When Proof isn’t Enough
She says she was hit. He says she’s lying. And without hesitation, we believe him.
Time and time again, society leans toward silencing woman not for peace, but for the protection of influential men. When women speak, they are met with questions, not comfort. Their stories are dissected. Their pain is debated.
To speak is to risk: reputation, safety, even sanity. The weight of truth often crushes the one who carries it.
Abusers charm and status, becomes a shield against consequence. Meanwhile, the woman who dares to say “he hurt me” is called bitter, dramatic, or worse.
Some mothers raise their sons like kings without rules, then wonder why their kids grow up to be violent and lives without a flicker of guilt.
We don’t need more proof — we’ve seen the bruises, read the court orders, watched the footage. What we need is empathy. What we need is accountability because the next woman might not have a video. Will you still bash her? Or will you believe her before the damage is caught on tape?
About the Creator
Unfiltered
Driven by a passion for writing what others are afraid to say; My work is written with empathy and unflinching transparency. Unfiltered is more than a platform; it’s a promise to readers; no cover ups, just the raw truth.
Keep reading
More stories from Unfiltered and writers in Poets and other communities.
Foot Bindings
I asked my grandmother how she knew she'd fallen in love. I am not sure I ever did love him, she said. This was before I met my husband. I was naive, a naked spring, a raw nerve of a thing. That cannot ever be me, I knew. Sadness swept in gently like a Moscow thaw. It is no simple thing, looking into a woman's vast soul and seeing its foot bindings. Now, in Italy divorced with my skin singed off, when I say I don't love him mean: I have succeeded at feeling nothing most days and it mostly works. Do you want the comfort of Nothing? Do you want Nothing, too? Be warned: you'll never be free, even when you are nothing. Here is what doesn't work: Accepting the stages of grief. Talking about it. Sitting with the feeling. Missing him—no, the person you were when you believed in death do us part. Writing poetry. That, too. When I say I don't love him I mean: I feel capsized in an endless, starved tide. What sometimes works: selective memory. You must forget ripe tomatoes and his beard and feeling perfectly sheltered in a big blue world. Forget coffee in bed, laughter watching TV, blowing out the candles on the birthday cake and the quiet all-encompassing knowledge that you are chosen. Remember only how love turned to a banal everyday survival act, a trapeze act unsure whether he will catch you, how the warmth stagnated and became sour, remember the foot bindings and remember the resentment boiling in your veins as you stick it out for the kids. Six-hour Netflix binges help, too. A man's fingers tracing your spine. Frozen pizza at 2 a.m. Random trips to the museum just to stand near things that last a while. The realization that crying won’t change anything. Seeing that life is just a dream, and refusing to participate in your own suffering. Bite your fist. Walk on eggshells around joy. When I say I don't love him, I mean he didn’t break my heart, he just stopped touching it and it forgot how to beat right.
By Ella Bogdanova6 days ago in Poets
Comments
There are no comments for this story
Be the first to respond and start the conversation.