by Allison Yoder

Allison Yoder is a 2010 graduate of Goshen College where she majored in Social Work and minored in Women’s Studies. She is currently living in Portland, OR, and recently began a Master’s in Social Work Program at Portland State University. When she is not in school she enjoys gardening, yoga, and going for walks with partner, Nathan and their dog. She finds solace in the notion that everyone holds their own version of truth and believes that human stories are sacred.

As someone entering two very new experiences—graduate school in Portland and a social work internship working primarily with African American and Latino 9th graders—my communication style has never needed to be so diverse and fluid. I have been told over and over again in social work classrooms that when relationship building, it’s important to be able to communicate in a culturally competent way that honors different belief and value systems. Currently, I am working to adjust how I communicate with African American and Latino parents and youth, youth, a multicultural team of co-workers, and a large group of intellectuals who have never heard of Mennonites, let alone understand the communication patterns present among them. Needless to say, re-learning and regularly adjusting my communication style to be a more culturally competent social worker has been heavily weighing on my mind in the last few months. For instance, never have I used the word “swag” so much in my life.

All this thinking about how to adjust the way I communicate has gotten me to start processing the ways I naturally communicate and how I learned those patterns. Through this, I’ve realized that Mennonites are not always open to topics that cause discomfort or direct communication, such as sexual assault and abuse. In order for Mennonites to be open to giving a voice to these issues, we must learn how to better deal with conflict.

I was recently asked by my supervisor what my relationship with conflict looks like and how I generally approach it. I got a big smile on my face and asked her if she knew much about Mennonites. Since moving away from Goshen, Indiana, I have gotten a lot of pleasure out of dropping the Mennonite card on unsuspecting acquaintances, most of whom nod their head, furrow their brow, and look totally confused and intrigued. I briefly explained to her what being a Mennonite means to me and how nonviolence fits into the equation. In that moment it struck me in a new way that for some Mennonites, myself included, the flip side of being non-violent can look like being non-confrontational, or as I have been called by friends from time to time, passive.

Being deemed as passive as a freshman or sophomore in college was initially somewhat shocking to me, and to be honest, pretty hurtful. Growing up with family and friends who were mostly associated with the Mennonite Church, the adjectives previously used to describe me were independent, outgoing, passionate, and thoughtful. I had known for a long time that being a caretaker for people around me was a gift I had and something I was drawn to, but I hadn’t evaluated yet that putting other people’s needs first could possibly hurt my relationships.

In college I surrounded myself with a group of women who were incredibly direct and honest about telling people what they needed. Some were Mennonite and some were not, but I was drawn to them as it was clear my passions in life aligned with theirs. What soon became even clearer for me was that our forms of communication were incredibly different and also where a lot of our conflict resided.

My initial response to being named a passive person was to feel hurt, resentful, and extremely defensive. My thinking went something like: “What the hell is so wrong with avoiding conflict? At least I’m not the kind of person who blows up at every little thing and constantly causes drama. If everyone could just calm down and not get so angry at each other, maybe we could have some rational conversations once in a while….”

The truth is I had just never been in such close relationships with women who were not afraid of being confrontational. I was thrown off my guard and left feeling vulnerable, unsure of myself, and truly confused about what my role was supposed to look like in relationships with my college friends.

So why talk about being marked passive on a blog about sexual assault? Something I believe the Mennonite Church can fail to overlook or name about ourselves is that our communication with one another and the rest of the world can appear passive. As a church with core values rooted in nonviolence, pacifism, and peace building, we can sometimes forget to acknowledge or give voice to anger, especially on a personal level. As I know that generalizing is unfair, I’ll tell you what I learned about myself when it comes to really looking at what it means to act passively.

As a 17-year-old I had a boyfriend who regularly wanted to have sex, and I, being the “good” Mennonite I was, knew that was not something I was ready for. He would ask, I would say no, and then he would pout. Out of my guilt I would put on a submissive front, and we would have a lot of “almost” sex. This went on regularly for almost a year, until he cheated on me and I had an easy out. There were obviously a number of problems in this relationship, but looking back what I know is that he was an ass for pressuring me, but I also had no clue how to stand up for myself. Nothing in my communication style had prepared me to recognize my own rights and demand respect. While I am in no way trying to let him off the hook, I have spent a lot of time looking back and wondering what prevented me from standing up for myself and ending things right from the start.

Later, when I was a freshman in college and a friend of mine experienced multiple accounts of sexual abuse, I had no idea how to empower her. Instead I did the opposite and somewhat unconsciously assumed she needed people to help her make better choices and to rescue her. It was the worst thing I could have done, and it pretty much ruined our friendship. Then, because I still wasn’t really sure how to deal with conflict, we just never fixed things between us. I never got to tell her that she was right to be angry at me, and that I definitely had no right to adopt such a “holier-than-thou” attitude with her.

Although I realize that my relationship with conflict and the way I communicate is solely my own, my life up through college was so indoctrinated with traditional, Mennonite community values that it is all too easy for me to see the connection. Living in a Mennonite bubble prevented me from recognizing that people do communicate in more direct ways. Although it initially hurt when my friends called me out for avoiding conflict or acting passive in my relationships, it eventually opened my eyes to another way of being a caring, loving friend that did not diminish my own feelings or leave me feeling undervalued or uncared for in return. Becoming a more direct person is not something that has happened over night for me, and often, especially in long standing relationships, I resort back to what is comfortable. Part of my life’s work is to critically look at choices I make in communication and to practice utilizing my true voice.

My life has been touched by sexual assault in a variety of other contexts including people in my family, other close friends, and the clients I work with on a regular basis. I believe that if Mennonites are going to be open to giving voice to sexual assault and abuse, then we must also be open to addressing the way we communicate with one another and the ways we deal with conflict. After spending some time volunteering for a women’s crisis hotline, I have better developed the skills to hear people, help them define their feelings, and then brainstorming actions relate to their feelings, whatever they may be. Empowering people has come to mean helping people give voice to their own stories and their needs. It means connecting people to their inner strength and reminding them of the power within them.

As a Mennonite community, I think one of the best ways we can empower people to speak their truth about sexual abuse is by encouraging direct and honest dialogue about the ways in which handle conflict between one another.