Emma Schwartz, I commend you, and cannot thank you enough for bringing attention to 'stealthing'. You have integrated a personal traumatic sexual assault experience and have risen up to create awareness to protect other women; you have created a forum for women to share and to gain critically important information about sexual assault -and that stealthing is a crime. I have been through a similar experience, although it involved a sleeping drug. I was shaking and had tears while I read what you've written here because trauma is held in the body. If we can talk about our experiences and be validated that we have been raped, then we can begin to heal. I dearly hope that women who have suffered from stealthing and related rapes will be empowered to speak out in the ways you have. All men of all ages need to understand the rights of women, their bodies and their voices. Thank you Steve Schmidt. You give me hope for how men can honor women's rights, autonomy, and Voices. Emma, you are my Heroin. Keep Going and so many of us will join you.
Hi Janet, and anyone reading this thread: As Tim Ryan discussed, "We are not a trauma-informed society." I've found the best resources for understanding trauma, so far, to be Gabor Mate's work. There is a truly ground-breaking documentary based on his work (he interviews people who navigate ptsd, and he gets to the 'cause' of the reasons of the traumas; he also discusses DJT and some of the reasons we're in the mess were are in.
Here is a 4 min trailer for The Wisdom Of Trauma documentary:
In order to understand the physiology of how trauma happens and is healed (fight, flight, freeze & trauma is stored in the body as a survival mechanism), I've found that Peter Levine's book, Waking The Tiger, is the most helpful. Here is a link to the Amazon book description:
I'm not a psychologist or psychiatrist. I can only share, after years of research, the best resources I've found. Best to ALL and if these resources help one person, my heart will soar. Thank you Emma for opening up this topic! XO Lisa
I highly recommend Bessel van der Kolk, too. His book, "The Body Keeps The Score" is excellent. Also, Gabor Mate's recent book, a comprehensive masterpiece, is called "The Myth Of Normal: Living in a Toxic Culture". The title says so much. Another great book and title: "In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness" by Peter A. Levine. Restores Goodness -how beautiful! XO
Lisa, I don’t think I could ever possibly express my feelings with better clarity and understanding than how you have here. Thank you and I am so sorry to hear of your pain and trauma. It is a familiar theme for me as well.
Emma, I am SO PROUD of you. What an amazing, courageous young woman you are - thank you and keep going! The world needs to hear you and hear this! We are behind you! ❤️❤️❤️
And Steve, thank you for shining a light on her story and getting the message across. We need men to step up to the plate just like this.
Thanks, Lynn. I'm considering how many women (and some men) suffer in silence, shame, and solitude. There are so many people who just need to feel supported and to have an opportunity to share -to feel validated. I've heard it said that 'isolation is devastation'. I so much hope we can help people know that they are not alone. We got this, together. XO
Shame is powerful and keeps many people from talking about their trauma. Traumatic experiences/events need to be talked about openly. It takes away the power of shame and provides human connection.
Yes, sadly, if a person is abused, abandoned, and their trust is betrayed, it is often the victim that ends up feeling shame and humiliation. That then can spiral into isolation, loss of friends and family, employment issues, addiction, depression, and illness. More awareness and support is needed so this doesn't happen. Shame, though -I find that to be a tricky one. I've learned some from Brene Brown. She has some good youtube videos on shame. Thanks for sharing! XO
Thank you ❤️ With the current climate about a woman’s right to do just about anything related to our bodily autonomy, I am not surprised at the response to protect the *young man* - it’s his “mistake”, but the woman’s “regret” that plagues our culture - I can’t go on…..I’m exhausted from being an American woman…. I think exhausting us was some kind of plan.
Girl, I’m 58. The exhaustion crept up on me in my 50’s. Our society cares the least for old women. We are no longer “useful”. We are 1 thing in America.
👏👏Thank you for giving Ms Schwartz the spotlight and microphone to amplify her voice and message. I only wish all people would hear it.
What resonated with me was her valid point that girls' futures are minimized or outright ignored when changes in law are considered. All in the name of "ruining a young man's future." 😒
I am stunned by this Steve and so glad that you presented her analysis to us.
