For years, Gabe Wright kept a horrible secret.
When he was in his 20s, Wright was beaten and sexually assaulted at gunpoint by three men he met while fishing in North Carolina. Wright, now 32, suffered flashbacks and nightmares that sometimes caused him to wake up in physical pain. He drank to cope, he said.
“I didn’t know how to tell anyone,” said Wright, who now lives in Lincoln Park. “I’m a guy, who’s going to believe me?”
He worried that if he told anyone, people would think he’d wanted it, that he could have fought back, or that personal troubles–including leaving college and being in a bad relationship–would make him less credible.
“People are going to think I’m making it up for attention,” he remembers thinking after the assault.
Three years ago, after hospital visits and counseling, Wright told family and friends about the assault. Now he’s speaking out in a more public way, by sharing his experience with students at his alma mater, Northern Illinois University, and through Voices and Faces, a Chicago-based non-profit dedicated to putting names and faces to the often anonymous victims of sexual assault.
Wright’s message is that rape can happen to anyone at any time–male or female, straight or gay. “It has nothing to do with gender,” he said. “It’s just about power and control.”
It is difficult to know exactly how often men are the victims of sexual assault, but law-enforcement officials and rape crisis counselors believe it happens much more frequently than is reported.
A 2006 study by the National Institute of Justice estimates that about 3 percent of men–one in 33–have been raped some time in their lives. The same study estimates that 17.6 percent of women–one in six–have been raped. Experts say that rape, regardless of a victim’s gender, is not about sex.
“It’s an act of violence and humiliation,” says Troy Melendez, a student affairs director at Northern Illinois University who is an adviser to a campus men’s group that works to prevent sexual assault. “It doesn’t have a whole lot to do with sex. Sex is used as a tool to dominate and humiliate another person.”
Experts think a combination of social factors, including an inaccurate assumption that men can’t be forced into sexual contact they don’t want, keep men from reporting sexual assaults.
Cook County Assistant State’s Atty. Shauna Boliker, who prosecutes sex crimes, estimates men who are raped report the crime far less often than women do. “There’s so much stigma attached to that,” she said. Her office has worked with male adult victims, but not often. With child sex crimes, boys make up about 30 percent to 35 percent of the victims, she said.
“We really don’t know to what extent underreporting occurs,” says Tom Weishaar, a psychologist who is working at Rape Victim Advocates in Chicago. He estimates the rate of victims not reporting to police is high.
Weishaar counsels male and female clients at RVA and helps run a support group for male survivors, which took the counseling center more than two years to put together. Because men and women face different issues, and some women may be uncomfortable in a group that includes men, the two sexes are kept separate.
In his work, Weishaar has seen men who were molested as children, men who were raped by someone they trusted, gay men assaulted on dates and men who were raped by gang members. “The truth is, male rape occurs everywhere,” he said.
Chicago-area rape crisis and counseling centers say they’re growing more aware of the need to provide special services for male victims.
A new organization called Anne’s Home that provides free, anonymous off-campus counseling to Chicago-area college students began offering counseling assistance to male students this year. The decision to expand its reach was made after founder Anne Bent heard two male survivors speak at a conference.
“Men have just as much, if not more, shame from the incident, and we think they’re not seeking services,” said Laura Sabino, executive director of the Evanston-based organization.
At RVA, about 8 percent to 9 percent of the people who receive medical, legal and counseling services are male, executive director Vicky DiProva said. “You simply have to be responsive to that.”
The organization is preparing to start its second men’s counseling group. RVA’s Weishaar says he’s seen remarkable things happen in therapy.
“Healing really is the key–to not just return to a state of emotional health but to grow to a new level of emotional health beyond the place where they were assaulted,” he said.
Wright, who says he’s never met another male survivor, came across Voices and Faces while researching online. The 16 stories now on the group’s Web site (www.voicesandfaces.org) illustrate the pervasiveness of sexual violence and how victims can overcome the trauma and thrive. Voices and Faces founder Anne Ream says Wright will be the first male survivor to have a profile on the Web site. “It’s a big deal,” she said.
Ream says she’s had a number of male survivors tell her their stories confidentially, and she knows there’s an audience who will relate to Wright’s story, which is scheduled to go up on the site in March.
“As much silence as there is around this issue for women, there is infinitely greater silence for men,” Ream said.
Wright’s long-term goal is to start an organization that focuses on education and prevention of sexual assault for both men and women. “I have to do something about it. I just won’t feel like my life is complete if I don’t do something with it,” he said.
