He would sneak into my room at night and hold his hand over my mouth and fondle me asking "do you feel gay yet?"
** This anonymous U.S. Coast Guard Survivor Testimonial was originally submitted to “The Pettiest Officer of the U.S. Coast Guard” on Facebook in May of 2024 and re-published by MLAA. MLAA does not know the identity of the author and has not verified any of the claims or allegations made in this testimonial. Light formatting changes for readability, or redactions for PII may have been applied before publishing. **
I reported to a cutter as a SN. I was super excited; I always dreamt of being a Coastie. My assault/harassment started with being introduced to an IS (male) who was spoken highly of. After being introduced, my friend the lead SN (female), IS, and myself would hang out on the way to Kodiak. On the way, he disclosed his sexual preference (men) to which I didn't think anything of. Upon arriving, I decided to go to Walmart and IS3 asked to tag along. We got our needs and decided to get food before returning to the ship. As we sat in the subway, he began to confide in me of his attraction to me and asked if I felt the same. I told him no, that I was straight and had a girlfriend (at the time). That was the end of it.
We returned to the ship and prepared for underway. This is where this took a different course. He began looking at the helm and lookout schedule on the bridge and would be waiting in my room when I got off, timing his arrival when I would be getting out of the shower and trying to pull my towel off or boxers. I would tell him to get out of the room or leave me alone. It only got worse, sneaking up on me and verbally harassing me on helm and lookout. I would ask the OOD to make him leave and I would hear "he's a watch supervisor, he's got more clearance than me to be here." This happened a multitude of times, one of those OODs being the command senior chief. He would sneak into my room at night and hold his hand over my mouth and fondle me asking "do you feel gay yet?" or showing up at mid rats or before my watch or just regular meals and he'd sit with me and tell me not to eat that because I'd not be attractive to look at, or eat that so it goes to your ass.
The final straw was when I was in my room and had done laundry. He came in, grabbed me by my throat and picked me up, and made the approach to kiss me until one of the other people walked in the room and he dropped me. He quickly left the room. That afternoon I put in for MK, which was critical at the time, and suffered his torment for 2 weeks after being flown home to PCS. This whole hell was 60+ days in a 105-day patrol.
Questions I was always asked:
- Why didn't you report?
Because of first-hand accounts from others saying they were discredited or they said oh, that didn't happen. As a man, I was like oh, I'll get nowhere.
- Why didn't you ask for help?
The deck department was shitty. They would play your friend, you'd talk about something that's bothering you and they'd tell the rest and it would be the joke of the day. The LSN, I didn't know if I could trust because they were friends before me, so would they back me or him? Hearing "oh, men can't get assaulted, if you think you are, you're just a bitch."
- Why didn't you fight back?
I was 5'6" ish, 160 lbs. He was 6'2", 250 lbs ish.
I went for 5 years questioning my sanity. Was I a victim? Were people right? Should I open a report? I still don't know, but I know my mental health was miserable. I wanted to quit, but instead I went to medical and asked for help and attended an outpatient clinic to deal with it. Since then, I've continued my career at an operational unit with LE and crew quals. I have also been working towards VA and any mental health support advocacy to help not only female colleagues, but also to show as a male it can happen and you can ask for help. You don't have to suffer.