I have two teenage male grandchildren who are good and moral (in my belief) young men but I have shared this with their mothers and fathers hopefully to create a conversation with the boys.
Thank you for sharing your experience with The Warning community. What rank hypocrisy of the attorneys who minimized your assault & immediately defaulted to protecting the perpetrators of assault. These men who want to take & hold power by any means necessary are the most fragile in our society. They moan & cry when they are held accountable, when they are told to share resources, when they are “asked” to treat everyone with dignity & respect. This isn’t all men as there are millions who stand by women, by POC, & LBGTQIA+ people. However, in Republican legislatures around the country, these fragile misogynists are trying to disenfranchise, demean & delegitimize women. Remember that these men are literally scared out of their wits at the prospect of a multicultural society that doesn’t protect their needs above all others. I’m sorry that you became a member of a very large club of women who were abused & betrayed.
I have a daughter and two granddaughters. The older granddaughter is 16; the other is 16 months old. They live in Florida, Lord help them. I have grave concerns for their safety just because they exist on this planet as females. The arguments brought up against Emma's case are a rehash of "boys will be boys." The boyfriend seemed to think no harm, no foul. Emma is very courageous; thanks to her for helping to educate this old grandmother.
We, women, are in a dark place. We are being abandoned by our governments in a way that has me wondering what kind of leadership will move mountains to better our present predicament. We are in a very dark place, because those responsible are many, many who just are not up to the challenge. We are a democracy. The feminists, the heroic women of yesterday who gave women the freedom of Bodily Autonomy to all women irrespective of personal religion and morality, was institutionally unthinkable before the sexual revolution. It gave us Freedom, Privacy, Healthcare. Women grew and men were left behind. And too many women went back with them. But now I find myself often using a deplorable word, the station in life where so many women end up.
When the great writers of my generation were writing about the realities of women in society, books like The World According To Garp, they were convinced that life for women would be better for real, that fiction as the one he wrote would not be surging as the Reality of our days. The author, the artist, the voice that saw wrong then, is the voice of the women who are as shocked today that we have not moved with time. Great writing, as is art in general, has not moved minds collectively. We must understand this, that poets and visionaries will always be our greatest representatives of us. Politics, instead, moves at a much slower tempo. Now, more than ever, it has moved away from the human. Notwithstanding the grand achievements of humanity. Thank you for your comment. Peace.
I did not know about this issue. I am so sorry to hear about this. Taking such a personal experience and sharing it, taking positive steps to help others is a lesson for us all.
As a 2-Daughter Daddy and Grandfather of an 8 month old girl, I thank you and applaud your courage to come forward to share your story. Your Insta account just picked up a new follower.
Emma, I am so sorry. You are right, women face issues that men do not, simply by being women. And the tolerance of abuse, especially in younger men is horrific. I admire your courage and wish for you continued healing. Stand strong.
Steve, thank you for posting this article. As a grandmother of a beautiful granddaughter who will go to college in the fall. I immediately thought of my Ava. I have posted this on my FB page, sent to NOW, and sent out to my database. I urge your readers to do the same. We must protect our young women, this is a crazy world we live in.
My heart aches for you that you had to experience this betrayal. Thank you for speaking out to make others aware of this, and for your ongoing work to legislate for consequences to males who find this acceptable. Best of luck in your journey!
Emma, speaking up is how you change the culture. Punishing innocent, naive, inexperienced young boys… bullshit. If they know to pull it off, stealthily, they are aware enough that it is wrong and indeed a sexual assault. Nothing less.
