, like, yeah, I wanted to do
a missionary style, but I don't want to do it.
Running back, well, I don't know if it's see see,
I don't know. See. I think it's important that we
don't lies it's situation. I don't mean to. I'm sorry
because and I know you didn't mean to. I know
you were coming from it from the spirit of that.

(05:03):
I know that the tendency is when we start thinking
about how to to dig deeper into these things, the
tendency is to pick out the most minute situation as
being the rule. And I think it's not necessary I
mean not minute, but the most you know, specific situation
to to make it the rule. Like I mean, we
can't we can't do a doggy style and have to

(05:24):
have a mission for that. I think really what it
all boils down to is how we communicate with each
other and how substitative we are to each other's reactions
to certain things, and how we communicate with one another,
and also to coming out of the of a society
that just values the safety of women. I just think
it's a cultural shift thing, not just uh, okay, now,

(05:46):
it's okay for you to kiss me. Now, it's okay
for you to touch me. Now, it's okay for you
to so and so. If the general idea is that
the woman has agency over her body and that that's
a culturally acceptable thing, you will treat that entire interaction
from m hmm. You know what I'm saying. It's sound.
You know, you're You're right, It's it just I feel
like it sounds easier than it is coming from a

(06:08):
male perspective. And mind you, I don't mean to come
from a male perspective, but we don't have one here,
so I'm just trying to think like, yeah, like okay,
so you gotta okay. Yeah, but the male perspective is
like us sitting here trying to find the white perspective.
Why do we have to worry about the male perspective?
I mean, at this time, we're the ones who are
in the position of society that says that we don't matter.

(06:28):
We're in the position of society that says we don't
have a voice. We're in the position of society where
we're over sexualized. And so why why do they why
do we have to worry or center how this affects them?
They have to discuss that. What are you going to
do to avoid that situation? Well, I asked you all
that because mothers fine, Because that's my point. I think
that we have to consider them to some degree because

(06:53):
we have men that we love all around us, uncle's, brother's, cousins, grandfather's,
you know, as men that we love. So, for instance, Um,
years ago, my favorite uncle in the whole world, Um
was accused of rape. He was accused of rape, and
he was arrested and he was going to prison, according

(07:16):
you know to what this woman said, and for whatever reason,
probably because he didn't rape her, she decided on in tears,
I'm so sorry. I was just mad at him. I
wanted him to be my man and I said this,
but he never did this and admitted this was in
the early seventies, so it was right before maybe maybe

(07:42):
the late sixties. And um, she admitted that that never happened.
But I think about it and who he is and
the kind of man that he was, you know, Um,
this was blues child. This was a kind hearted man.
This was an intelligent man. This was a man too
that went on to marry a woman so and love

(08:03):
her so splendidly. Even now it makes me, you know, emotional,
how beautiful he loved his woman, and how he cared
for his children and his mother. You know, this was
not his nature. That wasn't who he was. But had
that young woman, you know, going on with with that
story out of bitterness or whatever, um, you know, being

(08:26):
cast aside for somebody else or or nothing else, you know, Um,
he probably would have spent the most part of his
life in somebody's prison. Now, when you go into somebody's
prison when rape is the charge, you can already assume
what's gonna happen in there? And how And I know
that women are like, oh, why do we have to

(08:47):
think about them? Because because we've been a fact, because
has been a fact. And and to be honest, with you.
Guys are to be totally for right, Like I've been
on the other side of that Jill when she didn't
come back and say no, I was lying, like I
when I first went to college, my boyfriend was accused
of rape by a white woman in Jersey. It was
one word against another, and he ended up serving a

(09:08):
prison sentence of six years, coming out and being like,
how do I use this cell phone? So you and
then and then to be totally up front with you.
The odd part about all of it was as he's
going through his trial, I'm going through my trial because
I just got sexually assaulted on my college campus. So
sitting there and witnessing as a victim and then being

(09:33):
on the side of the accused, it was just a moment.
It was a moment. And knowing about like the rape
shield laws and knowing that victims are protected, which they
should be, uh within there within the twenty four hours
of their situation, where you cannot speak on what happened
that twenty four hours of their life, even if like
my ex at the time, that girl had had sex
with multiple dudes within her twenty four hours and did

(09:54):
cocaine and did all these other things. That could not
be spoken about because that is a rape shield. That's
the same shield that I'm being protected in Atlanta as
I'm looking at my teenage you know. So it's it's
just it's so heavy and always and that's why I
think we do have to look at it, like you'll said,
in a sense of a holistic type of way and

(10:15):
understanding from all sides of how this ship works. It's
I think it's a lot of it has to do
with us, with us educating our sons and educating the
men around us, um and trying to find the words
to make it real simple and plain, real simple and plain.
If the if the N word ever comes out, and
that's no, if the N word comes out at the end,

(10:36):
it's time to get up and get your ass out
of there. Just get out, apologize and roll. I'm sorry.
I did not mean in any way to disrespect you.
I thought that this was where we were going. This
is uncomfortable to you. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. That's where

(10:57):
we have to teach them. I really think that that's
the route to know. You're right about that. I wish
you would have just said get out. I mean, I
think not having I mean having having conversations with our
sons around consent is absolutely essential. Um and even looking
at it from a holistic point of view, I think
is important as well. But for black people and for

(11:18):
black men and women, it's very important that we can't
really have a conversation about the male experience, particularly when
it involves the justice system, uh where it without talking
about racism. So these things are going to have to
get addressed as a separate issue, but it has to
be addressed. So I think a lot of times what
ends up happening for us as Black women, we tend

(11:39):
to center not center, want to address the male's needs
in that situation because we want to protect him from racism,

