March 11, 2013 · 12:00 pm

Dear Colorado

By Michelle Spradling

Dear Colorado,
You finally want to talk about rape.  How timely.  Sexual Assault Awareness Month (SAAM) is around the corner, and the 2013 theme is perfectly fitting: “Let’s talk about It! Colorado Communities Coming Together.”

Sexual violence has become one of the hottest topics at the epicenter of the gun debate in Colorado, with common arguments like:  Victims need guns to protect themselves. Guns can backfire in sexual violence. Guns are the key to protecting women which of course means that anyone against guns is against women!

Suddenly, our community is taking notice of sexual assault, which is the ultimate goal for all anti-sexual assault activists. However, instead of welcoming this change, I want nothing more than for everyone to just stop talking.

Within the Colorado gun debate there hasn’t been any real talk about sexual violence, only personal attacks on representatives and political agendas cloaked in a flashy and radiant disguise of rape.

After Representative Akin was subsequently voted out of office for his infamous comment alluding that it was physiologically impossible to be impregnated from rape, I had high hopes. Perhaps legislators would see sexual violence as an important issue to their constituents. Perhaps legislators and the public alike would seek education on the realities of the crime and learn about how they could make a difference in the world. Unfortunately, it seems there was a nastier lesson to be learned: rape is the golden ticket to political gain.
Instead of learning the facts about how sexual violence can overlap in the gun debate, time and attention has been spent on ousting members of the opposite political party.  Any comments made about sexual violence by legislators have been molded in to ammunition to target the other side.  The right is declaring that Democrats don’t care about rape victims, and the left is affirming that it’s the Republicans who don’t care about rape victims.

Shame on all of us. No political party owns the issue of rape. Republicans are raped. Democrats are raped. Anyone can be raped, and both parties can and have come together to support meaningful legislation on sexual violence.  I am proud to call many republican and democratic representative allies for sexual violence. Just yesterday, national legislation, the Violence Against Women Act, was signed in to law with bipartisan support from our Colorado representatives and senators. Last month, I had the honor to testify as a survivor in front of the house judiciary committee about the SAVE Bill—HB 1163, which will create an emergency fund for victims seeking medical care after a sexual assault. It passed with unanimous support from Republicans and Democrats alike—just as it should have.

My biggest fear is that the ugliness of the gun debate will spill over in to other bills impacting sexual assault survivors; that bills like HB 1163 will get lost in a fight straight down party lines.  Sexual violence is a bipartisan issue, and in the spirit of the SAAM theme, it’s time for Colorado communities (and their representatives) to come together and fight sexual violence.

I’m urging you—representatives and activists on both sides of the gun debate—it’s time to disarm your sexual violence weapon and have discussions based on facts and the reality of rape. There will undoubtedly be survivors on both sides of this issue, and we need to honor their voices and allow them to be a part of the conversation, but these personal attacks for political gain need to stop. These strategies are at the expense of survivors, and it’s offensive. Period.

Michelle Spradling, 29, is the chair of the CCASA Policy committee, a local sexual assault response coordinator and a survivor of sexual assault who speaks locally about the impact of violent crime

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January 22, 2013 · 4:54 pm

Where we’ve been and How We can move forward in the Fight against Human Trafficking

Image from http://changebydoing.wordpress.com

By Becky Owens Bullard

This past Friday, January 11th was National Human Trafficking Awareness Day and the month of January has been declared National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month by President Obama. While this awareness day and month are naturally used to increase the level of attention to and action around the issue of human trafficking and its disastrous effects on women, men and children in our country, they can also be an important time for self-awareness and reflection on how far we have come in the effort to combat human trafficking.  During this January, I have been thinking about where the human trafficking field has been during the past few years and where it is headed.

