zumalicious

zumalicious
Location
Occupy Sacramento, California, Protest
Birthday
June 15
Title
Chief Head In Charge
Company
Make a Buck If You Can, Ltd
Bio
Honorarily retired Air Force Officer Perpetual grad school dropout. Sick as a dog. Writer. Survivor of G6PD. Trying to figure out how I had orders to go to Gulf War I but the VA doesn't consider me a wartime vet. Hell yeah, I occupy Sacramento. The banner is one of the few remaining Rick Tresa originals. Rick did these incredible banners for all of us. He is a true OS legend.

Zumalicious's Links

New list
NOVEMBER 15, 2011 12:46AM

Sexual Harrassment and Stuffing It Away

Rate: 14 Flag

I keep getting asked if I was sexually traumatized in the military. Hell yes, I was sexually traumatized in the military. I don't tell anyone about it, though.  

One time, I was at a banquet for some big ticket inspectors of my big ticket operation. I had taken on a real mess, but I was so shit hot that my technical school was waived. I kicked ass from day one and the improvements were fast and many.

At the banquet, one asshole walked up behind me and rubbed his penis against my head. I picked up my dinner fork and let everyone in the room know that I was about to do some frontier justice on that penis.

The head of the inspection team loudly decided to do something about the situation. But the most disappointing aspect of my job that night was that my own troops told me that I should have jumped the monkey with that inspector in order to pass the inspection.

I got the best inspection results in decades at that base, and no monkey jumping went on that night.

Am I traumatized? Nahhh. Pissed still? Yeah.

 Photobucket

 

I had a direct commander who grabbed my hand at a formal dinner and would not let it go. This is an old game that some men play. He ended up at a tire depot. Not because of the hand grabbing, but because he was a psycho and an asshole in general, and many, many of us wanted him dead or gone.

 My second boss on my first real grown up job once called me into a storeroom, then reached for his zipper. I turned around and walked out. I think that I had an impact on his libido by doing that. I was all of 19 years old and didn't know any better.  A week later, I was signed up for college.

 A lesbian who outranked me put her hand on my knee. I told her that she would draw back a bloody stump. She apologized profusely. She was not a bad person, just confused about my definite malebeanism*.

The same person informed me that a Major wanted me to know that he was highly regretful for asking me at the Officer's Club why he couldn't get no leg when my boyfriend could.

I told him: "Well, YOU are not my BOYFRIEND!"

Shit!

Every time I step on a natural piece of the Earth, my heart aches over the ancient women who walked in that place. Who was bought, sold, raped, beaten, killed, tortured, whacked upside the head. 

Every time I watch today's snuff porn lite where women are kidnapped, tortured in lasting ways, then killed and thrown out like garbage, my heart aches.

Every time I think about the apparent collusion of an entire county of officials, college officials and a monster in the  sickening case of little boys being raped, my heart aches. I hate football now.  I hate that a single game was not being forfieted in order to show support, shame and remorse.

Every time I think about my own ancestors, bought, sold, boiled alive, mulitated and raped with no hope of anyone relieving their suffering, my heart aches?

My harrassment? Come on. You are not going to get any trauma calls from me. Yeah, it bothers me. Sometimes it eats me up. But life's a bitch and then we die.

Other people are suffering vastly more. Children are suffering vastly more. Men and women are suffering vastly more than I can comprehend right now.

I thank God every day that I came out the kind of woman, living in this nation and society, who will take a chunk of someone who harrasses me and that I and many others will be better off because of it. 

What gives me the greatest upset and worry is that we will allow the Republicans to take us back to a world where anything goes and women will have to kill or be killed.  

"Traditional" roles for women. Being told that those roles are my only route to pleasing God and having eternal life.

That's my nightmare. That's my trauma. 

 

*Malebeanism: When a woman digs men so much that, if she had been born a male, she would have been gay.  It's all about the Schwang, doiiiiing....wank-danka-dank dank, you know.

 

 

 

Your tags:

TIP:

Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
Recipient's email address:
Personal message (optional):

Your email address:

Comments

Type your comment below:
Malebeanism....hm...nope, I don't ever think I could wrap my brain around that one ;D
Well zuma, you seem to have the character, less developed in some others, for dealing with awkward to tough situations. Good on you. As for another Repub presidency, it's too depressing to contemplate. You'd think that being only three years removed from two terms of Bush the Lesser, widely regarded as the worst Pres in anyone's lifetime, more voters would shy away from the absurd current crop promising renewed and more aggressive Bushism. Let's hope just enough do.
Hy: sknorxx!

Abrawang: We are headed for a bold new world of dark ages if we don't stop this. I keep thinking about Earth before the "Dune" series started, whenever I look at the massive structures we build and the fucked up world we have.
Violence, obviously, is a proper reaction at times, if you can stand the blowback.
Having been through some very similar "happenings" in my own life, including turning an abrupt 360 degrees to confront a boss who had already fondled a co-worker, I can confidently say that it would have been tough for me to not sink that fork into something. I can also say that I will not go back to a time when women were chattel. Perhaps it's our anger that will block that kind of slide.

Oh and I used the malebeanism strategy on a supervisor who spent a lot of time coming on to me. Only I didn't know it had a name.
you had me up to the republican part, but i'm a man. i suppose i should have seen that coming. like those religious comic books. you start reading and are really getting into it only to find jesus christ in the last frame. women are smarter.
Too effing right, Zuma. Those Neanderthals (and we have them up here too) need a sharp knee to the groin. Know when a man has a right to decide gender issues and reproductive rights? When he has his first period.
Brilliant, poignant essay. r.
This is just one more evidence of how much you rock, my friend. I admire both the way you rebuffed harrassment, and your overall attitude about harrassment.
Progress is always in danger of being clawed back. Or simply disregarded. Hard economic times makes for retreat - I worry about the future. Starting specifically with the next US election.
You are absolutely fabulicious! That loud noise you hear is me giving you a standing ovation.
It's going to take a long time to change, but life is still so much better now for more people than before. We are just more aware of how bad it can be, and how bad it has been. Child abuse is historically just child rearing. Military, church and other paternalistic (not Paternolistic) orders demand that men participate in rank and file humiliation and debasement. And they measure people by the distance from their penis. In order for women to succeed in that game, they must participate and emulate, although they will never have a penis to use as a weapon. There are some things that can not be accurately compared, and those of us who cannot have a penis or have not figured out how to use it for abuse, cannot fathom the deep rooted psychology of the use and abuse of it for humiliation, pain and degradement while simultaneously receiving pleasure.
If they get out of line, fork 'em. Love it.
Thanks, all! I just wish more women and girls were alive today to take such a hard core attitude about their worth and rights.
You are one rocking woman, Zuma. I wish the fork had done frontier justice, but we can't always let loose. Excellent writing.
They are half- way back to the dark ages - civil rights are going fast - choice is always on the table - tens of thousands cant vote because they were not weatlhy or white - time to stand up for all people - no need to name who they are.

we who swore to defend the ideal - owe because we know. thank you for your continuing service.
Love these big words: "Zumalicious"....yum! Malebeanism", yup, Malebeanism....that's a winner!
Malebeanism: Remember folks, we digs MENs!

Mpsyche: I still wish that I had used that fork!

Snowden and more: we have to fight because no one else will do it.

Ralph: Men in the same situation tell me that they are Lesbians.
Beautiful and funny. But not inappropriately funny for such a serious subject. Spot on.
In some cases, a bit of humor is all we got.