I must commend you, Emma Schwartz, for your powerful appeal to act, creating first the necessary ground to pursue it, information. But information gets lost always when not advocated with the experience you give us all, painful, revelatory, vulnerable, life-changing. Reading you I have learned ways unknown to me of how girls and women must protect themselves with specific actions. The Angel Shot and the role bartenders have as one of the most important protections in Public Spaces for girls and women. Most importantly, your writing speaks of the intimacy of relationships, the Unilateral assault on such relationships, the Weight on one of those affected by them, the perilous moment girls and women are now confronting from all sides, be it our homes, our social life, our TRUST in our surroundings. You battled an inner assault so much on your own and it so fits in with what the statistics have been given us in NUMBERS. There are 55 million Americans between the ages of 18 and 29. Of them, the percentages under pressure from different physical and emotional ailments are staggering. Self-harm is one. Your bodily reactions gave you the strength to find solutions and they are Heroic. You speak for all those peers of yours, and adults, about legislative action. And you give us the less spoken of in the media dark side of Misogyny. Misogyny so in the news, but irrelevant if not taken to the lawmaking-changing rightful place. As for boys turning to men, the very men on the news in the Fox News toxic masculinity environment that views women guests as breasts and vaginas to be exchanged in their thwarted and sick fantasia. But what happened to you was REAL, an assault on your body that continued on in the space that should have listened to you. No, somehow the statements above about the "young, inexperienced boys and men" are the solutions too many adult men prefer to choose.
Stealthing, from the Healthline article:
"The only way to prevent stealthing is to not do it
"Repeat after us: In this house, we do not victim-blame… EVER.
"The only person to blame for stealthing is the person who made the active choice to damage or remove a condom or other barrier unbeknownst to their partner(s).
"Similarly, the only way to prevent stealthing is to… not remove a barrier mid-sex.
"If you don’t want to use a barrier method during sex, that’s your prerogative! But it needs to be pre-negotiated and enthusiastically agreed upon by all involved before play begins.
"What’s more, everyone involved needs to freely agree to forgo barriers with a *full and complete* understanding of the potential risks of fluid bonding."
I am honored to know your name, Emma Schwartz, because I see before me the woman of the future.
This made me cry. I have lived a long time and frankly, I do not feel that women have really progressed much since the time that I was young. There has been an illusion of change as Women entered the workforce. But truly, not much has changed. I would like to see more Men involved in demanding rights for women. I see and hear a great deal of outrage from Men on the Left. But I am not seeing a great deal of legal protections put in place to safeguard Women. I am sick of rape being called sexual assault. I am frustrated by the light sentences handed down to rapists. I have owned houses since my 20’s and have a terrific credit rating. Yet when I wanted a modest loan on my home, that is in my name, I had to put my Husband on the deed. No, not much has changed for Women. I think it is getting worse for the next generation. This young Woman is articulate and I hate that this happened to her. Thank you for posting this article Steve! Sorry for the rant. But this is a subject that is close to my heart.
What an unsettling morning read! Emma Schwartz deserves a medal for this well thought out and written essay. I learned from this, I'd never heard of a 'birdie' or an angel shot. I wonder if bartenders learn the latter term as part of their employment. Do they actually act on an angel shot order in a fast moving busy bar and club scene? I certainly hope so. Accountability. Males DO need to be held accountable even if they are the star athlete with a bright future. The good old boy club needs to be torn down and women need to be respected. I am the father of two grown children. My son was instructed early on in respect for women. My daughter was instructed early on to feel confident and powerful as a woman and never to hesitate in doing bodily harm to a Male acting inappropriately. Emma, you are a hero!!
Dear Steve, I shared this Substack on Spoutible. It is being echoed at an incredible pace. The men of Spoutible are seeing why we need good men as allies. Thank you 😊
Emma Schwartz, I commend you, and cannot thank you enough for bringing attention to 'stealthing'. You have integrated a personal traumatic sexual assault experience and have risen up to create awareness to protect other women; you have created a forum for women to share and to gain critically important information about sexual assault -and that stealthing is a crime. I have been through a similar experience, although it involved a sleeping drug. I was shaking and had tears while I read what you've written here because trauma is held in the body. If we can talk about our experiences and be validated that we have been raped, then we can begin to heal. I dearly hope that women who have suffered from stealthing and related rapes will be empowered to speak out in the ways you have. All men of all ages need to understand the rights of women, their bodies and their voices. Thank you Steve Schmidt. You give me hope for how men can honor women's rights, autonomy, and Voices. Emma, you are my Heroin. Keep Going and so many of us will join you.