While the field has made great strides in the short time since it was officially recognized as a crime with the passage of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) in 2000, the movement to combat human trafficking is still relatively young compared to others such as the sexual assault and domestic violence movements. The relative novelty of the issue and movement to combat it has both positive and negative effects. A positive aspect is that people are undeniably drawn to the issue of human trafficking as a “new” type of crime (though it is not new at all) and want to become involved, hear about how it affects their community, and look for solutions. Conversely, while there is great interest in the issue, there are still prevalent misconceptions about what human trafficking is and isn’t as well as a need for more comprehensive, victim-centered responses to the issue.

So when reflecting on how much the human trafficking field has accomplished and what lies ahead to be achieved, I thought about some of the things I’ve seen in the few years I’ve worked on the issue:

While we hear about human trafficking more and more in the media and in our communities, we still have a long way to go to clear up misconceptions commonly associated with the issue. When I started working on the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) hotline in 2009, we received an average of 636 calls per month and many were requests for information about what human trafficking is and how to identify it. Just two years later, the monthly call average had almost tripled to 1,619 and calls about tips of suspected trafficking and crisis calls directly from victims were more prevalent. This demonstrates an enormous growth in understanding and awareness around the issue.

Nonetheless, even though most people have seen enough news specials or gone to a sufficient number of trainings to understand that trafficking does not only affect foreign nationals and that trafficking does not necessarily have to involve transportation, there are still lingering misconceptions about what trafficking can look like. For example, I often train on the intersections of human trafficking and domestic violence and in every training I conduct, participants express their surprise that a trafficker can be a family member, a parent, a spouse or an intimate partner. So while we have achieved a level of success in clarifying some misconceptions, we still have work to do to broaden understanding of what human trafficking can look like and how it can be very different from prevalent images of organized criminal activity, kidnapping of children and chains and shackles.

Though we have more agencies than ever working on human trafficking, there is still a long way to go to develop comprehensive and trauma-informed services for victims of this crime. The human trafficking field has seen an enormous increase in law enforcement and victim services agencies working on the issue over the years. When I began my work at the national hotline, infrastructure was still weak or growing slowly in many places and now, we see a number of task forces and coalitions (funded and unfunded) working together on this crime as well as multiple service organizations dedicated to these victims.

But while the human trafficking field is undoubtedly growing by the day, there are still a number of gaps to cover in service provision and response to victims. For example, the NHTRC recently conducted a nation-wide survey on how many beds were available for trafficking victims and found that there is a serious shortage of space for victims with fewer than 2000 available beds and only a little over 500 of these specifically designated for trafficking victims. Additionally, we need to ensure that the many new programs that are emerging are operating with victim-centered and trauma-informed practices. So, although we have more services for trafficking victims than we’ve ever had, the need to ensure holistic service provision is still very great.

Finally, although the human trafficking field has become a more robust group, there are still a number of ways that we can expand our reach and work with other fields that are vital to ending human trafficking. As mentioned above, the human trafficking field has grown exponentially over the past decade and has made great strides in reaching out to related fields to engage them in the issue. Yet at times we can get caught up in the increased special attention to the issue and treat human trafficking as an issue entirely unique unto itself.  In doing this, we neglect opening the issue up to related fields and creating meaningful partnerships.

So while we may develop tunnel-vision, like all movements do at various points in their history, we must remember that human trafficking is an issue that intersects with so many others, like sexual abuse, domestic violence, child abuse, teen dating violence, runaway and homeless youth, labor rights issues, immigrant and refugee issues and many more. In short, we cannot solve this problem on our own and our voices are louder and stronger working together. With these essential partnerships, we can make this issue everyone’s issue and work together to stop human trafficking and modern slavery.

By recognizing how far we’ve come and what we still need to accomplish this year during Human Trafficking Awareness Month, we can continue to move forward on this issue and work towards even more meaningful partnerships, comprehensive services and innovative strategies to combat human trafficking.

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December 6, 2012 · 1:30 pm

Let’s Call It What It Is: Domestic Violence

KL.jpg

by Kari Lorimer

Photo: Jamie Squire, Getty Images

Let’s not skirt around the issue, I’m just going to call it what it is: Kasandra Perkins was a victim of domestic violence.  Period.  Perkins’ death was tragic, heart breaking, and wrong.  And unfortunately, it is not an uncommon story; almost one-third of female homicide victims that are reported in police records are killed by an intimate partner.

