• 3 days ago
"This is exactly why f---ing females in the military f---ing kill themselves."

For this marine, staying silent about her experience with sexual misconduct in the military was no longer an option...
Transcript
00:00This morning I posted a f***ing TikTok about how f***ing unfair it is that I've dedicated
00:07my life to the military and the Marine Corps and everything that I've done and that I was
00:12able to see my f***ing perpetrator in court and how much it f***ing sucked that he was
00:19being forced out of the military, that he would be getting an honorable discharge.
00:22Well not even f***ing 10 minutes ago I just got word that this motherf***er will be getting
00:29retained because it went all the way up across the board, everybody said that they would
00:34not retain him, and the f***ing head honcho, the f***ing CG, with all of the proof and
00:40a f***ing admission to guilt, decided that they will retain him, and this is exactly
00:46why f***ing females in the military f***ing kill themselves, this is exactly why nobody
00:51f***ing takes this seriously.
00:53Regarding the video, I found the video deeply disturbing, and I've asked my staff for additional
01:06information, and I'll leave it at that.
01:21It's f***ing brutal, it is brutal, I'm not going to sugar coat it, I was regarded as
01:34a temptation, they talked about my, how, they talked about how yes he did something wrong
01:44to me, and they acknowledged that, but that my trauma could be a character building lesson
01:51for him, like he can now take this one small incident that he did, and be a better leader
01:57for it.
01:58One of the things that stood out most to me is how similar Delina's response and situation
02:05is to so many other survivors, where they have really risked so much to go through this
02:10process of making a report, and seeing that report through a formal system, and then are
02:17later in a situation where they find out that that information wasn't communicated to them
02:24in a transparent way, that their harassment or assault was not taken seriously.
02:40Because in the military there is this emphasis on unit cohesion, and the chain of command,
03:00and the hierarchical structure, that creates additional barriers for victims of sexual
03:05assault and harassment.
03:06One of the other things about this story that is really unique and troubling is that
03:14the person who, the person who perpetrated sexual assault that, who assaulted Delina
03:22was actually a uniformed victim advocate within the military.
03:27Four days ago I made a video before I stood on the stand and testified against what a
03:41Marine did to me, what he took from me, and the person that I am because of it.
03:46I was allotted the opportunity to watch that Marine receive an honorable discharge.
03:53He will be getting out with benefits and the opportunity to enlist into any other service
03:59regardless of him admitting to what he's done.
04:02This is the reality for so many men and women in the military, and it is swept under the rug.
04:23It is not an easy thing for survivors to do, to share their story publicly, let alone in
04:31an identifiable way on social media that is going to be viewed by millions and circulated
04:39by news media.
04:53All those men and women in our service suffering from sexual harassment, suffering from sexual
05:08assault because they reported it, yet they take it as a joke.
05:14Vanessa Guillen's story was in many ways like a Me Too moment for sexual assault in the
05:21military, and it really created this avenue for survivors to recognize that they are not
05:31alone.
05:32We're losing soldiers, and not to foreign lands and on battlegrounds, but we're losing them
05:37within the military system because of the pervasive culture of harassment and abuse.
05:51So every once in a while, I come to terms with the fact that I'm leaving the military,
06:03that I dedicated myself and my body and my child's whole life to just this organization,
06:16and they just didn't take care of me the way that they promised that they would.