(12:00):
and so unfortunately, what that does is it puts an
added weight on us as women and added emotional labor
and labor around being the victim to carry. So what
I'm saying is that, yes, it's important that our sons
are protected from a justice system that will happily put
them away for anything, anything, for anything, But that is

(12:22):
also an element that is some that is linked together,
but at the same time too, it's separate. At some point,
our men and men in general must carry society's burden
or the burden of their own privilege. And so because
for black men, they have a privilege in this conversation
and they have a marginalization in this conversation, it is

(12:45):
just dually difficult for them. Yeah, just as it is
difficult for us. So I just you know, So it's
not a matter of just being like, forget men, they
don't matter here. They absolutely do matter. But it is
important that as women, and particularly as Black women, all women,
but particularly as Black women, that were very clear on

(13:09):
not making the racial aspect of it um part of
our labor in this situation because as women were just
victims just do not have the same rights that non
victims do, even when the victims are actually men as well,
damn Asian, So we're always protect them. M hm. I

(13:34):
want the brotherhood, That's what I want. I missed that.
I want that. I want to be able to say
that so and so was inappropriate with me or try
to do something that I didn't want, and I need
those brothers to go and whoop his motherfucking ass. That's
what I want. I want that consequence was getting your

(13:58):
motherfucking ass whooped. And I say it the way I
said it, come on now, when the consequence was that
cats kind of held themselves together a lot more. But
because you know, Willie Nilly, we're just out here and
I have to say, you're not gonna like this. You
are not gonna like it when when we put ourselves

(14:22):
in harm's way, it's like it's like standing on a
train track. You know what I'm saying. Why my dear,
my dear sister friend, you can't go to this man's
room at two o'clock in the morning. You can't. You
can't do that. You cannot. You're putting yourself on the

(14:45):
train track and you're expecting, you're expecting to be safe.
You have to have some accountability for your safety. You
have to. You cannot mess around and and be with
a group of guys that that you're not, that you
don't know very well and have very little clothing on

(15:05):
and think that they're going to be accountable for you.
You can't. You're gonna hate this. You're gonna hate it
because you don't hate it. I don't hate it. I
don't hate it. I think that it is just a
reason why we're still having this conversation. Because we gotta
graduate beyond this idea that, yeah, we have to be

(15:30):
concerned about our own safety. Of course you don't. You
don't just walk down an alleyway. But I think we
have graduated in this country past this conversation of individual
accountability into um the accountability of the systems themselves. So
we don't want to discuss why we live in a
city where you can't walk down the alleyway. We just talk,

(15:52):
We just tell ourselves, don't walk down the alleyway. But
what we should be discussing is why there's so much crime.
Why are we afraid to walk down an alleyway. Why
is the alleyway not safe? Why are the people who
are making the alleyway not safe resorting to making people
I'm safe? This is These are the questions we have
to begin to more focus on because we've been talking
telling women, We've been telling women since at the beginning

(16:15):
of time that you're responsible for you. You can't be
around men, you can't do this, you can't wear this.
We've been telling women that for centuries, and yet they
still get raped. So but is there something to that.
I'm just asking you. You You mentioned the alley but in
in Jail's example, excuse me for playing moderated here, but
she kind of gave the hotel room date, Like, what

(16:37):
is what is the answer to that part. If y'all
think that women will and I know you don't think this,
let me start with that, it's more like a figurative thing.
If y'all think that women are not gonna get raped
just because we eliminate going to hotels late at night, bro,
that is not the majority of the way this thing happens.
I'll get in the brotherhood aspect of it, too, is that. Yeah,

(17:00):
we in our minds, I think we think the brotherhood
is more realistic than it really is. When my mother
was coming up in the nineteen fifties, trust and believe
my uncle went to jail for trying to kill him
a man who tried to rape my aunt. You feel me,
So I get what you're saying. That brotherhood did exist.
It did exist, but it existed simultaneously with the culture

(17:21):
that did not protect women at all. In the fifties,
girls weren't safe, some of them in their own homes,
with their own brothers, with their own uncles, with their
own daddy's And that's where that's where it gets the
most tricky because it's not like, in no way I'm
I'm at I was raped, so I grasp all of this.

(17:45):
I'm not saying that it was my fault. I'm not
saying that it's any woman's fault. I'm saying that you
don't walk down New York City streets with your purse
open and your money hanging out. You have to be
mindful and protect yourself. You have to because we have

(18:07):
not dealt with the systems. We have not looked into
what is going on on our television screens, or on
our phones or in our music. We're not dealing with that.
And until we actually make it, make make a staple
of how you know you think about women, or the

(18:28):
mentality of our men, of all races and ages, until
we deal with that system that is clearly fucked. Until
we deal with that, then we have to be mindful
and do the best we can to protect ourselves. I

(18:52):
like it when women know how to fight. I like it.
I like it when a woman is proficient with her weapons.
I like it if somebody can hold a knife and
and take somebody all the way down. I like it.
And this is what I'm saying, that it's imperative that
we know how to to protect ourselves as much as

(19:16):
possible and not put ourselves in harm's ways. I'm so
with you. I'm with you on that. Absolutely, we don't disagree.
I just personally feel that we are already and have
been for decades, coming at this problem from that point
of view. Yes, there are some women that are gonna

(19:37):
fall through the cracks in that conversation, just as anyone would.
But I do believe that this is the work that
we as women have consistently been doing. That our mothers did,
that our grandmothers did, This is the work that we've
always been taught. It's time for us to focus on
the work that's not already being done. And that's kind
of where my head is on it. But I don't