Having said that, I’m not going to discuss Belcher’s character or even the serious problem the NFL seems to have with players that are perpetrators of domestic violence and sexual assault.  Instead, I want to discuss the role that media isn’t playing in calling it what it is.

The vast media coverage of Jovan Belcher murdering his girlfriend, Kasandra Perkins, and then killing himself is both disheartening and frustrating.   There has been some mention of domestic violence but, if anything, the media might be reinforcing stereotypes about domestic violence by what they choose to focus on, such as alcohol use causing the argument to become more heated, indicating that Belcher doesn’t fit the typical profile of an abuser, or touting that Belcher had pledged to never be violent to women.  Let’s be clear: alcohol does not cause domestic violence and anyone can be a perpetrator of domestic violence, even if they have made a pledge not to be.

In my time working as an advocate for victims of domestic violence, I had the opportunity to train throughout the community about domestic violence.  In order to prepare for the trainings, I would do an internet search to research current events related to domestic violence.  Sometimes the search was rather difficult – not, unfortunately, because the violence wasn’t happening but because the media didn’t call it what it was.

I would cringe every time I read something about an intimate partner that was brutally murdered or beaten but the article indicated that it wasn’t domestic violence because there was no history of violence or the perpetrator hadn’t shown any violent tendencies.  Or even worse, the phrase domestic violence wasn’t even referred to at all.

I cringed for multiple reasons.  I cringed because the media doesn’t seem to understand intimate partner violence and all its nuances and is passing those misconceptions on to their readers.  But, I also cringed because it feels like a waste of time determining if there had been prior violent tendencies because if you understand domestic violence, the lack of visible history shouldn’t be surprising.

In their 2003 report “Criminal Victimization,” the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics indicated that domestic violence is one of the most chronically underreported crimes.   The reasons for not reporting the violence are endless ranging from embarrassment to fear and the idea that “what happens in the home stays in the home” is still very prevalent in our society.  So, is it any wonder that there often doesn’t appear to be a history of violence?

Rather than focusing on the lack of violent history in the relationship, the public would be better served if the media focused on the violence itself and using its power to educate the readers.  Rather than focusing on how none of the neighbors thought there were any problems, the focus should be on what would keep a victim from telling their story and educating the public about all the different types of abuse, the red flags that could indicate a violent relationship, and how to help someone who is in an abusive relationship.  And most importantly, please call it what it is: domestic violence.

To give credit where credit is due, the Kansas City Chiefs called it what it is.  They took a step in the right direction when they held a moment of silence for victims of domestic violence at their game last Sunday.

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Filed under Domestic Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, Violence Against Women, Violence in the Media

November 25, 2012 · 8:36 pm

Ending Violence against Women is “a responsibility for all of us”

By Becky Owens Bullard

“This is not just a women’s issue, this is a responsibility for all of us. This violence is an outrage and it must be stopped. Time has run out for complacency or excuses. Let us show the will, the determination and let us mobilize greater resources to end what is a scourge of humanity, violence against women.” – Michelle Bachelet, UN Women Executive Director November 20, 2012.

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Photo from Say NO – UNiTE to End Violence Against Women

Every November 25th is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, yet I’m always surprised at how little coverage this day and the issue itself receives.  In some countries around the world, including my own, this time of the year is a time where most people are consumed with upcoming holidays and what presents to get our loved ones.  So most often, this day of awareness is lost on these countries and the millions who inhabit them, but the importance of raising awareness to eliminate violence against women and girls can not be understated.

With some of the progress that we’ve seen in issues like domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, harassment, human trafficking, femicide, forced marriage and rape as a method of war, it may feel easier to overlook violence against women and girls as an issue deserving of serious attention at this time of the year or really at any time of the year. However, violence against women and girls continues to be incredibly pervasive, much more so than you might think. In a multi-country study conducted by the World Health Organization finds that in most countries between 30 to 60 % of women have experienced physical and/or sexual violence, with the highest proportion of findings at 71% of women in Ethiopia.

