Use Your Soap Boxes

By Cordelia Anderson and Joan Tabachnick, guest bloggers and hosts of the Ending Child Sexual Abuse Web Conference Series

There is certainly good news about the changing face of the media. Social media and the internet offer many opportunities for accessing information, and this web conference series is a prime example of how technology and new forms of media are connecting people like never before. However, these new opportunities don’t come without their challenges. Our recent web conference titled “The Role of Media and Pornography” brought together two national leaders known for their expertise on media and pornography, and examined the ways in which new media and technology have transformed the pornography industry to the detriment of safer communities.

During the conference, presenter Cordelia Anderson (typically a co-host for this web conference series) highlighted the impact of current internet pornography in everyday lives. She explored how we can begin to use alternative images and messages that capture the joy, consent, and mutual pleasure necessary for healthy sexuality. Anderson’s presentation helped us see the need for a culture that doesn’t censor the healthy while marketing the harmful. We need a culture that nurtures healthy sexuality and normalizes caring connections rather than disconnection. This, she argues, is essential for building communities that don’t allow for the sexual abuse of children.

Building on this theme, presenter Dr. Sharon Cooper challenged the standard notion of “what you see is what you get.” Instead, she says that when it comes to media, “what you see is what gets you.” As a pediatrician, Dr. Cooper uses her time with patients and families as a way to start conversations with parents about the impact of media messages on their children, the importance of self-worth and respect, and ways to combat the growing sexual objectification of children -- she refers to these education moments in her office as her metaphorical Soap Box, inviting each of us to do the same. One participant suggested that this could become the beginning of the SOAP BOX Campaign among pediatricians, while another creatively noted that SOAP is truly what Dr. Cooper was doing -- “Speaking Out Against Pornography.”

As bloggers, we agree that it’s time for each of us to pull out our soap box -- speaking out against abuse and objectification of children in the media and calling for models and images of healthy sexuality and relationships.

Click here to learn more about the Ending Child Sexual Abuse Web Conference Series. Slides and recordings are available for each web conference. Sign-up to learn more about upcoming sessions.

ART CHANGES LIVES

By Cordelia Anderson and Joan Tabachnick, guest bloggers and hosts of the Ending Child Sexual Abuse Web Conference Series that PreventConnect is co-sponsoring with Ms. Foundation for Women.

It was one of those days. The papers were full of child sexual abuse stories focused on the problem -- from national stories such as the sentencing of Jerry Sandusky to a wide variety of local cases involving priests, teachers, and family members. The web conference “The Role of Art in Ending Child Sexual Abuse” was a breath of fresh air because it showed so clearly how the trauma of child sexual abuse can be transformed into a wide range of positive solutions.

Opening with the photographs from Bonnie Fournier’s the SMOOCH project, the web conference began with a clear vision of what love may look like to many people. Bonnie described her process of taking photographs and how that process challenges every participant to consider questions of love and affection. Immediately after the web conference, a participant sent in her own example of a smooch and noted:

“This photo was taken on the second year anniversary of the start of a relationship with the love of my life. We are both survivors and have begun our healing journey together just by sharing our experiences with each other. Smooches help heal lives.”

Moving from the visual to the spoken word, we shared Travis Monford’s powerful spoken word piece that directly speaks to the pain of the incest he survived and the importance of ending silence within families. His clear and commanding piece models how we cannot let sexual abuse move to the next generation. He calls on all of us to break the silence and expose what happens, while at the same time acknowledging how hard that can be. In his words:

We were raised to believe that the family business
Stayed the Family’s business
Cause it was no one else’s business

Finally, we explored Donna Jenson’s one-woman show What She Knows: One Woman’s Way through Incest to Joy, which began as a healing project and has expanded to touch the lives of both survivors and those who abuse. Donna talked about the many ways that her show has become a catalyst for conversation in communities, with most shows ending with audience dialogues about what they can do to end abuse. As she says in her piece, “We made noise, and friends, and a difference.” The show is great example of how art can challenge us all to make noise – to make a difference.

In this short web conference we could see how the arts entertain, bring smiles to faces, tap into our deepest pain, and underscore critical life lessons -- why not use them fully in our prevention work?

Click here to learn more about the Ending Child Sexual Abuse Web Conference Series. Slides and recordings are available for each web conference. Sign-up to learn more about upcoming sessions.