(19:58):
disagree with you or that. I love the fact that
you even incorporated the idea of self defense and understanding
how to wield a weapon, how to take care of yourself,
how to protect your family. But um, and so, I
absolutely I'm absolutely in agreement with that part of it.
I just, you know, want to make sure that we're
talking about that. But I also want to mention this

(20:18):
as well. There was a really interesting art exhibit that
that existed. I want to say, like last year where
this woman um hung either onto the wall or from
the ceiling, clothing that rape rape victims were wearing at
the time that they were raped. And I think it's
really important for us to continue to remind ourselves that

(20:38):
we do sometimes live in this vision of what we
think rape is that might actually be based on society,
our own particular experiences. Because as I've also been raped,
I'm a victim of date rape. I've been in that
situation as well. So I'm just gonna say that I
think sometimes we we we believe and begin to believe

(20:59):
some of the scenarios that aren't actually indicative of the norm.
The norm is usually not somebody who's dressed in a
quarter We are right, we weren't. All three of us were.
I was wearing jeans and a T shirt from the
Cold Stone. So I'm just saying, like all of this,

(21:21):
this typically doesn't happen that way. This is actually the
story that men tell that we find ourselves consistently retelling.
And I'm not saying that there were some women who
went up to a hotel room with whomever and was
in this or out late with a bunch of dudes,
you know, and and and found herself in a situation
where she wasn't safe. So I do agree with that.

(21:43):
Safety is is, Safety is number one, and being mindful
is super super important because you're walking around with a
gold mine. And plus just at this point, you're walking
around with every man's fantasy. And and and you know,
as straight guys, you know pleasure, you got it, you're

(22:05):
carrying it with you. You got a bag full of
diamonds in your panties and anybody and everybody you know, um,
and and because of the society is so sick. If
you wonder, if you question it, if it is, then
then go on a porn site and and look up
rip her or look up yeah, yeah, that's that's when

(22:27):
a man rips a woman, you know what I'm saying.
And that's a thing, and it's it's millions and fuse,
if you question in this there is a thing. There's
something happening and has always been happening in this society
where women are are pulled apart in pieces, little tiny

(22:48):
pieces too. Uh makes me ill. And not to mention
the different levels of you know, a black woman being
assaulted versus a woman of another color, and the reaction
from authorities, you know what I mean versus it's it's
a whole mind fuck of I might not get in

(23:08):
trouble as much because because she's black, but checked this,
we're also not having a much wider discussion about the
fact that people who are disabled are actually sexually assaulted
at a much higher level, and that we're not talking
about women who don't identify um of don't are not
feminine identifying, or we're not talking about trans women, and

(23:31):
we're not talking about you know what. These are all
situations that that literally do not fit into this narrative
that we always end up right back at this narrative
you know about that's very heteronormative, that's particular to this
one particular thing. And I think when we're talking about
sexual assault in particularly against women, but also remembering also

(23:52):
to that men, men are sexually assaulted. My son's freshman year,
there was a student at More House that sat outside
and a protest on um on a mattress saying this
is the mattress I was raped on because he couldn't
get any justice. Right. So I'm saying that we have

(24:24):
to begin to open up this conversation in such a
way so we start to see the vast different stories
of sexual assault, so that we really begin to understand
that in many instances, so you know, your sexuality and
and the and the people who have violated is they
are getting an okay from a society that says you

(24:45):
are not protected. And the more of these groups you
identify with, the more unprotected you are. If you are
a woman, if you're a black woman, so if you're
a black woman who was disabled, who is also non binary,
or like all of these but all of these different
things will make you even more susceptible to these things.

(25:05):
Like I said, from a systemic point of view, and
I hate to keep going back to that, but really,
for me, that's where my heart is on this subject,
because um, I just recognized that we are in a
state of emergency and we're just becoming really aware to
the enormity of the problem and how sown and woven

(25:31):
it is into our everyday practices and lives. And I'm
I for one, am trying to change all the language
that I use around it because I feel like it
starts with the with the way I tell the story.
It starts with my language. It starts with how I
discussed this with victims, you know what I mean? And
even with myself because I don't know about y'all. I

(25:53):
got raped on a date, so I it took me
ten years. Yeah, I got raped by a teenager too,
on a date. But now I was in college to
even admit that I had been raped. What what? That's different?
And I know it's different for it. Some compensate rate
struggle with that victim word. I struggle with that one.

(26:14):
I do I do how survivors probably the better word
for sure? Did you guys? We y'all told y'all mom's
did y'all get to My mom said to me, she
was like, you know, it's really hard to find a
woman who hasn't had this experienced Babe, like this is unfortunately, Uh,
it seems like a part of being a woman. Remember
my I'm telling me that the math it's three women,
three women talking. That's what this is. That's what this

(26:37):
whole j dot Ill experiences. It's three women communicating and
each one of us has been sexually assaulted. Well damn yeah,
I mean for some reason, when I first had my kids,
I I don't know who gave me this, but they
were like, somebody gave me the statistic and they were like,
one out of every four woman is sexually assaulted. And

(26:58):
I found this out after I had the twins, when
I officially have four daughters, and so I had to
live with the numerical reality that one of my daughters
would be sexual sex damn aging. That's deep, that's heavy. Like, listen,
I love black men. My life is a testament to that.

(27:19):
But I will be I will be fine in life
if I never have to actually verbalize that again, because
at the end of the day, my life says that
it is better that I spend my time centering in
around the liberation of black women, because if black women
are liberated, black men will be also. I'm not sure
about that. Yeah, I feel like I gotta go home

(27:42):
and think on its homework. You know. I love y'all. Yeah,
And and this is the we are don't so we
have the capacity to agree, to disagree, and to keep
it pushing and find ways to understand each other. And
that's the fan fantastic. I'm not sure I watched UM.

