TW: Explicit discussions of abuse and trauma
Note:
To the pathetic rat who abused me, who reads this, probably furrowing his brow or freezing, probably unable to sleep or eat, you should be grateful I am not there. I had planned on dealing with you, but for now I shall settle with exposing you for what you did to me -- but Allah will grant me justice, both in this life and the next.
I am not scared of you or how you shall react -- whatever slander, statement, or deflection and attempt to claim yourself as the victim is irrelevant to me, I completely expect you to act as if I was a terrible, crazy, angry ex-girlfriend spewing lies. I am completely and utterly sane, the most lucid and clear I have been in my entire life and I have already spoken with a variety of people in regards to this over the span of a year: mental health professionals, feminist organizers, and principled comrades who have all affirmatively confirmed that what I experienced was abuse and rape.
TW: Explicit discussion of abuse and rape
When I was fifteen, my eighteen-year-old cousin Amaan tried to rape me on my birthday.
From the age of fifteen to sixteen, a Kashmiri Muslim man named Fadil Mir tried to groom and rape me.
I was alone at the time, emotionally devastated from the annexation, felt as if there was nothing I could do to change the fact I was powerless and passive -- both as an indigenous person and as a woman, that all I was destined for was to be used as an object by men, that I was nothing more than a pretty face, to watch helplessly as people died, that I could do nothing but watch, and as I was ensnared by older men who saw me as a toy to use as they pleased, a spectator in my own life, watching dully as I was dehumanized.
I was an angry and volatile teenager, extremely alone and isolated, with no one to turn to, cutting off my friends and lashing out angrily at my family because I felt so resentful. As a result of the abuse I faced, I developed an eating disorder, was excessively focused on my appearance to the point I would try to pull my hair out -- my mother would often feed me herself because I was so depressed and listless, losing weight so much I would often be physically unwell, to the point my teacher at the time had a discussion with my mother about how I needed to gain weight for my own health.
Initially, I had planned on never saying anything. How could I? I viewed myself as too angry, too rebellious, too emotional to be a victim of abuse and perhaps I could not accept it myself, that despite how cautious I was with men, how extremely careful to the point of immense paranoia, that it had happened again, that I had been subject to abuse I had sworn to myself I would never face again, that the pain and misery I had faced as a teenager was something that came when I was supposedly an assertive, strong adult, that how could I as a feminist be so stupid to fall for this again?
I asked myself this question thousands of times since that fateful day when Ayed pushed me, was I being abused? When Ayed begged for forgiveness, said that he pushed me on "accident', I thought, was this what the rest of my life going to be? Was the fear in my eyes and the way I pushed at his hand (I pushed and he didn't remove it, but kept it there, reassuring me he loved me and wasn't hurting me, that he just liked to hold my neck and lightly squeeze it) when Ayed wrapped his hand around my neck not enough? Was my quivering voice not reason enough to remove his hand from my neck? Being hit and then apologized to, building resentment over and over till I felt that I would explode, comforting Ayed, "No, I don't think you'll ever hit or abuse me like how your father hit your mother, No, Ayed, I don't think you're a bad person, No Ayed, I'm not angry or upset, just please don't do it again" and then watching as he would hurt me?
If I had been abused, I asked myself, how was it that I could get angry and upset with Ayed? Ayed saw himself as my savior -- as the "good" man who would protect me from men like who hurt me, but to me, all I could see in Ayed was the reflection of the past, all I could see was my own inability to escape, that I was a hostage, a bird with a broken wing trapped in a cage, a deer bleeding and limping unable to run from the hunter, one who would live undoubtedly an outwardly good life -- I would be the good Muslim wife, that I would be the perfect girl to show off, dedicated to his cause, charming, smart, and somewhat religious, a trophy to show off and to rape but never a person with agency.
I was an object and I knew it, and I hated him for it, I hated myself for it, and thus, I wasn't a perfect victim, now, was I?
