As part of Sexual Assault Awareness Month, the Sexual Trauma Awareness and Response organization is handing out a form reading: “My name is ______. When someone tells me that they were raped or sexually assaulted, I will: ______.” The form also encourages campaign participants to support victims, speak up, take a stand, start a conversation on social media using #StartByBelieving and take the pledge and post a picture of the pledge on social media.
This form is part of STAR’s Start by Believing campaign, which is a global campaign started by End Violence Against Women International in April 2011, according to STAR Capital Area Regional Director Kirsten Raby. The campaign was launched alongside the International Conference on Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence and Stalking in Chicago, Illinois, according to Start by Believing’s website.
“By preparing both professionals and loved ones to respond appropriately to sexual assault disclosures, we help to improve outcomes for victims — one reaction at a time,” the website said.
The campaign hopes to change the response to sexual assault so that more victims will report crimes to law enforcement, according to the campaign’s website. Start by Believing aims to eliminate the “cycle of silence,” so that rapists and aggressors can be prosecuted effectively to prevent future incidents of rape or sexual assault.
“The goal behind the campaign is simply to bring awareness to how society as a whole can change how we support survivors by first believing them,” Raby said
The campaign extends beyond the pledge and aims to affect the community’s response system through policies, practices and protocols of victim-serving agencies, according to the website.
EVAWI wanted to use April, Sexual Assault Awareness Month, to influence how society treats sexual assault and to encourage the public to believe and support survivors, Raby said.
EVAWI is the nation’s leading non-profit organization “dedicated to improving criminal justice responses to sexual assault,” according to the Start by Believing website.
“Working with professionals inside and outside the criminal justice system, we seek to improve outcomes for victims and pursue accountability for their assailants,” EVAWI’s website said. “We envision a world where gender-based violence is unacceptable on every level — where the victims whose lives, families and communities are torn apart, receive the compassion, support and justice they deserve.”
EVAWI was founded in 2003 by retired Sgt. Joanne Archambault, according to the organization’s website. Archambault served in law enforcement for 23 years, the last 10 of which she spent supervising the Sex Crimes Unit.
“Knowing and understanding how to respond to survivors of sexual assault can have such a huge impact on a survivor’s outlook on life and how they move forward in their process of healing,” Raby said.
When survivors are met with a negative response to sharing their story, that negative response can influence how they view themselves and how they handle their experience in the future, Raby said. Survivors often already blame themselves for their experience and should not be confronted with victim-blaming language.
Instead, Raby encourages people to respond by supporting the survivor by listening to them, asking them how they want to proceed without forcing their own opinions on the survivor and by speaking with non-judgmental language.
“When a person comes to you and discloses that they’ve been assaulted at any point in their lives, it’s important to just start the conversation by believing them,” Raby said.
Raby said she’s seen a positive response in the Baton Rouge community so far. STAR has reached out to existing STAR supporters, representatives in the Capitol, the mayor’s office and others to share how they will “Start by Believing.”
“Today, I partnered with [STAR] to invite the community to show support for survivors of domestic and sexual violence and make a commitment to #StartByBelieving,” Mayor-President Sharon Weston Broome tweeted on April 3.
“We want to get people thinking and we believe that’s what we’ve been able to do,” Raby said.
“We just want people to understand that their words have an impact and they have the choice of making sure it’s a positive impact,” Raby said. “You never know when you may have a survivor in your presence so being aware of that is important.”