Additionally, people will often ask why the focus on women? And aren’t men affected by violence too? While a number of men and boys are certainly affected by violence, the unfortunate reality remains that violence disproportionately affects women and girls. This is a result of discriminatory gender norms that view females as the weaker sex, as property, as subservient to men, and as objects to be gawked at and grabbed whenever men please.

The most common number taken from the WHO study above and additional studies on the subject is that on average around the world 1 in 3 women will be affected by some form of abuse or violence in her lifetime. So if women and girls make up half the world’s 7 billion human beings, over 1 billion of these individuals have been victims of some form of violence. over 1 billion people.  This constitutes a pandemic of very serious proportions. Nonetheless, it is an issue that is commonly placed behind other international, national and local priorities even though violence against girls and women between ages 15 to 44 cause more death and disability than war, cancer, malaria, and traffic accidents combined.

For example, in the U.S. during the most recent elections there wasn’t a single question in the presidential debates concerning this pandemic or the long overdue ratification of the Violence Against Women Act, even though 1 in 4 women in the U.S. are victims of domestic violence, 1 in 6 women are victims of rape and 1/3 of women murdered in the U.S. are murdered by their intimate partner.

Sadly, what we did hear were various comments about “legitimate rape” not causing pregnancy, rape being “something that God intended to happen” that girls don’t get pregnant from statutory rape or incest, pregnancy from rape being similar to “having a baby out of wedlock“, and that “some girls they rape so easy“. Disturbing comments like these show a troubling lack of understanding that half the world’s population is at very serious risk of becoming a victim of very real violence.

These persistent misogynist attitudes and the staggering statistics on violence perpetrated against women and girls clearly demonstrate why we cannot ignore this issue and the opportunity to raise awareness about ending this violence today or any other day of the year.

But why should you be bothered with this difficult and depressing issue, especially at this time of the year?  Because you know her.  You know a woman/girl who has been sexually harassed, you know a woman/girl who has been so terrified of her intimate partner that she’d do anything to calm him down, you know a woman/girl who has been a raped.  While you may be thinking, “I don’t know anyone who has had that type of horrible experience”, these statistics aren’t just numbers and the prevalence of violence against women and girls is very real. You know her I guarantee you, you’ve just never heard what she’s been through.

So during this time of the year when we are supposed to focus on love, togetherness and humanity, do your part to raise awareness about this issue.  Do your part to help the women/girls you know who have been affected by violence. And like with any issue, if we work together to educate ourselves, our children and our communities on the important role that every single one of us has, we can end the pandemic of violence against women and girls.

Ask your government to commit to end violence against women.

Take action against gender violence during the 16 days between today and December 10th (International Human Rights Day).

Learn how to help someone who may be suffering from abuse or from sexual assault.

And finally – share this post on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women with your family and friends to raise awareness!

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Filed under Domestic Violence, Familial Violence, Gender Equality, Human Trafficking, Intimate Partner Violence, Sexual Violence, Stalking, Stranger-Street Harassment, Violence Against Women

October 31, 2012 · 5:31 pm

Reproductive Coercion: A New Term for an Old Problem

By Karen Moldovan, Guest Blogger and Program Manager at CCASA
Originally posted at and re-blogged with permission from the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CCASA)
Throughout my career, I’ve consistently worked with women (and girls) who are pregnant.  As an advocate at a domestic violence shelter, it was not uncommon for pregnant women to access residential and other supportive services.  When I became a teacher at a Florence Crittenton program, all of my students were pregnant and/or parenting teen girls, between the ages of 12 and 18.  In those settings, it wasn’t uncommon to have conversations about morning sickness, baby names, back aches, and the logistics of getting to and from countless OBGYN appointments.  While those conversations came easy, I gradually realized how complicated it was to have conversations beyond the more mundane pregnancy and birth talk.  As I was able to build trust with the women and girls I worked with, I slowly learned about the mounting physical and emotional safety needs that were often a quiet struggle.  One student was a twelve year old 7th grader, who flatly refused to tell anyone, anything about the male who was no doubt involved in her pregnancy.  Yet other students would quietly murmur about how the biological father was a grown man, and she didn’t want to get him in trouble.  Apparently her family didn’t want to get him in trouble either, because he did have steady employment and would be able to financially provide for the baby.