Lisa, thank you for sharing your own trauma. I am so sorry that you went through such a horrifying experience. xo (heroine)
FYI: Gabor Mate On Sexual Abuse (Mate is leading trauma expert.) 37 second video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHU_lMSjBFg
Hi Janet, and anyone reading this thread: As Tim Ryan discussed, "We are not a trauma-informed society." I've found the best resources for understanding trauma, so far, to be Gabor Mate's work. There is a truly ground-breaking documentary based on his work (he interviews people who navigate ptsd, and he gets to the 'cause' of the reasons of the traumas; he also discusses DJT and some of the reasons we're in the mess were are in.
Here is a 4 min trailer for The Wisdom Of Trauma documentary:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70HNmSsJvVU
Here is a link to the full documentary, The Wisdom Of Trauma:
https://thewisdomoftrauma.com/access-video/movie-fb/
In order to understand the physiology of how trauma happens and is healed (fight, flight, freeze & trauma is stored in the body as a survival mechanism), I've found that Peter Levine's book, Waking The Tiger, is the most helpful. Here is a link to the Amazon book description:
https://www.amazon.com/Waking-Tiger-audiobook/dp/B01LZKDSNZ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2UOTM7Y8L54X4&keywords=waking+the+tiger+peter+levine&qid=1682468658&sprefix=waking+the+tiger+peter+levine%2Caps%2C186&sr=8-1
I'm not a psychologist or psychiatrist. I can only share, after years of research, the best resources I've found. Best to ALL and if these resources help one person, my heart will soar. Thank you Emma for opening up this topic! XO Lisa
I highly recommend Bessel van der Kolk, too. His book, "The Body Keeps The Score" is excellent. Also, Gabor Mate's recent book, a comprehensive masterpiece, is called "The Myth Of Normal: Living in a Toxic Culture". The title says so much. Another great book and title: "In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness" by Peter A. Levine. Restores Goodness -how beautiful! XO
Lisa, I don’t think I could ever possibly express my feelings with better clarity and understanding than how you have here. Thank you and I am so sorry to hear of your pain and trauma. It is a familiar theme for me as well.
Emma, I am SO PROUD of you. What an amazing, courageous young woman you are - thank you and keep going! The world needs to hear you and hear this! We are behind you! ❤️❤️❤️
And Steve, thank you for shining a light on her story and getting the message across. We need men to step up to the plate just like this.
Thanks, Lynn. I'm considering how many women (and some men) suffer in silence, shame, and solitude. There are so many people who just need to feel supported and to have an opportunity to share -to feel validated. I've heard it said that 'isolation is devastation'. I so much hope we can help people know that they are not alone. We got this, together. XO
Shame is powerful and keeps many people from talking about their trauma. Traumatic experiences/events need to be talked about openly. It takes away the power of shame and provides human connection.
Yes, sadly, if a person is abused, abandoned, and their trust is betrayed, it is often the victim that ends up feeling shame and humiliation. That then can spiral into isolation, loss of friends and family, employment issues, addiction, depression, and illness. More awareness and support is needed so this doesn't happen. Shame, though -I find that to be a tricky one. I've learned some from Brene Brown. She has some good youtube videos on shame. Thanks for sharing! XO
My college students (I teach hospitality) knew all about “angel shots” and “cocktail condoms”. I was both relieved and horrified for them.
Thank you ❤️ With the current climate about a woman’s right to do just about anything related to our bodily autonomy, I am not surprised at the response to protect the *young man* - it’s his “mistake”, but the woman’s “regret” that plagues our culture - I can’t go on…..I’m exhausted from being an American woman…. I think exhausting us was some kind of plan.
I was SO HAPPY when I turned 40! Men started treating me like a person, not a sex object.