(28:04):
It depends on the liberation. Let's say, for instance, we're
talking about UM we're talking about Black women and education
and how we are super educated out here now, I
mean most sisters I know, you know have some kind
of masters or or PhD. I mean absolutely, we're killing

(28:25):
the game. And while our men go to prison like
we are being liberated, and we're liberating ourselves in a
lot of ways. But the majority of our of our
men end up going to somebody's jail house. And so
as we are liberated, does not mean that it's occurring,
um see to me, to me, formalized education, to me

(28:46):
is not necessarily a form of liberation. If if if
that means we have to go out and make sixty
three cents to the dollar, then to me, how is
the How am I liberated by my by my education?
I mean to me, white women say so. So I'm
just saying that I want to be clear. Black men

(29:08):
are important. Black men matter. I love black men. They
deserve love, they deserve healing, Yes, they deserve all of
those things. I am saying that I myself must begin
to use my energy and my emotional labor to the
liberation of black women because we fall much lower down

(29:32):
on the totem pole, and that that's the way liberation
and equity works, you address the person who is the
most vulnerable, which also means that me, as a heterosexual
black woman, I have to recognize my privilege and I
have to make sure that when I'm in certain spaces
to say, hey, we're here talking about black women. Where

(29:53):
the trans black women. So so there's a there's a
moment for me where I this is a moment for
me that came even just in the last couple of years,
where I started to understand or started to decide where
I was going to put my mental and emotional energies
right and um, and that's just a personal decision, but

(30:15):
it's not an indication of any love. That's less, it's
not at all, not at all, not at all. I
want um, my husband and my son to feel free, free.
We talked about freedom at one point in another and
another show. Ultimately I want them to have freedom. But
I realized too that the world will liberate a male

(30:37):
before it will liberate me. So then when does that stand?
And then when I decided to say there's been no progress,
they'll say, well, no, we gave this to those men,
to the men we're worry about them, Like, come on, guys,
we're more likely to die during childbirth. We're more likely
to have you know, hell of different you know, physiological

(31:00):
co problems. If there's no one to give birth to
these men, how do we preserve their lives if we
can't give birth to them far I think it's exhausting
being a black woman. You've been a tenant and know
it every day. If I could get to if I
can take to the n Ministry's, and if I could
take two, I will certainly try to get in there.

(31:31):
We'll be back after the break. There is an illness
in society when it comes to sexuality. There is a problem. People.

(31:55):
Everybody's bucking, you know, just just bucking. They have no
concept of what it's like to connect to another person.
There's something that's magnificent and beautiful about that. And now,
of course you can switch it up and bucka you
know what I mean. It's a sexuality. So yeah, you're
gonna get it, you know, in many different ways. But

(32:17):
he shouldn't just be this one way where the woman
is completely submissive or you know, beaten down. I hear that.
I hear the guys I got male friends. I listened
to them talk. You know, then what did they say, um, oh,
it's you know, it's some kind of beat it up.
You know, it's all their words for sex are violent words.

(32:41):
Oh no, I was listening to something on the other
day and he was like, he's gonna burn it and
ansenerated to the point I was like, you're gonna because
I don't even like what it's anything hot down there,
even when it's wedding. What are you talking about? What
was the song? I want to do is that he
was gonna cenerate the pussy. That's okay here, but he was.

(33:02):
I'm sorry he might be on the phone having a
whole special conversation. I'm sorry. As as a writer, I
just think that there's a lot of ways to be
sexual that don't necessarily have to use the words. You
know what I mean, Like be up off of that, Mike. Okay,
I'm sorry that too much? God, she was just it

(33:27):
was for effect, because that's how the soul sound. I
love whisper. That used to be my chance. I love
it too. My favorite part would go FLD. All of
these women are dancing. I don't love I'm sorry that

(33:49):
including inappropriate. This was supposed to be a very special
J dot L presents a sexual because let me stop
presenting sexualist. So I mean about it, but listening, guys,
seriously though, but listen that the playfulness of it and
and the playfulness of it and and and whole child,

(34:13):
we as women enjoy sex, We enjoy all of that.
So I just think it's one of those things where
the potential of what sexuality can be and what it
can be outside of these umbrellas, the big umbrellas, the patriarchy,
white supremacists, whatever. But but even down to like violence,
and when we come from underneath those umbrellas, there's freedom.

(34:36):
There's sexual freedom and intimacy there. But when you said
the thing about connection and also to sexual assault is
also not even about sex. We all know it's about
power and control, but again and and and manipulating power dynamics.
But then again you were saying the thing where it
was like about connections. As a society, we are not

(34:58):
good at that. So it goes down to every little
thing which is not good at it. No, that is
a that is a very big problem and a concern.
What is it? What is it is? Is that that
the television? Is it the porn? I've I've often thought
it was a porn. You know, it just limits and

(35:19):
minimizes what what sex actually is. There's a beauty in
this thing, and where just being nasty, just nasty. I'm
a freak. I'm a freak. I'm a freak guy. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'm trying to tell you that there's more, There's so
much more than that, and that the problem is the

(35:41):
mentality and what's being poured into our men um. You
know that puts us in a dangerous in a dangerous
This is propaganda. It's an illness because it's an illness.
It's a mental illness when you think you can just
jump on somebody like you don't know what I mean,

(36:05):
You don't We have no thoughts about how this person,
this human being that is so attractive to you right now,
may feel You don't. You don't recognize that they have
emotions and feelings too, that they and you don't want
her to feel good at all. You don't care how
she feels at all. Well, I said, we're assuming that

