Men and Women Aren’t Having the Same Conversation About Sexual Violence & Assault

By Guest Writer: Caitlin Heine

For a long time, I was naïve. I thought men and women were in the same conversation about sexual violence — that we were just clashing on solutions, divided by opinion.

I was wrong. We aren’t even in the same conversation. We’re not even in the same reality.

The comments to my writing made that beyond clear. Men and women aren’t looking at the same picture from different angles, we’re describing two entirely different worlds. And the gap between what men believe and what women know is wider, and more dangerous, than I could of ever guessed.

1. Consent Definition

Men: “If she didn’t say no, it was a yes."

Women: “If I couldn’t safely say no, I never truly said yes."

Men often translate silence or compliance as consent. But for women, silence almost always means a calculation.

Consent isn’t just about the absence of force, it’s about the presence of safety.

If it’s a first date, she doesn’t know whether a “no” will trigger anger or violence. If it’s her new boss, she doesn’t know whether “no” will cost her job. If it’s someone in her social circle, she doesn’t know whether “no” will brand her difficult, ruin friendships, or destroy her reputation.

So she goes quiet. She goes along. Not because she wanted it, but sometimes because she couldn’t be sure it was safe to refuse.

Men call that consent. Women do not. Maybe if silence can be mistaken for yes, they never have to face how many times it really wasn’t.

2. Men’s Fear vs. Women’s Fear

Men fear: being falsely accused, reputational harm, losing their careers.

Women fear: being assaulted, not believed, losing their safety, jobs, privacy, or relationships.

When men talk about sexual assault, their fear isn’t violence — it’s accusation. Their nightmare is that a woman might lie, and that lie might cost them their reputation or career. They never picture themselves as the ones doing harm — only as the ones unfairly accused of it.

When women talk about sexual assault, the fear isn’t abstract. It’s life. We fear being followed to our cars. We fear being cornered in our homes. We fear saying “no” and watching it turn into violence. And even if we survive the assault, we fear the aftermath: not being believed, losing jobs, families, privacy, and peace.

Men’s greatest fear is that women might say something. Ours is that men might do something.

One fear lives in what if.

The other lives in when.

3. What Counts as “Real” Harm

Men: only violent rape “counts.”

Women know trauma isn’t one act. It’s a spectrum: coercion, intimidation, harassment, violation.

Men rank harm in degrees. A violent rape by a stranger matters. Being groped at a Christmas party? Inappropriate maybe, but not life-altering.

What they don’t want to see is that every violation tears through us in the same way: safety, agency, the right to say no. Whether it’s a violent assault in an alley or a “light” grab at work, the message is the same: your body is not yours, you are not safe, your boundaries don’t matter.

The obsession with degrees of harm isn’t neutral. It excuses and it minimizes. It makes some violations sound survivable — and therefore forgivable. But for women, there is no sliding scale. Coercion, pressure, harassment, assault — all of it impacts our foundation in the same way.

There is no minor violation. No lesser trauma. Ranking harm is how men protect themselves from accountability. For women, the cost is always total.

4. Patterns vs. “One-Offs”

Men want: each case to stand alone.

Women know: every “small” act makes men more bold.

Men demand proof case by case, as if sexual violence happens in isolation. But predators repeat. That’s how they become predators at all.

The grope. The persistence. The intern silenced. Each time he gets away with it, he pushes further.

By the time the headlines break — 50, 100 women — everyone claims that they’re shocked.

But it was never hidden. The pattern was there the whole time.

Dismissing “small” violations isn’t neutral. It’s permission. Predators aren’t made in secret. They’re made in public, one unchecked act at a time.

5. Public vs. Private Risk

Men imagine: assault as stranger-danger. Rare, dramatic, a man in the shadows.

Women know: it isn’t strangers in alleys. It could be any man — a coworker, a boyfriend, a friend, a teacher, a cop.

We say “1 in 3 women will be assaulted before 25” like it’s weather — random, anonymous, inevitable. But assaults don’t fall from the sky. They aren’t accidents. They’re choices made by men.

We never publish the other side of that statistic: “1 in X men will assault a woman before 25.” Because saying it out loud would kill the myth of a few bad apples.