Still to this day, it’s painful to think about the struggles of many of these young women.  Pregnancy was often closely intertwined with intimate partner violence, incest, inter-familial sex trafficking, and rape.  There was a young women who refused to speak about or even acknowledge her pregnancy, a young woman who confided that she could not hold her baby daughter without breaking down into tears due to the flood of traumatic memories she could not stop, and the young woman who flatly refused seeking any sort of child support because the most important thing was being away from the man who impregnated her.  I bring up these cases because they changed me as an Advocate.  Now I look back and see that the context of the pregnancy was often the “elephant in the room.”  As an advocate, baby names and OBGYN appointments felt okay to bring up, but I really didn’t talk integrate the following facts into my work:

  • Approximately one in five young women said they experienced pregnancy coercion and one in seven said they experienced active interference with contraception (National Crime Victimization Survey, 2005).
  • Girls who are victims of dating violence are 4 to 6 times more likely than non-abused girls to become pregnant (Silverman, 2004).
  • As many as two-thirds of adolescents who become pregnant were sexually or physically abused some time in their lives (Leiderman, 2001).
  • Homicide is the second leading cause of traumatic death for pregnant and recently pregnant women in the U.S. (Chang, 2005).

Considering what we know about perpetrators of intimate partner violence (and the power and control they demand), it should not be surprising that sexual coercion and forced pregnancy are frequently used as tools of abuse.  This abusive behavior may manifest as threats and/or violence if a partner does not comply with the perpetrator’s wishes regarding contraception or the decision whether to terminate or continue a pregnancy.  It may manifest as intentionally interfering with the couple’s birth control, or forcing invasive fertility treatments.

In my own personal life, my partner and I have spent the past two years seeking medical advice and intervention regarding (in)fertility.  In our journey to try and become parents, we’ve seen numerous doctors and medical professionals. When exchanging small-talk before or after an appointment, they’ve all asked me what I do for work.  As I explain CCASA, the tone of the conversation shifts, and more than one Fertility Specialist has shared case examples of reproductive coercion.  One case involved a couple coming in to seek in-vitro fertilization (IVF).  The Doctor just sensed something wasn’t right and (smartly) decided to talk to the husband and the wife separately.  When separated, the wife confided to the Doctor that she didn’t want to be pregnant and didn’t want to do IVF, but that her husband was forcing her.  Another Doctor told me about a situation where she had performed an Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) procedure for a couple, which was successful and resulted in twins.  Shortly after, the couple was back with the husband demanding IVF.  The Doctor was perplexed by both his urgency and demeanor.  Within a couple months of that appointment, the husband was arrested for both child abuse and domestic violence.  When these stories have been relayed to me, the Doctors each seemed incredibly saddened, baffled, and unsure of how to both identify warning signs and respond appropriately.

Because October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I think it’s important for all of us to think about how we can collaboratively improve outreach and awareness around reproductive coercion and the unique considerations of survivors who are pregnant.  I’ve found that health care providers want assistance with these issues, yet are often just too busy to be the ones outreaching to community agencies. The good news is resources are available.  Futures Without Violence (www.futureswithoutviolence.org) has numerous, groundbreaking tools for addressing reproductive coercion and facilitating cross training and collaboration between health care providers and advocates.  Penny Simkin and Phyllis Klaus’s book, “When Survivors Give Birth: Understanding and Healing the Effects of Early Sexual Abuse on Childbearing Women” is a must-read for anyone working directly with survivors who are pregnant.  Research determines that a physically-abused woman also experiencing forced sex [is] over seven times more likely than other abused women to be killed (Campbell, 2003).  In light of this horrific statistic, these conversations are absolutely worth having.