(36:25):
this is about sex, and it's about like I feel like,
it is about power dynamics. It's not really about sex,
and it depends on who is doing the assaulting. Correct
like everybody probably you know, I've got different reasons and
different backgrounds. I'm sure everybody has under that say about
the men in our society that they feel powerless. Yes,

(36:47):
those men probably, they probably were victims of assault themselves.
I mean, look at the whole r Kelly situation where
it came to like had been ongoing, had been have
been molested for many, many years, and because of the
society says it's okay for I meant a man to
be hyper sexual even when his high school teacher said,

(37:09):
I knew that the boy was over sexualized, but it
didn't turn a light on in her head because guess what,
he was a teenage boy and they're supposed to be
hyper over sex like that. So by the time not
ebumped into bumping grind, it was just like, oh, that's
the jam. It was already a following illness I had
going to see my guy in the collegist and um,
we're just talking, Yeah, of course we must see them. Um.

(37:33):
We were talking and she said that her son, um,
I've switched guy in collegees since but um at the
time she said that her son um half of the
school had her pies. And we're talking about you know,
high school, you already starting off with a venereal disease.
Got darn it. She said that they were passing it

(37:54):
around to each other like like skittles. Mm hmmm. Yeah. Well,
sexuality is just going to evolved if you think about
it like this is so the things that we did
in high school are it's like times. Well, first of all,
they don't have sex education in the schools anymore. Now
I forgot. They don't know. That's number one. That's that's
it right there. It's like there's no sex said in

(38:16):
the schools anymore. Used to be something we had to take.
That's number one. They don't even know what hurtpiece is.
Some of these kids don't even know what HIV is. Wow,
I can't even deal with that thought. I don't even know.
I don't know. Yeah, that's that's a lot. And it's forever.
You don't you don't get rid of her piece. It's
for longer, longer than a baby. M h. I'm not surprised,

(38:56):
I am, for one. Me for one, I'm not surprised.
And I think what what we're what we're looking at
is people get mad about certain artists or whatever, and
how highly sexual they are and if when, whatever the

(39:18):
spectrum is. But these are the same people, like I said,
who will happily watch the schools take sex it out
of the out of the out of the system. These
are people who will happily not have a single conversation
with their child around pleasure and but happy to have
a conversation with their child about birth control which they
ain't never gonna use. And you know, and we don't

(39:42):
ever want to be real. We're not want to be
real about how many times we ourselves have had unprotected sets.
People don't want to talk about that either, you know.
And even if it's one time, one time is enough.
Didn't that when we tell the kids, you know, I
have no I've never had a problem telling people that
because I've also said it's gotten me to a place where,
you know, got in to a hospital room and pro

(40:06):
choice MS made me pro choice you know, mistakes some
teenage pass I think we should be honest about that.
We're not, though we're not. Though I do not think
that we're in a time and you would think that
we would be in a time where we're being fourth
white and honest with kids and young people about sex
and sexuality. And we are not especially I gener like

(40:29):
now that we're the it's an us. Yes, we shouldn't
absolutely have the right to. We're in a great position
to tell the three kids. Yeah, generation, it's part of
a list of Genet's failures that we're gonna have to
come to terms with. Yeah. Well, everybody tells the generation

(40:49):
following in some form of dest like the way as
I'm just saying, I remember when I spoke about Bill
Cosby and it came up whoa. I mean that was
that was a hard time because because so many women

(41:10):
were angry with me and they felt like I was
pro rape, which is ridiculous, ridiculous. I don't know, how
do you formulate these things? How could I? I don't
want anything. It's not a thing. It's not a thing
at all. But at the time, um, before his uh,

(41:32):
before I got out what do you call it? Um?
Not the trial, it was him admitting um. He didn't
admit it. He in a sense to me, he admitted it.
You know like if a if a pedophile says, oh
I love it when little girl sit on my lap.
And I'm not a pedophile, but but I don't care.

(41:53):
You just said that you love when little girls sit
on your lap. So now even if I had any
questions about it, now I cannot ignore that statement. I
can't let go of that. Who says that? Like who
says that? Yeah, and that's what happened with with Mr Cosby.

(42:14):
You're talking about the Spanish flight thing where he talked
about but there was there was a dot not the
stand up. There was a interview saying that he had
done it before, that he had given women Spanish flights before.
And I was like, Uh, as much as you know,
I'm here because you have changed my life and and

(42:37):
and broaden the strokes of my life. You know, far
as seeing what college was, how would I know I'm
in North Philly. I don't know about college, you know,
seeing what an HBC you felt like, seeing what family
could be, seeing art on the walls, you know, just
expanding my horizons and jazz on TV, just marrying Makay

(43:00):
but like my god, But it turned it really ties
back into the conversation we were having earlier about Yes,
racism does play a part and how our men are perceived,
particularly when they do it something wrong or if they
are in a situation where they have to be reckoned

(43:21):
with either with the law or socially right, so the soul,
even socially, they're going to be dealt with differently. But
as women we have to continue to center ourselves in
the conversation so that we don't take on the weight
of having to say, okay, because he's dealing with racism, now,
I have to give him this room where he will
most likely be victimizing women black women, because because the

(43:44):
reality is like, yes, sir, you are dealing with racism,
but so mine a man, I sold mine and you
wronged me, and you wronged me, and I'm sorry. This
is not more seconds, so it don't I'm gonna use
that when you wrong me. Yes, there and there that is.

(44:11):
We'll be back after the break. If you can take
it your way, If you can have it your way.
What would you like for sexual offenders? UM? For for pedophiles? UMM?