Girl, I’m 58. The exhaustion crept up on me in my 50’s. Our society cares the least for old women. We are no longer “useful”. We are 1 thing in America.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XPpsI8mWKmg&pp=ygUmTGFzdCBmdWNrYWJsZSBkYXkganVsaWEgbG91aXMgZHJleWZ1c3M%3D
👏👏Thank you for giving Ms Schwartz the spotlight and microphone to amplify her voice and message. I only wish all people would hear it.
What resonated with me was her valid point that girls' futures are minimized or outright ignored when changes in law are considered. All in the name of "ruining a young man's future." 😒
YES! Outrageous!
I am stunned by this Steve and so glad that you presented her analysis to us.
I have two teenage male grandchildren who are good and moral (in my belief) young men but I have shared this with their mothers and fathers hopefully to create a conversation with the boys.
It is a conversation that is much needed.
Thank you
Thank you for sharing your experience with The Warning community. What rank hypocrisy of the attorneys who minimized your assault & immediately defaulted to protecting the perpetrators of assault. These men who want to take & hold power by any means necessary are the most fragile in our society. They moan & cry when they are held accountable, when they are told to share resources, when they are “asked” to treat everyone with dignity & respect. This isn’t all men as there are millions who stand by women, by POC, & LBGTQIA+ people. However, in Republican legislatures around the country, these fragile misogynists are trying to disenfranchise, demean & delegitimize women. Remember that these men are literally scared out of their wits at the prospect of a multicultural society that doesn’t protect their needs above all others. I’m sorry that you became a member of a very large club of women who were abused & betrayed.
I have a daughter and two granddaughters. The older granddaughter is 16; the other is 16 months old. They live in Florida, Lord help them. I have grave concerns for their safety just because they exist on this planet as females. The arguments brought up against Emma's case are a rehash of "boys will be boys." The boyfriend seemed to think no harm, no foul. Emma is very courageous; thanks to her for helping to educate this old grandmother.
We, women, are in a dark place. We are being abandoned by our governments in a way that has me wondering what kind of leadership will move mountains to better our present predicament. We are in a very dark place, because those responsible are many, many who just are not up to the challenge. We are a democracy. The feminists, the heroic women of yesterday who gave women the freedom of Bodily Autonomy to all women irrespective of personal religion and morality, was institutionally unthinkable before the sexual revolution. It gave us Freedom, Privacy, Healthcare. Women grew and men were left behind. And too many women went back with them. But now I find myself often using a deplorable word, the station in life where so many women end up.
Please keep the faith as our youngest voters come to the stage to take their turn at leadership for all!!!
When the great writers of my generation were writing about the realities of women in society, books like The World According To Garp, they were convinced that life for women would be better for real, that fiction as the one he wrote would not be surging as the Reality of our days. The author, the artist, the voice that saw wrong then, is the voice of the women who are as shocked today that we have not moved with time. Great writing, as is art in general, has not moved minds collectively. We must understand this, that poets and visionaries will always be our greatest representatives of us. Politics, instead, moves at a much slower tempo. Now, more than ever, it has moved away from the human. Notwithstanding the grand achievements of humanity. Thank you for your comment. Peace.
I did not know about this issue. I am so sorry to hear about this. Taking such a personal experience and sharing it, taking positive steps to help others is a lesson for us all.
As a 2-Daughter Daddy and Grandfather of an 8 month old girl, I thank you and applaud your courage to come forward to share your story. Your Insta account just picked up a new follower.
Emma, I am so sorry. You are right, women face issues that men do not, simply by being women. And the tolerance of abuse, especially in younger men is horrific. I admire your courage and wish for you continued healing. Stand strong.
Steve, thank you for posting this article. As a grandmother of a beautiful granddaughter who will go to college in the fall. I immediately thought of my Ava. I have posted this on my FB page, sent to NOW, and sent out to my database. I urge your readers to do the same. We must protect our young women, this is a crazy world we live in.
My heart aches for you that you had to experience this betrayal. Thank you for speaking out to make others aware of this, and for your ongoing work to legislate for consequences to males who find this acceptable. Best of luck in your journey!
Emma, speaking up is how you change the culture. Punishing innocent, naive, inexperienced young boys… bullshit. If they know to pull it off, stealthily, they are aware enough that it is wrong and indeed a sexual assault. Nothing less.
