I am a mother, a daughter, and a sister. I am also a whale. And I was sexually assaulted by John McAfee on June 2, 2016.

I was drifting around in the middle of the ocean, where I live. McAfee, taking a liking to me, invited me on his 200-meter long party yacht when he happened to sail nearby. I clambered on, rather inelegantly, and he summoned me to his room, where I expected we would discuss cybersecurity. Instead, he disrobed and pushed his penis into my whale blowhole. He then kissed me on the forehead and slid me back into the ocean. I never said “yes” or gave tacit consent once.

You might have thought otherwise. On a post dated December 31, McAfee wrote on Twitter:

“Enough of the ‘Whale Fucking is non-consensual’ bullshit. A Humpback Whale weighs 70,000 pounds, is fifty feet long, can dive more than a quarter mile and can crush ships with a single swipe of its tail. If a human manages to fuck one, you damn well better believe it’s consensual.”

This much is true: I do weigh 70,000 pounds, I am fifty feet long, I can dive more than a quarter mile and I can crush ships with a single swipe of my tail. And yes, John McAfee did penetrate me. But it was not consensual. And it was not sex.

Perhaps he “misinterpreted” my ultrasound complaints as “yes.” Perhaps he doesn’t “speak” whale. Get real. This is just one more case of the humans trivializing whales’ voices, suppressing whales’ lived experiences, and exploiting whales’ bodies with impunity. Our blowholes are their glory holes.

The reality faced by whales every day, you see, is that, because we are large aquatic mammals incapable of human speech, we are submissive when we don’t react to violent men with equal violence. When we choose not to flail our mighty tails we wanted it, because why else wouldn’t we have done anything?

I am not alone here. Every whale has his or her own story of assault. It is only because abusers like McAfee are flanked by a complicit media and protected by serried ranks of expensive lawyers that cater to their criminal whims that we are rendered voiceless. Indeed, by calling out McAfee I am putting my career as a whale at risk; I am putting my whale children at risk; and I am putting the good name of all whales, everywhere, at risk. And indeed, I am already braced for the kind of miswhalist rhetoric that regularly floods our way:

“Whales are sluts.”

“Whales shouldn’t dress so provocatively.”

“Whales should just be grateful we’re not grinding them into sushi.”

You get the idea.

There might be people who don’t believe me, and I fully expect John to deny my claim. However, I can describe his penis. It was round and fluffy, like a bichon frise.

To broach this subject uncovers fresh trauma each time I return to it. But in sharing my story — and in doing so, I am breaching the non-disclosure agreement McAfee had me sign — I hope that other whales, and perhaps also ostriches, will speak out and hold accountable the male humans who treat blubber as a rubber and violate the whale edict, enshrined in our national anthem, that we “don’t like being wanked on.”