Kayce M. Hagen: Why Men Shouldn’t Be Sharing The ‘Helpless Wh*re’ Letter

The Kayce M. Hagen letter: have you seen it?

I’m sure you have. It’s the one where the female airman tells the Sexual Assault Response Coordination (SARC) office in no uncertain terms that its well-meaning efforts to combat sex abuse in the military are turning her into a “helpless wh*re.”

This “open letter” has popped up on my Facebook feed about 50 times today, in part because I have a lot of conservative friends and skew toward right-leaning libertarianism.

And you know what?

Each time I see it, I cringe. Why, you may be asking?

Because this is one scenario where you definitely have to consider the source before passing it along with a ringing endorsement — something I’m sure around 99 percent of my Facebook friends have failed to do.

Before I go further into why the source matters, allow me first to share some of the text, which was first posted on the John Q. Public blog. Follow that link to read the full text. Here’s a sample.

Dear SARC,

I got up this morning as an Airman in the United States Air Force. I got up and I put on my uniform, I pulled back my hair, I looked in the mirror and an Airman looked back. A strong, confident military professional stared out of my bathroom mirror, and I met her eyes with pride. Then I came to your briefing. I came to your briefing and I listened to you talk to me, at times it seemed directly to me, about sexual assault. You talked about a lot of things, about rivers and bridges, you talked about saving people and victimization. In fact you talked for almost a full ninety minutes, and you disgusted me.

You made me a victim today, and I am nobody’s victim. I am an American Airman in the most powerful Air Force in the world, and you made me into a helpless wh*re. A sensitive, defenseless woman who has no power to protect herself, who has nothing in common with the men she works with. You made me untouchable, and by doing that you made me a target…. They will never respect me or the power and the authority I have as a person, or the power I have as an Airman, because I am nothing more than a victim. That I as a victim, somehow I control their fate. With one sentence, I can destroy the rest of their lives.

‘He sexually assaulted me.'”

First thing’s first: John Q. Public says upfront that Kayce M. Hagen is a pen name. That means we the public don’t know who wrote the letter. The author could be a female, yes. In that case, I would say good on her for having strong convictions and making her voice heard.

She has every right to feel this way and to say the things that “she” said in this letter.

But — and this is an important but — if Kayce M. Hagen isn’t a female airman and is, in fact, a man, then this letter just went from something to be celebrated to heinous tripe that needs to be obliterated from the face of the internet.

Why?

Because men have no right to tell a woman, who’s the victim of sexual assault, how she’s supposed to process that experience, and if the author is male, that’s exactly what his letter would be doing.

Guys — and in my experience, it’s been all guys sharing the Kayce M. Hagen letter — if you feel this is how a female airman should “act” regarding all the sensitivity training and “sexual assault response” the military is now doing, fine.

You have a right to think it, but don’t you dare try to hold this up as the gold standard for a female airman, who may be struggling with the trauma of sexual assault. You don’t get that power.

Ladies, if you agree with the letter, then more power to you. Share all you want, or better yet, share your own thoughts on SARC. At least you know those would be authentic.

As for the Kayce M. Hagen letter, it’s an authoritative piece of writing, no doubt. But sharing it isn’t exactly the most responsible thing to do when you’re trusting a lone website with 12,000 likes on Facebook as the sole source.

[Image via ShutterStock]