Karen Moldovan is the Program Manager for the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CCASA). She joined CCASA with strong experience in advocacy, education, community organizing and international development. Her professional experience has often focused on working with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault, individuals experiencing homelessness, and pregnant and parenting youth. Karen has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Gender Studies, and a Masters of Arts in Teaching. In 2009, she completed service as a United States Peace Corps Volunteer in the Kingdom of Tonga. She is a founding member of First Response Action, which advocates for comprehensive reform for sexual assault prevention and response within the Peace Corps.

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Filed under Domestic Violence, Familial Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, Sexual Violence, Violence Against Women

October 1, 2012 · 10:01 am

Intimate Partner & Familial Human Trafficking: when Domestic Violence & Human Trafficking Collide

By Becky Owens Bullard

Image source: preventconnect.org

Today marks the beginning of Domestic Violence Awareness Month (DVAM), an awareness month that is particularly meaningful for me. Domestic violence was the first issue I worked on as an advocate, and I remember my first training vividly – the power and control wheel, the cycle of violence, and the myths surrounding intimate partner and familial abuse. I remember the women and children that I worked with in shelter, support groups and in the courtroom, and I can’t forget the devastating impact I saw this issue have on so many people’s lives. So, when I left my work on domestic violence in Nashville, TN and shifted my focus to the anti-human trafficking field in Washington, D.C., I carried my first passion with me.

Although I had little expectation that domestic violence would be so closely tied to human trafficking when I arrived in D.C. to work for Polaris Project, I did have an inkling that my work with domestic violence victims was far from over.  In my first week of training, I quickly realized that the power and control used by traffickers was incredibly similar to that of batterers and I subsequently developed the Human Trafficking Power and Control Wheel to raise awareness about these similarities in non-physical forms of control. The abuse was similar, cycles of violence and coercion were present, and to top it all off, the case that brought me to the anti-trafficking field in the first place was both a case of domestic violence and human trafficking.

On the surface, the case appeared to be a straight-forward domestic violence incident where a woman and her child had been physically abused by the woman’s live-in boyfriend. However, while waiting to testify, the woman expressed fear of being in trouble with the police because a Vice Detective had been questioning her about the defendant. I was confused, thinking she meant a DV Detective, and seeing my confusion she explained that her boyfriend had not only abused her and her child but had also forced her to engage in commercial sex. With this disclosure, I felt fairly helpless as an advocate.  I had worked on plenty of cases of intimate partner sexual abuse, but sexual exploitation (i.e. human trafficking) had not really occurred to me as a potential form of intimate partner abuse. The case and my feeling of incompetence stayed with me, opening my eyes to the intersections of domestic violence and human trafficking.

However, when I came to the anti-trafficking field, I couldn’t seem to find an appropriate place for this woman I had worked with. There was no mention of an intimate partner as a trafficker and her story was lumped into a fairly large category of “pimp-controlled” trafficking. While my take on pimp-control was that it was intimate partner violence anyway, she still didn’t fit the idea of pimps having a “stable” or controlling multiple women at one time. And what if her abuser had started selling her daughter for sex?  There was also very little recognition of family members or parents as traffickers.

Maybe it was just a rare case and not the norm for human trafficking? Maybe I was over-thinking it? Nevertheless, a few months into my work on the national hotline for human trafficking, I realized that her case was far from unusual. I ended up working on multiple cases where family members and intimate partners were perpetrators of both sex and labor trafficking and in 2010, we started to categorize them as such. In a few months, 10% of hotline calls were reports of intimate partner or familial human trafficking and I had heard multiple stories of intimate partners, parents and other family members who compelled their victims into commercial sex, domestic servitude, sexual servitude and labor.

Although it is rarely the type of exploitation or abuse highlighted by the media or by either field, it is happening and it’s time we start calling it what it is – both Domestic Violence and Human Trafficking.

When a mom and dad sell their daughter for sex to make their car payments – it is familial sex trafficking and child abuse.

