Responding To Controversy Peace Love And Friendship On The Internet

"CAN TWO TOTAL STRANGERS EMBRACE EACH OTHER'S PERSPECTIVE ON A SENSITIVE ISSUE IN JUST A FEW COMMENTS TO A POST? ON THE INTERNET?" I believe it's possible. It happened to me. We didn't get nasty.We didn't act like trolls. We actually sent messages like this, "I see your perspective, too. xx." I know, I know. I had to sit down. I could hardly believe it, too. I opened up Time magazine's instagram account and saw their post about their recent cover. It featured a story about rape on college campuses and they added this caption to the photo: "What will it take to make women safe at college?" See TIME's new cover on the rape crisis in higher education." Oh boy. I took a breath and posted this comment, "@time women aren't the only ones being raped on campusesmen are victims, too I wanted to mention that it's so easy to keep perpetuating this myth that rape only happens to women. It silences others who are victims. Within a few seconds, an instagram user named @moniquegermon posted this comment, "Men trying to tell the world that men are also the victims of rapeLOL to that. The ratio of incidents should be enough to make you stand up and fight for the protection of women." I took a deeper breath. I wanted to say something but wanted to acknowledge our different identities. How could I continue to express myself and advocate for my assertion and still validate this woman's opinion? It was intimidating because of how we know the exchanges in comments can often go. I replied, "@moniquegermon talking about male rape doesn't take away from the conversation about rape of women. It doesn't seem like something to make a contest. Everyone deserves justice and visibility, no matter the ratios." I hoped for the best. I hoped she would see what I was trying to say. She quickly replied, "@dillandigi it just changes the subject to men." I understood her concern. Similar to issues of race, accessibility, sex, gender and countless other issues of power, privilege and difference, it becomes all too easy to silence the voices and issue being raised by raising the counterargument of the "other side". I really didn't want to do that to her. I saw her ellipsis and hoped she wasn't already experiencing me as aggressive or invalidating the very important point she was trying to make. And still, and still, I wanted to bring light to the rape of men. I didn't want it to be lost or not seen-but not at the expense of stealing the so-called spotlight. Can we bring visibility to something, some specific issue, without needing to bring others into the conversation, too? Are we isolated or always connected to each other? I did it as gracefully as I could in this reply, "@moniquegermon I think it includes them. I do not mean to redirect focus at all but just make the conversation more inclusive. I understand how you feel and what you are saying