Start With Healthy Sexuality

By Cordelia Anderson and Joan Tabachnick

The most recent web conference, “Healthy Sexuality and Caring Connections: Foundations for Prevention” featured Rev. Debra Haffner of the Religious Institute and therapist Geraldine Crisci. Both Debra and Geraldine are published and passionate advocates for promoting an accurate understanding of sexual development and healthy relationships. Speaking to an audience of those interested in child sexual abuse prevention, they emphasized the importance of starting with healthy sexuality.

Geraldine emphasized sex education as a tool in preventing child sexual abuse. She noted that that the highest risk factor for sexual abuse is age, and emphasized the need to discuss healthy sexuality at an early age. Geraldine went on to offer an overview of the benefits of secure attachment in infants, toddlers, and children. She emphasized the importance of building respectful and trusting relationships early in children’s development. Building on this overview, Debra focused her presentation on healthy sexual development in adolescents. She emphasized the importance of making moral and ethical decisions about sexual relationships during adolescence, noting that sexual health education is the foundation for healthy relationships.

Both speakers identified the need for parents and professionals to understand age-appropriate sexual behaviors. They also challenged all of us working to end child sexual abuse to think about the intersection of sex education and seize opportunities to bring this conversation into all of our discussions about child sexual abuse prevention.

Click here to learn more about the Ending Child Sexual Abuse Web Conference Series. Slides and recordings are available for each web conference. Sign-up to learn more about upcoming web conferences.

Lived Experiences Fuel Hope & Action

By Cordelia Anderson and Joan Tabachnick

The August 30 ECSA Web Conference featured two survivors of child sexual abuse who have incorporated their stories into their activism to end child sexual abuse.  Their stories and their work provided a moving foundation for a discussion about how to tell one’s truth with a vision for social change. 

Amita Swadhin opened with her own story of abuse within her family and described how her healing led her to question the responses of the system to those of different class, ethnic or immigrant status.  And these questions led her to the idea of building a theater performance from the perspective of adult survivors of child sexual abuse, which was created by Ping Chong & Company. The result is an incredibly powerful performance, called Secret Survivors, performed by those whose stories are crafted into the script. As a young, queer woman of color and daughter of immigrants she fights structural oppression with the power of her truth and paves the way for the truth of others to be heard.  Randy Ellison, Board President of Oregon Abuse Advocates and Survivors in Service (OAASIS), was silenced by the weight of shame as a male sexual abuse victim, so much so that he did not disclose abuse or address his trauma for 40 years.  After telling his story for the first time at a public hearing before the state legislature, he will not be silenced again. He authored the book, Boys Don’t Tell: Ending the Silence of Abuse, and is part of the OAASIS Speakers Bureau that works for policy change.

Randy and Amita point out that while speaking out results in others feeling safer to disclose their own experiences of abuse, they believe the power of personal stories is to give hope and inspire action for social change.  Personal stories make the facts come alive and motivate people to get involved. But then what?  When asked what others can do, Amita supported the idea of a national “coming out” day for survivors in order to create a broader picture of who is affected and how many of us are affected by child sexual abuse.  Randy talked about the power of having many voices speaking together, and suggested contacting a local coalition to speak with others on key questions facing our policy makers and funders

Much of the discussion centered on how ALL of us are affected by child sexual abuse in some way.  We defined “Voices of Experience” as anyone who has been personally affected by child sexual abuse –survivors, friends and families of survivors, and the friends and families of those who have perpetrated abuse.  We explored the difficult question of how to learn from all stories – even of those who have abused.  Amita brought forward a quote that captured how our collective stories force us to look at trends and long term solutions rather than just an immediate response: “The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story” (Chimamanda, Adichie, The Danger of a Single Story).

Beyond what Amita and Randy spoke about, they also modeled so beautifully the power of combining personal stories with professional goals.  For years, it has been hard for professionals to fully own and incorporate their personal stories into their work.  In this web conference these two survivors, activists, and professionals did just that -- opening the door for others to do the same.  

We ended the web conference with a quote by Henri  Nouwen “when we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means most to us, we often find that it is those who instead of giving advice, solutions or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand”.  A huge thank you to Amita and Randy for all you do to build a movement and make prevention a reality.