When a husband forces his wife to sell herself for sex by threatening to take their child away – it is intimate partner sex trafficking and intimate partner abuse.

When a teenage boy convinces his girlfriend to sell sexual favors to feed his drug addiction – it is intimate partner sex trafficking and teen dating violence.

When a parent makes their child work long hours at the family restaurant under duress instead of going to school – it is familial labor trafficking and child abuse.

And when a husband forces his wife to work, taking all of her wages and beating her if she loses her job – it is intimate partner labor trafficking and intimate partner violence.

But why don’t we call these crimes what they are?  What stops us from understanding that domestic violence and human trafficking can not only involve the same types of power and control, cyclical violence and manipulative perpetrators, but can also directly collide, mixing the two crimes together completely?

Unfortunately, there are several myths that keep us from identifying these crimes and inhibit our understanding of intimate partner and familial human trafficking:

The myth that traffickers are usually someone unknown to the victim, not their mom or dad or intimate partner – even though we know that those closest to us, those who are supposed to love and care for us, can also exercise forceful bonds of control, manipulation and abuse.

The myth that abusive partners and family members wouldn’t go so far as to exploit – even though we know they commonly dehumanize, sexually abuse and economically manipulate.

And the idea that intimate partners (especially husbands) and family members (especially parents) somehow have a right to force their loved ones to work but not calling this forced labor – even though if the perpetrator were a stranger or an “official” employer, we would recognize it as human trafficking.

These myths and discriminatory ideas inhibit us from recognizing the intersections of these two issues, keeping domestic violence and human trafficking in separate silos. When we treat these issues as completely distinct, we risk misidentifying victims, providing inadequate and uninformed services, and missing out on crucial collaboration between the domestic violence and human trafficking fields.

So as we work to enhance the public’s understanding of abuse during Domestic Violence Awareness Month, let’s also improve our own understanding of the types of abuse that we can encounter in our work. By acknowledging that human trafficking is one of these forms of abuse and that it can intersect directly with domestic violence, we can ensure no advocate feels ill-equipped when they come across their own case of intimate partner or familial human trafficking. By uniting the domestic violence and human trafficking fields around this issue, we can amplify our voices and work together to end abuse and exploitation by those closest to victims: their family members and intimate partners.

For more information on the intersections, please see the following resources:

Issue Brief on the Intersections of Domestic Violence & Human Trafficking

Intimate Partner and Intrafamilial Exploitation: How the Intersections of Domestic Violence and Human Trafficking can profoundly affect our Work by Becky Owens Bullard

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Filed under Domestic Violence, Familial Violence, Human Trafficking, Intimate Partner Violence, Labor Trafficking, Sex Trafficking, Violence Against Women

September 24, 2012 · 9:47 am

First Impressions Count: Campus Safety from a Survivor’s Perspective

By Michelle Spradling, Guest Blogger and Project Director of the Sexual Assault Interagency Council in Denver

Originally posted at and re-blogged with permission from the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CCASA)

More than any season, fall brings nostalgic feelings of excitement and anticipation. I am certain this is a direct result of 17 years of “back to school” shopping trips, class schedule-comparing, and no. 2 pencil sharpening. Fall is the season of change, with leaves turning into delicate crisps of mahogany and new classes, friends, and the promise of a whole year’s worth of experiences waiting to be realized.

Although exactly ten years have passed, I still remember starting my freshman year of college, which was prefaced by a summer of accumulating boxes, squirrelling school supplies and reading college survival guides. I will never forget saying goodbye to my best friend and how we said we would IM and call each other, “like, all the time.” And I will never forget how arriving 10 hours and two states away from the only life I ever knew was nothing short of awesome.

Recognizing Campus Safety Month in September is obviously deliberate: get the message out about the dangers of alcohol, campus shootings, theft, fire safety, and sexual assault the minute students disembark on the quad. More importantly, the beginning of school is memorable and serves as a golden opportunity to imprint the vital messages students carry with them throughout their college careers and beyond.