(44:38):
I vote for um. Damn It so tough because yesterday
I would have said death, castration, castration and clicktoral removal.
I guess it's the same. I guess that's castration. I'm

(45:03):
just saying because women, there are women who do it, yea.
And but again, that does that deals with the sexuality
part it doesn't deal with the power and the mentality
of that. Yeah for me, Yeah, for me, this is
this is a tough question for me, because a tough

(45:24):
question this year. This year I just started to shift
my ideas around um incarceration almost completely. So, um, if
you want to decarsorate, then you can decarceerate just you know,
these people, but not these people. So if I had

(45:45):
to reimagine a society in which jail boy is not
a thing, I would say that, Um, well, I'll say
this prior to jail not being a thing. If jail
is gonna always be a thing, I would say I
would first start prosecuting in people who have who who
commit sexual assault, because for the most part, they don't
get prosecuted. That's true that they do in some sense,

(46:06):
some senses of the word both a lot of times
they don't even get reported, let alone prosecuted, and and
and and that goes along, right, and that goes along.
But that's only if the person who does it to
her is black. So you also have a situation with
that and molestation. But if I try to imagine a
world where there's no jail, my first thinking is that

(46:28):
there has to be a psychological evaluation and an emotional evaluation,
because usually what you're going to find is some sort
of trauma. If we had a society that based that
was based on healing trauma, I mean across the board
and providing resource, I think there is a way in

(46:49):
which we can help and heal people have who have
victimized others. There are people who may have certain issues
that may be tied to mental ill this that can't
necessarily be fixed in that way. But if you have
to separate them from society, you don't have to separate
them separate them from society in squalor. You don't have

(47:13):
to separate them from society and ways that actually make
their condition worse. There's ways to if you if if
we didn't look at mental health facilities as prisons, if
mental health facilities were set up exactly how mental health
facilities should be set up, they would be that would

(47:33):
be uh to me, a good solution for people who
are dealing with something that is very linked to and
in most instances linked to, some sort of emotional or
traumatic experience in which they have now become the violator
which changes into a mental illness, which is you know,
some people do say that depending on your background in
the situation and sexual it cannot be. Yeah, especially when

(47:54):
you talk about pedophilia, because they talk about there's there's
ways in which that cannot be that just cannot be fit,
you know. So yeah, I mean I would start there though,
That would be my start, And that is the evolved
ager from this from this year, reading a lot of
Angela Davis and kind of delving deep into this whole

(48:14):
decarceration conversation. So that's kind of the lens I'm in
about that word ration, abolition, decarceration, no more prisons, no
more jail, not in the way that they look now.
I think there's some I think things that wild um,

(48:35):
the wild animals or rabbit animals, um. You know, if
you can't get them the medication that they need, that
they have to get put down because they are a
harm to everyone around. Oh I do, I do. I
can't trust white people with that decision, and that don't
need to be put down, and that's an issue. That's

(48:57):
an issue. So basically, what we're saying over all is
that the problem is the system, the system of the problem,
and aldays how we deal with things we don't I
don't know, if we deal with things like people are human,
even when you go to admit or go to someone
to say that you've been um sexually assaulted, how you're

(49:22):
treated afterwards, you know? Um yeah, the system? I think, Okay,
so it looks like that's what this is. But as
I always say, how do you eat an elephant? One?
Which one we were gonna take to buy that? There's

(49:42):
a lot of places. It's a fatast album. It's a
fat You should really start you should really start with
um Angela Davis, Our Prisons Obsolete? Go ahead, I'm serious.
I don't. I want to know what you've got this
d incarceration? I don't. Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, start with
Angela Davis. She has a book called Our Prisoners obsoletem

(50:04):
really really really good place to start on that conversation.
I think that there has to be more conversation about, um,
what's wrong with them? You know what I mean? We
we've been on what's wrong with them before and and
and we'll be on what's wrong with them for quite
some time. I think that we have to deal with
what's wrong with them? You know, what would make you

(50:26):
what would make you want to um harm somebody in
that way, if we know that it's not about pleasure
and sexuality, that we know that this is about power. Um,
you have to question why is it that the men
in our society and others don't feel powerful or they

(50:48):
they're looking to feel powerful? What is what is that
that's uh messing with your mind? Boom power? Yes, because
it doesn't asked you know that you're that power is fleeting,
you harm someone and then you're going about your business.
But that's why I think we've been kind of touching this.

(51:09):
But it just needs to be a conversation. I know
it needs to be a conversation men and women generally,
but there are some conversations that I think that black
men and women need to have between us to create
a sense of strength and foundation that's stronger than what
we have. There are some conversations that are lacking about
us feel are not protected and the reasons as to

(51:30):
why they are. They are helping us feel this way,
like there's a just I feel like it's just it's
pushed us closer and closer to this conversation. Oh yeah,
I mean you know that I believe that most things
that happen in shifts in culture start in language and

(51:50):
how people communicate with each other. So that is absolutely
the work that needs to be done, particularly in our community,
because there's there's a hard it's very difficult to see
the difference. I think that a lot of people, black
men and black women, they just dump us all into
one pot. There's got a lot of black people over there,

(52:13):
and we got issues, situations that we have to work
out on. People don't even know. I'm like, I mean,
we as a black women were exhausted because we're sitting
here protecting men, protecting our trends, me our gay community.
Like what you just said, d children, pect about them women?
Do you mean protected white women to and then last,

(52:34):
but not least, come on, come on my shoulders, and
then last, then protect ourselves. And that's right back where
where we started. And I still feel the same way.
Do the best you can. I know, I know there's
lions and bears and wolves and hyenas out there. Girls, ladies, women,

