CW Sexual harassment, sexual assault, spiritual abuse

In 2016, during the YWAM Dunham School of Digital Filmmaking, we were working on our 48-hour film project, when one of the staff guys kissed me on the neck. It was not consensual. For years, I didn’t think this was a big deal, but it turns out this is considered sexual assault. 

This event was part of a bigger pattern of spiritual abuse, sexual harassment, and manipulation by a male staff member of the School of Acting for the Screen, from Chile. His name is Pablo. I was not his only victim. 

And because words like “sexual harassment” and “spiritual abuse” can be very vague and broad, here are specific examples of what Pablo did:

• Styled himself as a mentor to me, even though I didn’t ask for that attention or that kind of relationship. He said he wanted to help me grow in my identity and recover from purity culture. 
• Repeatedly gave me hugs over the first couple weeks of my relationship with him after I admitted I wasn’t super comfortable with physical affection from guys (due to the purity culture). Would ask me “what percentage of awkward is this?” during each hug, until I eventually said 0%. 
• Challenged me to wear more brightly coloured and form-fitting clothing and pants. Ostensibly, this was to help me deconstruct modesty culture. I did try experimenting with different clothing during the school, but when he suggested I cut my hair and try a different style I dug in my heels and said no. (He still pestered me about cutting my hair a few years later in a facebook message.)
• Paid me close attention and spent large amounts of time with me, and had deep conversations with me for the first part of the school, then withdrew those affections in the latter part of the school (classic lovebombing)
• Trash-talked my school leaders to seed distrust between me and them
• Took advantage of my compassion by encouraging me to stay up late praying for his depression and for another student’s struggles, frequently. (I needed that sleep for film school!)
• Refused to accept my influence and leadership during the 48-hour film when I was the producer, and made a big fuss on set about being put on boom pole operator rather than being an acting coach like he wanted, this caused enough disruption we had to do a formal debrief with the whole cast and crew after the film. (Remember this was the guy who said he wanted to encourage me in my identity and giftings. . . but as soon as my leadership conflicted with his ego, he threw a tantrum.)

That’s just the stuff I remember best, I’m sure there’s more. From the Ontario Human Rights Commission definition of sexual harassment, here’s what Pablo’s actions towards me check off: 

• demanding hugs
• invading personal space
• unnecessary physical contact, including unwanted touching, etc.
• requiring an employee to dress in a sexualized or gender-specific way
• paternalistic behaviour based on gender which a person feels undermines their status or position of responsibility

A lot of what he did is also textbook manipulation and abuse: lovebombing, separating me from friends and leaders, taking advantage of my insecurities, styling himself as a spiritual mentor, systematically wearing down boundaries, sowing confusion, gaslighting. 

Notice that it was during the 48-hour film, when I was the producer, that Pablo kissed my neck. This happened in public, as I was talking to another member of the crew. I froze in that moment. Pablo knew my history with purity culture, and that at that point I had the conviction of saving my first kiss for marriage, and did not want to kiss people or be kissed. Up until this point, our physical affection had been hugs and hand-holding. This was out of the blue. I was at work on set. 

I was busy, and didn’t know how to deal with the neck kiss. I didn’t say anything, just kept talking with the crew member, and pretended this didn’t happen, but internally I was frozen and bewildered, should I speak up about this or not? I just stuffed it down and kept going.

For years, I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. But I think that was part of the abuse, Pablo doing this in plain sight, while nobody around me reacted, was strategic. It sowed confusion. It minimised what happened (that was sexual assault). And the fact that I still felt confused and frozen about it six years later means that it was a bigger deal than I first realised. In fact, those feelings overwhelmed a lot of my memories of shooting the 48-hour film — so much so that I forgot I was the producer of that short. He not only violated my consent and my autonomy for his own ego, he stole my confidence and the memories of my accomplishments by his actions. He undermined my leadership. And put me into freeze mode for six years. That’s why I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. Well. Now I do.

Part of what made that non-consensual neck kiss so damaging is that it isolated me, and I felt like I couldn’t speak up or say anything. So now it’s an important part of my healing to say “Hey, this happened. It’s not ok. He shouldn’t have done that. And everyone, look and listen to what this guy did, witness with me that this was wrong.“