Abusers aren’t rare. They’re everywhere.

We count women’s suffering while we erase men’s responsibility. That’s why women grow up expecting harm — and men grow up assuming impunity.

6. What Men “Know” About Men

Men know male violence is real. They see the headlines. They hear the jokes. They warn their sisters away from certain guys — and then still call those guys friends.

Seventy thousand men in a Telegram chat trading rape strategies. Police officers beating their partners, shielded by their departments. Comedians, athletes, politicians — “open secrets” everyone knew until the public couldn’t look away.

It’s the uncle everyone avoids at family dinners but no one names. The coworker who corners women at office parties. The neighbor everyone knows to keep their daughters away from.

Men know. They do. But instead of naming it, they carve out exceptions: not me, not him, not my circle.

The question isn’t whether men believe male violence exists. It’s whether they’ll admit the men they already know are the ones committing it.

7. Whose Credibility Is on Trial

Men picture: a neutral system where facts are weighed.

Women know: it’s our clothes, drinking, and history on trial — while the man’s patterns of behavior are excluded as “prejudicial.”

Men imagine court as the place where justice happens. Facts. Evidence. Proof. But when a case makes it that far, it isn’t his violence on trial — it’s her character. What she wore. How much she drank. Whether she’s had sex before. Whether she texted him afterward. Whether she cried the “right” way.

Meanwhile, his record is omitted. The other women. The accusations. The obvious pattern everyone already knows — all ruled “too unfair” or “prejudicial” to show a jury. His reputation is protected in the name of justice. Hers is annihilated in the name of the same thing.

This isn’t a flaw. It’s the whole design. The law was never written to protect women. It was written to protect men from us.

8. What Counts as “Proof”

Men talk about proof like it’s simple. DNA. Video. Eyewitnesses. Without it, they say, there’s nothing.

So what does that mean for women? Should she pause mid-assault to snap a photo? Record it on her phone? Call in a witness? Risk her life fighting back just to leave bruises for a jury?

Sexual violence happens in silence, behind closed doors — and then that same privacy is weaponized against her. Courts call her word “just an allegation.” Her body isn’t evidence unless DNA is left behind. And even then, DNA only proves sex happened, not whether she said yes.

So what counts as proof? Almost nothing. Unless she fits the script of the “perfect victim” — instant police report, visible injuries, a timeline that matches what a jury imagines rape should look like.

Proof, as men define it, isn’t just rare — it’s designed to be impossible.

9. Justice Outcome

Men equate: acquittal or dismissal with innocence.

Women know: those outcomes don’t prove him innocent.

When men see “case dismissed,” “charges dropped,” or “acquitted,” they hear one thing: she lied. But those words aren’t proof of innocence. They’re proof of a system so broken it can’t hold men accountable unless the conditions of proof are so perfect.

And that’s the loop. Every time a man walks free, it doesn’t just protect him. It reinforces the myth of false accusations. Men point to the outcome as proof that women lie. Women see it as proof that the system was never meant to believe us. The more men are cleared, the more women are doubted. The more we’re doubted, the easier it is to clear men.

10. Perception of Women’s Motives

Men think: women accuse for money, attention, revenge, or power.

Women know: accusations cost us everything.

The “gold digger” myth gets tossed around like accusations are some kind of jackpot. But where is the woman who won by speaking out? Not just survived, but actually won.

Name her.

Because every woman who comes forward loses. She loses peace, privacy, safety, jobs, relationships. She gets dragged online, called a liar, a slut, vindictive, unstable. Even if he’s convicted, she carries the stain while he eventually rebuilds back into respectability.

There is no payday. No stardom. No win. The only guarantee is harassment, threats, punishment for daring to speak. Women don’t come forward because it helps them. They come forward because silence is worse — because knowing he will hurt someone else is heavier than the cost of being destroyed for telling the truth.

So if you believe accusations are about fame or fortune, name her.

The woman who ended up richer, safer, freer, happier because she spoke up. You can’t. She doesn’t exist. The men who keep getting away with it? They’re everywhere.

How can we ever have the same conversation when we aren’t even living in the same reality?

Maybe we never will.

And maybe that’s the point — men don’t have to.

© Caitlin Heine