(52:57):
do the best you can to protect yourself. Be mindful
of your surroundings. It's important. And I'm not trying to
blame you or anybody else. I don't even blame myself
because I can't. I know, what happened to me. I'm
saying to you, be mindful, be mindful of where you

(53:18):
are and who you're around. And if you don't know
these dudes, you don't want this to happen. You don't
You don't want somebody to jump on you and and
treat you as as if you don't exist. You don't
want that, even if you think you're a guy's girl
and you're tough, even if you don't want that. So
it's a terrible feeling and it's something that haunts you

(53:40):
if you if you allow it. That's what I'm gonna
say about that. Shout out to all the women nn.
Just it was a moment when my mom after my assault,
and my mom said to me, you know, you should
be aware that most women go through this. So if

(54:00):
that's the case, and I took that, and I I've
always been opening that way at the very least with women.
I think us having conversations helps a lot, and us
knowing that we have experiences that are the same as
you're not alone out there. And then I also think
at a certain point you need to discuss this with
the men in your life. Like I don't think that

(54:22):
we should it should be left with just the women.
I feel like the especially the love, the madness in
your love life, or the man or woman, whoever the
person is, you should let them know because oftentimes you
don't know the physical aspects. I know, for a long time,
just to share my own personal I had a problem
like during sex, like opening my legs wide right. I
had a midwife tell me that sometimes when women are

(54:45):
sexually assaulted, they don't know that there that that happens,
like they have issues physically in that way of So
I just think that conversations are key, like not keeping
it to yourself, like initially it's it's just so importan
because the things that can happen when you keep it
to yourself, can you can implode from that I agree

(55:07):
with because I think men don't are not able to understand.
I think usually in the giving people in general the
benefit of the doubt that men operate from a place
like oh I love my mom and my sister and
my home and my girlfriend, but they don't look at
those women as the as survivors of sexual abuse because

(55:32):
typically that's not a conversation those women are going to
have with them, and so it takes away it creates
an other nous when they're talking about sexual assault. Those
are those women over there that that happens to, not
the women who I love, right because I'm here and
I love them, you know what I'm saying. So I

(55:53):
think it's very I just you don't wanted to kind
of build on what she was saying, because I totally
agree with that. Also think that compassion is so important
when you are discussing very difficult subjects. If we don't
have compassion, and everything is about you. When you don't

(56:14):
have compassion, you can't listen to someone who you just
agree with without getting angry. And I think a lot
of times in the social media spaces and there's a
lack of compassion, and when people discuss things, it's all
about quick whips and who can who can chase somebody
the quickest or throw out the the uh you know

(56:35):
whatever facts that can grab from Google real quick, and
people go back and forth, back and forth, and it's
not really you know, it elevates the conversation nationally, but
it doesn't elevate the conversation. It doesn't make the conversation
itself elevated. So that's something that I would say is
only engage in these conversations in circles where empathy and

(56:57):
compassion is present. Uh, it's it's it's like and I
keep trying to figure out how to not be emotional?
How how can anybody get out of their feelings to

(57:23):
present information when it comes to being sexually assaulted, when
it comes to being raped? How, I just that's that
challenge right there is massive? How How do you so

(57:44):
you know when what happens is if someone brings up
rape everybody that's been raped, and we've already discovered that
it's typically you know, um of the room, you know,
typically damn right now, right now, it's of the room.

(58:06):
So how how damn? How are you not emotional about
something like this? The work that it takes to not
be emotional and to present information that even that takes time,

(58:29):
that takes a lot of time. And I'm not sure
that it's it's even possible. I'm not sure about that.
What occurred with me happened years ago. And nonetheless, I
when I think about it, I do want to stab him.

(58:52):
I do, I do, I really do, And And I
don't know how you know to not feel that way.
But the same intensity jail as it was definitely m
absolutely I got. I gotta tell y'all, in my situation,

(59:14):
I kind of did the black woman thing because you know,
like I said, I was in college, I was in
my I was nineteen and it was a fifteen year
old and I kind of went for the protection and
I was worried about how he even got to the
point where he would have a gun on a woman
and want to do that. So when it got to
the trial, it was like, can we just figure out
how to get him some help? I did. I did

(59:38):
the whole I shouldn't have been there. I shouldn't have
been there, and that lasted for ten years. I did
the same thing. Damn, I shouldn't have been there, and
I've been there when it happened. I mean, there are
gonna be women who are not who are not either,
like you said, in the emotional space, not able to
have that conversation with out going right back to that

(01:00:02):
to the actual trauma. And they're also going to be
people women, men, young people who cannot who just don't
have the energy and the bandwidth to speaking out about it.
You hold tight and heel because those of us who
can should and we will because we have to look at.

(01:00:23):
I just want a band of brothers. I want a
band of brothers that you know are in every city
and you just call them and say, hey, listen, this
is what occurred. I need you to whoop this motherfucker.
This ask until tomorrow. I need to put him in
the hospital. I need him to go go go down.
I need stuff broken. That's what I want, Okay, I'm

(01:00:47):
just saying that in reality, that is that is, that
is what I would want. I would want that. You don't,
you know, causing pain, emotional spiritual pain to somebody like that,
Like God darnay, you just deserve it. You deserve to
get that ass all the way whooped. I just wanted

(01:01:07):
to be easier for for people to tell their story
because if you can deal with a situation when you
have details sexual so so fucking murky, because nobody actually
talks about it. You don't even realize. Sometimes if somebody
did the ship to ten other women, you know what
I'm saying. Sometimes you don't know that anything has happen

(01:01:30):
until you wake up with your thigh wet. That part,
that part, that part, I may destroy you. That's what happened.
It ain't easy being a woman or a man, and
I definitely did the thing, and I still do and