People are convinced that abuse victims must be docile, pitiful, and pathetic, that they must be so submissive and passive and nice that that is the only way they will have sympathy for them, that if we are angry and upset, our experience wasn't valid, that if we fight back in whatever way we can, our abuse wasn't really abuse. In the same vein, we understand how nationally oppressed people are interrogated in the same way: observe how liberals will verbally attack Palestinians for fighting back against their genocide and only support them if they consent to being perfect victims, passive, docile, dying and waiting for a superior Western power to save them.
I thought, was I a victim if I was angry and resentful? If I screamed, cried, lost my sanity? Was I allowed to be a victim if I was an angry one, if I was one who hated my abuser, who treated him with disdain and disregard? That everyone labelled me as the angry girlfriend, the mean ex-girlfriend, that I was "hung up" on him, that I would slander him because I was bitter?
That because I was angry and upset over how I was being abused and controlled -- that he even cheated on me, flirting with another person in front of my face while I was having a mental breakdown over my sexual trauma being invalidated? That he broke up with me because he was dissatisfied I was no longer the bubbly, cheerful young woman he had met, that I had become jaded and angry over his abuse?
Over organizing responsibilities in Austin, over attempting over and over to create sustainable organizing infrastructure in El Paso, over my studies and the weight of the world almost on my shoulders at 19?
Where were my comrades when I needed them?
That my body physically rejected him and he blamed me for not being aroused (Almost as if I did not enthusiastically consent, felt pressured to perform acts of sex against my own will and upbringing and did it to appease him)?
That he had such a traumatizing impact on me I was a duller version of myself, that I spent months fantasizing about suicide, that I would constantly be asleep or refuse to leave my home and he would complain, "Why don't you ever want to do anything?" as I lay in my own depressive pit of self-loathing?
That in April, June, and July, I considered killing myself because I saw myself as worthless, as dirty and degraded, that the combination of sexual abuse from the state and my own comrade who I trusted drove me into insanity, that I could not hug my mother or father without wishing Allah would kill me, that I felt I had turned my back on my faith?
I was not a perfect victim -- and Ayed weaponized this to act as if he was the victim, complaining that I was mean, that I was unkind, that I would take out my anger on him. I am not a perfect victim, I was and I am angry, I want justice, and I refuse to be pitied and I do not care if I am seen as too angry or upset or framed as an "evil" person.
I never expected to live past the age of seventeen. I never expected to overcome the men who abused me as a child, and I never expected to overcome Ayed, yet here I am, alive, strong, and able to confront those who hurt me-- whether it be organizing leadership who engaged in abusive tendencies or abusers in these spaces. I am able to stand and confront everyone who hurt me -- all due to the support of my comrades and community. I was able to live and survive, grow from an angry teenager who had no one to a strong young woman who was able to facilitate change.
I wish I could tell my younger self that it was going to be okay. I wish I could comfort her and hug her, tell her that one day, you will not only live past the age of seventeen, but live to twenty-one, that you will be able to be part of a movement that in spite of liberal and abusive leadership and organizers, succeed in confronting Zionism, that you will be able to one day fight for Palestine. There are many survivors like my past self, lonely, depressed, angry -- and I am here to tell you it gets better.
I have survived and I will continue to survive, and everything I endure I will overcome to fight for the movement, wherever that is, however I can, I will find a way and no amount of suffering or torment at the hands of oppressors can prevent me from dedicating myself to this cause, whether that is national liberation or the liberation of women from sexual exploitation and abuse.
I do not say this to self-aggrandize but to demonstrate my commitment and my love for the cause, to show other survivors who read this that we are strong, that the abuse we endured will never define us, that we in fact are the ones who will bring forth our own liberation.
I am a Kashmiri Muslim -- my people have fought against colonialism and genocide under the Dogras, resisted slavery under the British, the women of my land fought against oppressors who raped them, our nation has given over a million martyrs in the struggle for liberation, and in honor of that strength, in honor of the resilience of the people of Gaza, of Lebanon, of Algeria, of every oppressed nation that has fought against the chains of imperialism & colonialism -- of the masses who have resisted the label of being a "perfect victim" and resisted and fought for their freedom, this is who I am, a Kashmiri Muslim woman, a feminist, a survivor, and a comrade on the path to liberation.
Part 7 will come soon.