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SURVIVOR STORIES
Gabe Wright
32, Chicago
Gabe Wright says he feels like an outsider in two ways.
Wright, who is finishing a master’s degree in higher education administration at Northern Illinois University, is deaf. He lost almost all his hearing as a child and communicates with the hearing world by reading lips and using a hearing aid in one ear.
He also is a male survivor of sexual assault.
“I’ve got those two struggles right there, two challenges,” Wright said.
His hearing problem may have contributed to his assault–the men who attacked him were able to sneak up on him, he said–but Wright wants people to know it could happen to anyone at any time, not just to someone who can’t hear.
His mother, Olivia Wright, remembers a time when her son was struggling but she didn’t know why. He drank and would call her in the middle of the night, threatening to kill himself.
When he opened up to her, “My heart was broken for him,” his mother said. “I can’t imagine what he must [have gone through]. Guys are supposed to be macho and he couldn’t turn to anybody.”
After Wright told his family about what happened, he reported the assault to a sheriff’s office in North Carolina in 2005. The case still is open, according to Lt. Roy Brown of the Catawba County Sheriff’s Department.
Wright also started telling women he would go out on dates with. Wright wondered when a good time to bring up such an uncomfortable topic was, so he decided to tell them immediately, sometimes on the first date. He figured that way, he wouldn’t waste time getting to know someone who couldn’t accept who he was.
He found that acceptance in Kim Horstman, now his fiance. The two met through MySpace, and Wright told Horstman on IM what had happened to him before they met face to face.
Horstman said she was surprised when Wright told her about the assault–she didn’t think she knew anyone who had been raped–but she wasn’t scared off. She says she admires Wright’s strength and his willingness to share his story to help others.
“I’m not going to judge him; it’s not his fault,” Horstman said. “The people this happens to; it’s not their fault.”
[ K.M. ]Ben Wise
27, Albany, New York
Ben Wise says he was raped at house party during his freshman year of college in upstate New York.
The morning after the party, Wise woke up confused and went to the college health center. They recommended he go to a local hospital for a medical exam, which revealed traces of two predatory “date rape” drugs, GHB and Rohypnol, in his system, Wise said. He doesn’t remember much about the assault, which happened nine years ago this month.
Wise went to police but says they didn’t treat him like a victim. Instead, he said, they acted like he must have been feeling guilty about having sex with another man.
Wise, who is gay, says there is an added stigma for gay males who are sexual assault victims, because some people think the assault may have been consensual or wanted.
“It’s not about sex; it’s not about getting off. It’s about control over another human being,” he said.
After the assault, Wise transferred to State University of New York at Oswego. He did not immediately seek counseling but kept the phone number for the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN) in his wallet. He called them for the first time the summer after the assault–and after his friends and parents noticed something was different about him. He eventually told the people close to him what happened. Wise said his mother has been especially supportive, sending money to RAINN and remembering the anniversary of his assault.
“I say I came out twice,” Wise said. “I came out as a survivor. I think there’s just as much of a stigma around sexual assault as there is around sexuality.”
Wise, who works in public health, shared his story for a book called Voices of Courage. (When speaking about the book at a conference last fall, he met Anne Bent, who runs a Chicago-based service called Anne’s Home, which helps college-age sexual assault victims. Bent later decided to open up the services to men as well as women.)
Wise believes there are a lot of sexual assaults, attempted assaults and sexual misconduct among males that are not being reported, especially at the college and high school age.
Wise says it is possible to move beyond the assault and lead a full life.
“Just because I’m a survivor that doesn’t mean it’s all I think about,” he said. “In fact, 99 percent of the time it’s not what I think about.”
[ K.M. ]– – –
Where to get help
Organizations that provide free counseling to sexual assault survivors:
— Rape Victim Advocates
312-443-9603
www.rapevictimadvocates.org
–Chicago Rape Crisis Hotline (run by the YWCA)
888-293-2080
www.ywca.org/chicago
–Anne’s Home (for college students)
847-604-1911
www.anneshome.org
How you can help
The Voices and Faces Project and Gen Art are teaming up March 7 for a CD launch party to benefit survivors of sexual violence. The party will be held at Reserve, 858 W. Lake St., from 6 to 9 p.m. and will feature live performances. Tickets are $20.
The CD, “Voices and Faces, Volume One,” features music from Neko Case, The New Pornographers, Michelle Shocked, Motion City Soundtrack and Kelly Hogan.
Tickets and CDs can be purchased at www.voicesandfaces.org.
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kmasterson@tribune.com