I must commend you, Emma Schwartz, for your powerful appeal to act, creating first the necessary ground to pursue it, information. But information gets lost always when not advocated with the experience you give us all, painful, revelatory, vulnerable, life-changing. Reading you I have learned ways unknown to me of how girls and women must protect themselves with specific actions. The Angel Shot and the role bartenders have as one of the most important protections in Public Spaces for girls and women. Most importantly, your writing speaks of the intimacy of relationships, the Unilateral assault on such relationships, the Weight on one of those affected by them, the perilous moment girls and women are now confronting from all sides, be it our homes, our social life, our TRUST in our surroundings. You battled an inner assault so much on your own and it so fits in with what the statistics have been given us in NUMBERS. There are 55 million Americans between the ages of 18 and 29. Of them, the percentages under pressure from different physical and emotional ailments are staggering. Self-harm is one. Your bodily reactions gave you the strength to find solutions and they are Heroic. You speak for all those peers of yours, and adults, about legislative action. And you give us the less spoken of in the media dark side of Misogyny. Misogyny so in the news, but irrelevant if not taken to the lawmaking-changing rightful place. As for boys turning to men, the very men on the news in the Fox News toxic masculinity environment that views women guests as breasts and vaginas to be exchanged in their thwarted and sick fantasia. But what happened to you was REAL, an assault on your body that continued on in the space that should have listened to you. No, somehow the statements above about the "young, inexperienced boys and men" are the solutions too many adult men prefer to choose.
Stealthing, from the Healthline article:
"The only way to prevent stealthing is to not do it
"Repeat after us: In this house, we do not victim-blame… EVER.
"The only person to blame for stealthing is the person who made the active choice to damage or remove a condom or other barrier unbeknownst to their partner(s).
"Similarly, the only way to prevent stealthing is to… not remove a barrier mid-sex.
"If you don’t want to use a barrier method during sex, that’s your prerogative! But it needs to be pre-negotiated and enthusiastically agreed upon by all involved before play begins.
"What’s more, everyone involved needs to freely agree to forgo barriers with a *full and complete* understanding of the potential risks of fluid bonding."
I am honored to know your name, Emma Schwartz, because I see before me the woman of the future.
Beautiful, N.Z., inspiring, reassuring, empowering, pro-active, educational. Thank you!
This made me cry. I have lived a long time and frankly, I do not feel that women have really progressed much since the time that I was young. There has been an illusion of change as Women entered the workforce. But truly, not much has changed. I would like to see more Men involved in demanding rights for women. I see and hear a great deal of outrage from Men on the Left. But I am not seeing a great deal of legal protections put in place to safeguard Women. I am sick of rape being called sexual assault. I am frustrated by the light sentences handed down to rapists. I have owned houses since my 20’s and have a terrific credit rating. Yet when I wanted a modest loan on my home, that is in my name, I had to put my Husband on the deed. No, not much has changed for Women. I think it is getting worse for the next generation. This young Woman is articulate and I hate that this happened to her. Thank you for posting this article Steve! Sorry for the rant. But this is a subject that is close to my heart.
What an unsettling morning read! Emma Schwartz deserves a medal for this well thought out and written essay. I learned from this, I'd never heard of a 'birdie' or an angel shot. I wonder if bartenders learn the latter term as part of their employment. Do they actually act on an angel shot order in a fast moving busy bar and club scene? I certainly hope so. Accountability. Males DO need to be held accountable even if they are the star athlete with a bright future. The good old boy club needs to be torn down and women need to be respected. I am the father of two grown children. My son was instructed early on in respect for women. My daughter was instructed early on to feel confident and powerful as a woman and never to hesitate in doing bodily harm to a Male acting inappropriately. Emma, you are a hero!!
Dear Steve, I shared this Substack on Spoutible. It is being echoed at an incredible pace. The men of Spoutible are seeing why we need good men as allies. Thank you 😊
Claudia,
Thanks for spreading the word about this mostly unfamiliar topic.
Steve