Category Archives: News

New Huffington Post Post

If you haven’t already, please check out my article, “Are You Your Own Worst Critic?”

Many of us consider ourselves to be our own worst critics and I used to think so, too. I was always so hard on myself to the point of perfectionism. Then one day I began to see things differently. I started to realize that other people’s opinions of me and what they thought I should be doing were so imbedded into my mind that their expectations became stronger than my own wants and needs. I inevitably realized that the self criticism that tortured my mind for years was not in response to my voice. In actuality, it was self-criticism and self-punishment for not living up to expectations of others. Slowly I began to eliminate their opinions.

If you have felt this type of guilt and thought this way, the truth is, you’re not really disappointing anyone through your actions. These people are only disappointed in you (when your actions differ from their vision of what you should be doing) because they are losing control of you. These are not friends, nor are they people you should be taking advice from.

Think back to the things you always beat yourself up over. Do you beat yourself up over failures that caused you disappointment or are you being hard on yourself for not living up to other people’s desires for who you are and who you should be? I guarantee that the majority of failures and things you hold against yourself belong to the latter category.

Read the rest at The Huffington Post feel free to share and comment!!

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Surviving Trauma: I Choose To Live

I was surfing the web looking at different statutes of limitations and legalities for rape crimes, when I found an article that proposed a repeal of statutes for certain rape cases in the state of Connecticut. In the article, Governor Jodi Rell is quoted as saying of rape crime, “It is violence of the most personal and devastating kind, as brutal in its own right as murder.”

In the article, Rell points out that rape is not a crime of passion, but rather a violent crime, which is a common misconception for many. The term rapefrom the Latin word Rapere, originally had no sexual connotation, and meant “to seize or take by force.” It simply meant to steal. If you are someone or know someone who has been raped, you can testify that this definition is still applicable to the verb “rape” as we use it today. Because when you are raped, something is taken from you by force.

Justice systems for centuries have considered rape as brutal of a crime as murder. Even in ancient Greece, Rome, and Colonial Times, rape was considered a capital offense within the same category as murder. In the 12th century rape victims’ families were granted the right to carry out the rapists’ brutal and sometimes fatal punishment. In 14th century England, the rape victim was expected to gouge out their rapist’s eyes or castrate him. Today in the United States, current death penalty standards consist mainly for convicted murderers. Modern day rapists typically receive much cushier punishments than their violent predecessors.

Read the rest of the article at The Huffington Post. 

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Filed under Healing, News, Sexual Assault

Weekly Update

Hi Everyone! A lot of news this week.

First, I want to thank everyone for responding to my “Finish my sentence” exercise. It went really well, and there were a lot of great responses!

Secondly, my article “The Worst Piece of Advice Ever” was published on The Huffington Post this morning, so please check that out (feel free to share and comment!).

Thirdly, I would like to connect with some more peeps on Twitter, you can follow me at HRoseStudios!

Thanks! I wish everyone a safe Memorial Day weekend!!

Best,

Hayley

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Beating the Devil Around the Stump

Beat the devil around the stump- to evade responsibility or a difficult task. Old Western terminology.

What’s wrong with this country. Well a lot, but let’s start with healthcare. The United States is the only country of it’s caliber (“civilized,” modern, industrialized, etc) to not have universal heath care. For years people have considered Americans to be disconnected and ignorant of our European neighbors across the pond. It certainly seems we are removed from what’s going on over there, it’s scary over here; a real frontier. Those without healthcare are subject to death both mortal and financial. Disease and accidents are yesteryears outlaws. Will you dodge them? And if they get you, are you one of the lucky ones who have health care? Or will you collapse in the streets from illness or financial ruin; a sight reminiscent of the gunfight at the OK corral, where only a few unlucky ones got hit. Are you okay with our nation’s health care being as chaotic as Old Western vigilantism crossed with Russian Roulette?

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Rape and Gender Bias

A friend recently brought an article to my attention about a seasoned sexual assault detective who, after years on the job, was sexually assaulted. Aside from the irony of the victim’s profession, I read the article to see why else this story had attracted so much attention. It was not surprising to read that the officer-turned-victim experienced the same shame and anxiety that is common for most victims of sexual assault. Additionally,  like 95% of sexual assault victims, the officer did not want to report the crime to the proper authorities. There was only one outlier in this story: the rape victim was an adult male.

When most people hear the term “rape victim,” the image of an adult male is not what comes to mind. In cases of rape, men are usually associated with assailants rather than victims. Perhaps this is because 90% of rape victims are female, and the majority of rapists are male. These statistics do not make men immune from rape, in fact,  1 in every 33 men are sexually assaulted in their lifetime. In the US a sexual assault occurs every 2 minutes.

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Filed under News, Sexual Assault, Uncategorized

If You Don’t Have Anything Nice to Say….

Since becoming a serious member of the Blogosphere through participating in my own site, writing for Gender Across Borders and The Huffington Post, I’ve adopted one simple etiquette policy: if you don’t have anything nice, don’t say anything at all. Although it is evident through some of the nasty comments I’ve gotten (though few and far between) and through reading the comments on other popular websites, many people don’t fly by this rule, and prefer to spew vile and hide behind the anonymity that the World Wide Web often provides.

Although I apply this rule to my internet comings and goings, there is no doubt in my mind that most of us first heard the phrase, if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all from our mothers or some other parental figure during a time where the phrase was to be applied to everyday life before the internet existed. There are many reasons why this is a good policy. Many of those reasons includes common courtesy, being a nice person, and otherwise overlooking another’s indiscretions and personal failures in favor of letting karma work it all out for you. Another reason is because when you say something mean or nasty with intent to harm, it sometimes comes back and bites you in the butt, or as Donald Trump recently demonstrated, it sometimes comes back and bites you in the butt before you can even formulate the words, “Your Fired.”

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Rory’s Story Cubes and Other News

Our Fiction Friday Rory’s Story Cubes Open Call was a success. Not only did we get a variety of great stories, but we also got some recognition from Rory’s Story Cubes!

Rory’s Story Cubes left me a tweet complimenting your stories, “nice variety of stories inspired by a roll of the cubes.” Below is a screenshot of the tweet:

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Filed under Fun, News