I've lived most of my life being told that my value as a woman is priceless, that my sexuality and my virginity is sacred, and that any misstep in that area is irreversible, with severe lifelong consequences, and I'd be accountable to my father, to my family, and to my church. I'd bring shame to my father, my family, my church. And there would consequences and discipline from my father, my family, and my church.

So what am I to think when my father, my family and my church have enthusiastically embraced a man who sexually assaults women, degrades women, calls them obscenities, calls them pigs, calls them nasty, ugly, and their vaginas his for the taking.

Who does my father, my family and my church answer to? Where are their consequences? Where are their threats of disaster for stepping out of line? Why aren't they cut off from their family? Why don't they receive formal church discipline?

I kept up my end of the bargain. I was different, made fun of, didn't fit in, dumped, and escaped sexual assault on more than one occasion. I kept up my end of the bargain when it wasn't popular, when it wasn't convenient, when it was hard and I didn't want to, and when people I loved called me a slut because they didn't even believe that I kept up my end.

I couldn't wear revealing clothes or date boys, because again, as a woman I WAS THAT PRECIOUS AND VALUABLE.

But then I watched my father, my family, and my church ENTHUSIASTICALLY say that, yes, there actually IS something more important than all that "God's gift" stuff — it's political power.

And now I wonder if any of it was ever true... whether they ever believed what they were saying or if it was just something to say to control their daughters, their women.

I do not regret for one second that I BELIEVED what I was taught — that I am special, a gift from God, and that my sexuality is sacred and priceless. But where I used to be confident that I had a strong community around me that affirmed that in me, I now feel utterly alone.

This is hypocrisy on an intimate level, and it has shattered one piece of my world view.

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