Although subtle, I wouldn’t realize the weight of the messages I learned during the first month of college until January of the following year. Exactly one week in to the second semester, I was raped. In the interest of time: he was a trusted acquaintance and fellow Greek member. I was at a party where I had been drinking and my friends had gone home, accidentally taking my cell phone and dorm key with them. In the aftermath of the assault, I felt painstakingly alone, ashamed and responsible. As I considered my next move, I tried to recall anything about what I was told to do in the prior months, but could only recall the following references to sexual assault from my weeklong orientation class:

1.       Our orientation class discussion about sexual assault was brief.  While sitting in a shady spot under a tree near the student center, we flipped our student handbooks to the crime report statistics which showed one sexual assault was reported during the previous school year. Our orientation leader informed us that of course this is not a real number since most victims do not report.

The Message: You’re probably not supposed to report a sexual assault—unless you want to really stand out.

2.       Campus Police presented about self-defense classes and the After Dark police escort service, which would shepherd any student to their car after a late night class or past the big scary oak tree by the Science building.

The Message: Women shouldn’t walk alone on campus at night.*

*Two months later, as I was leaving to walk to my sorority house for a pledging activity,  I ran in to a nice guy that frequented the floor of my dorm. He offered to walk with me, as it was after dark and “there are a lot of creeps out there”. I didn’t mind the company, so I accepted his offer. The next time I saw him was through the glass of the study room on my floor, chatting with the cops. It turns out he had been stalking a girl down the hall. I realized I was better off walking alone at night.

3.       The Resident Advisor came in to my dorm room and tossed a “Red Zone” packet on my bed and explained that the start of the school year until Thanksgiving is the most dangerous time for women on campus. Inside the packet were statistics, phone numbers to the rape crisis center, and a keychain rape whistle.

The Message: Mark a commemorative date on the calendar for December 1 to celebrate not being raped. Also keys are now a weapon against violence and shouldn’t be left unattended.

4.       Many times we were warned by both the orientation leader and Resident Advisor that the campus is dry. Don’t drink, don’t stash alcohol in your closet, and don’t even try returning to your dorm drunk. You will get caught and disciplined accordingly.

The Message: The campus is dry. Don’t get caught drinking. It’s safer to go off campus to drink and use the stairwell instead of the elevators when returning to your room. And if you find yourself without your dorm key at 4AM and you’ve been drinking, your only option is to use the emergency call box to dispatch an officer to open the door for you. Unless you want to risk being arrested for underage drinking and kicked out of school, it’s probably “safer” to stay off-campus at a fraternity house, with a guy who will ultimately rape you.

Looking back, I realized that what I didn’t learn in those formative weeks was a message about how survivors of sexual assault are believed, encouraged to seek help and supported by the institution. I hadn’t learned what constituted rape, but had instead received mixed messages about perpetrators being known to the victim while at the same time being handed a rape whistle. I, like most survivors, struggled internally with defining my assault: It didn’t seem like rape because I hadn’t heard of anyone who had experienced anything similar.  While I did ultimately find a culture of support from university administrators, counselors and police, I disclosed with a delay, slowly and reluctantly, and only after I had been reassured by trusted friends (and later a rape crisis advocate), that I had been sexually assaulted, it wasn’t my fault, and I would not be in trouble.

This September, alongside fire extinguisher demonstrations and sexual assault prevention education (bystander only, please), ensure that your definitions of “sexual assault awareness” and “campus safety” include consent descriptions and a component of emotional safety for sexual assault survivors. Because not all sexual assaults can be prevented, send the message early that your school is a place where students can feel safe talking about, intervening in, and disclosing sexual violence—and subsequently where perpetrators do not feel welcome.

Michelle Spradling is the Project Director of the Sexual Assault Interagency Council in Denver. She also speaks publicly about her experience as a survivor and is co-chair of the Crime Victim Advisory Council, a group of crime victims who work educate the community on the personal and societal impact of violent crime.

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Filed under Sexual Violence, Violence Against Women