I’m the outcast -
The one that always never belonged.
She did it to me...
"Are you kidding?
That doesn't happen."
The evils of which you speak are an everyday occurrence for you;
Which is precisely why they are so evil.
But mine hide in the shadows.
Mothers don’t do that.
And yet they do;
And we, their sons, suffer in silence.
No one can see.
No one can hear.
No one wants to.
"It doesn’t really happen, does it?"
It happened to me.
My pain doesn’t matter somehow.
I’m 6’4” tall and over 300 lbs;
I’m a man’s man.
My bike roars.
My leather a warning to all.
I don’t have to fear when I walk into the bar.
I don't worry when I park my bike that there is no light.
It doesn’t really matter what my mother did to me.
I’m a big boy with all this privilege...
...So...
I suffer alone
My pain doesn’t matter.
No one talks about it.
No one researches it.
There is nothing out there!
Look!
My abuse is an inconsequential blip on the screen.
In this fact, women steal privilege.
'Cause their pain is out there now.
Everyone can see it.
It is rightly laid bare before us all.
And they are right!
Men abusing women has to end!
Me? I fuckin' sit on the pile of shit where I won’t bother anybody.
It’d be wrong to turn peoples' eyes from those who feel empowered to whisper or shout, “Me too!”
I’m sure, in all honesty, my Mom could and would shout with them.
Maybe, that is part of the reason she did what she did.
And because I am not a woman, I can only nod into a void of silence, as I hear them shout,
“Me too.”
But I’m not fucking alone!
1 in 6, baby… At least that many.
It is probably more.
That's how many of my brothers were violated with me.
And though it may not sound like many;
It is in the fucking millions.
Next time you’re at church or a ballgame… count...
One out of every six male faces you see...
Their bodies resound with my whisper.
We've been told, quite rightly, “me too,” isn't for us.
But we need to find a voice.
I don’t hold out much hope.
But maybe, just maybe, you might see
'Cause, just like my Mom could say, “me too”
As she violated me to escape her own pain;
Men do too.
And we have no voice...
With no hope to gain one.
Our pain doesn’t really matter.
We just need to tough it out
While we sit as dead men our white horses:
Willed to stay there by those who need us to love them;
Demanding us to be something more than we know ourselves capable of being.
Look at my brave face.
You’ll never see my pain.
Most will never consider my sexual nightmare a possibility.
Besides, as a guy, I probably enjoyed it.
And, if the truth be known, I did.
I walked to her room, not the other way around!
That is my shame.
See, she can't be blamed.
I’m such a guy.
I need to simply get the fuck over it.
And so we do.
And in so doing
We do what we know.
And because of us countless others
Will also whisper or scream, "Me too."
~~Stephen Grant
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