I have read two stories on facebook about two little girls being molested on different days of the same week in Liberia. I have also learned that the men that molested them are still free and might not even go to jail… So I am conditioned to think that society accepts rape culture.

It’s such a taboo to speak about something so vulgar and intense. When we are addressing the topic of rape we start by asking what the female was wearing. “Well she shouldn’t be wearing that.” We almost never blame the men for their actions because after all ‘boys will be boys’ right? It’s okay to allow such behaviors to be the order of the day. I have never met a guy that felt like they were not entitled to a woman’s body. Counting how many women you have slept with is a sport for guys but when a female does it she is a whore or immature.

Men should never feel like they’re entitled to a woman’s body. No means no, it doesn’t mean that you try to woe her with your charm or force her with your strength; no means no! We never give girls room to grow into who they are before we start restricting them on how to be and how to act and what to wear. Schools are enforcing their stupid dress code rules shoving insecurities down our girls throat and society is constantly reminding us that if we get raped it’s because of what we’re wearing and because we’re girls and pretty much there’s nothing we can do about it.

What we can do is stop shaming women for how they dress, stop making sex seem like it’s such a taboo, have more sex education classes for our girls, teach independence and embrace the idea of equality. The more a girl knows about sex and health the less likely she is ok having STDs, pregnancy or even rape. Let’s embrace the idea of equality as a society.