(01:01:51):
I won't um make the same mistake again, which is
why I'm so adamant about this. Be mindful of where
you are and who you are round Be mindful because
had I had the foresight, had I been mindful of
my surroundings, had I been mindful of And I'm not
trying to blame myself, and I'm trying to be accountable too,

(01:02:13):
I should have walked the store. It's a difference. I'm
not trying to blame victims. I'm not trying to make
people victims. That is not my effort nor anywhere in
my intention. I'm saying that it is imperative for you
to use your mind since you've got a gold mine
in your panties. You got diamonds in there, and there

(01:02:35):
are wolves and cheetahs that's out there trying to get it.
And like my mama said, if you gotta jump out
the car, you just she said, I had to jump
out the car on he wasn't going the right way.
Jump out the motherfucker's car. Listen. I mean, I'm just saying,
look people out here, but I would have to say
I might have to This is where we might have

(01:02:55):
to disagree on the diamonds and pearls thing. I think
presenting vagina like it like it's a treasure is has
I think it's part of the language. We need to
shift a little bit because they want the treasure. Because
they want the goddamn treasure. You keep talking about. This
ship is jammas they call they call moody. It's just vagina.

(01:03:18):
It's like a neo elbow. It's a part of the
body special. I don't know what it's b I p
up in here, Okay, I don't know about your general
and right there, listen, let me tell you a song.
Make somebody cry, make somebody motivated and get up and

(01:03:41):
change their life. Hello, songs about it, and he wrote
songs about it. It's it's nice. It's nice. But like
I said, that's why these girls is walking around thinking
that they didn't ruin their life by giving the damn
thing away, because when we keep I'm presenting it like
it's this thing that it ain't, well, that's a hard

(01:04:03):
it's a hard meddle in there somewhere, because I do
want my my couchee to look like it's up on
a pedeschool. But I understand what you're saying where it's
like it's so far up than now they really want
to breach, jump and try to find and get it.
So I don't. I don't know what to do about that,
because it is special, very very It is not an elbow.
This thing. This thing, it's a tunnel. It's a past

(01:04:28):
while you're alive. Well, you're alive, while you're alive. I'm
riding with you like on that when that thing it's
a wonderfully made beautifully listen, I'm gonna tell y'all. You
ask about me, listen, ask about you. It's still it's

(01:04:55):
still a body part that thing is. That's a precious
treasure that you have, in my opinion, and you have
to be mindful that you're carrying around something really special.
Just be mindful who you're with and even the women
that you're with, be mindful. And I'm not you know again,

(01:05:26):
I have to just try to be really really clear.
I'm not blaming you and I'm not blaming me. What
I am saying is there is accountability to all things,
to all things. You didn't you didn't do your homework,

(01:05:47):
you didn't do your homework. You didn't motor grass or
to mode a lawn. I get it mold and the
lawn is crazy and you h your way ume on it.
You know what I mean, there's come on, come on yet.
I'm just there is accountability to all things. And I
think it's very important for us to be mindful and

(01:06:08):
stop walking around nilly willie with this, with these treasures.
We got here because somebody's gonna jump on you and
try to get it. And if we could deal with
the systematic illness, the mental illness of people who have
I don't know what that is, where they're trying to
get some kind of power or feel powerful for a
few minutes. We can deal with those people and put

(01:06:29):
them in situations where they can get help or they
can go the fuck away. I don't care. I don't
care if that's an island. I don't care. What you
what you do, what you do, what you do deserve
some kind of deserve some kind of major punishment, whether

(01:06:51):
you're harming children or women or men. If you're harming anybody,
you need to go somewhere and everybody needs to know
that that's your add public flogging castration a mento it
can't you just tell them where they need to go
one more time? They need to go what I say,
the funk away, the funk away, go to funk away.

(01:07:14):
That was me sending them away. Yeah, we will go
somewhere which sick self. That's what I need, That's what
I want. God done it? How do you eat an elephant? One? By?

(01:07:38):
It time? Hey, y'all, it's Eaves, a producer on the show,
So per usual. We're offering you resources related to the episode.
Sexual assault affects so many people, and we want you
to get the help you need or are seeking. You
can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at the Rape

(01:07:59):
Abuse and Incest National Network if you need support or
to be directed to local resources. That number is eight
hundred six five six hope. That's eight hundred six five
six four six seven three. The National Sexual Violence Resource
Center also offers support to sexual assault survivors and information

(01:08:21):
on sexual violence. Their number is eight seven seven seven
through nine three eight nine five. Aside from those resources,
Jill Layah and Asia did talk about prison abolition as
an impact sexual violence has on black women specifically. For that,
you can check out the book Agent mentioned Our Prisons
Obsolete by Angela Davis and you can read Sir journal

(01:08:44):
Truth's speech and I a woman. I'll drop links in
the episode description. So this was Jake dot Ill. Where
are here to spark curls san And if you are
inclined to implement something um powerful for change, powerful for

(01:09:10):
building our community, please do so, believing us leaving you,
thank you for listening to Jill Scott presents j dot
l the podcast. This podcast is hosted by Jill Scott,
Why You St Clair and Agar Graden Dancer. It's executive

(01:09:33):
producers are Jill Scott, Shawn j and Brian Calhoun. It's
produced by Why You're Saint Clair and me Eve Jeff Cooke.
The editing and sound design for this episode we're done
by Taylor Shakana. Yeah. Shout out to Angela Nissel's brother
I know andh Philly. He has a whole class where
he teaches woman how to use their pistol. I'm definitely
one who is for it's our right Our Jay dot

(01:09:59):
Ill is a auction of I heart Radio. For more
podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.