They ‘Take Back the Night’ in Ann Arbor:
Survivors call for ‘mutual respect’
Staff Writer
In “Dead Man Walking,” Sean Penn plays a man on death row who co-murdered a couple after raping the woman. To the couple, Penn and his fellow felon played strangers; the two crept up on the couple’s car in the woods. They dragged them out and held the woman down as they raped her. Now, replace the two perpetrators with one. Instead of a stranger, make him your boyfriend, girlfriend or friend. Instead of being held down, he or she makes you believe that you have no choice but to let this happen. And it’s not in the woods — it’s in your own house. While the details won’t be the same in every case, most rape cases resemble the latter example. In fact, it’s rare for perpetrators to sexually assault complete strangers. When the attacker is someone the survivor knows, the incident becomes much more confusing, complicated and harder to report. “Sexual assault happens with someone that we know 86 percent of the time,” said Jennifer Pasquale. “We’re not talking about ‘stranger danger.’ It is someone we know and that’s why it makes it so hard for a victim to disclose anything.” Pasquale will be the rally keynote speaker for Ann Arbor’s chapter of Take Back the Night on April 8. The rally will take place on University of Michigan’s Diag two days after the survivor speak out on April 6. As a mother of a survivor, Pasquale brings a perspective that is not often heard, but certainly is not unique. She estimates that one in three women and one in six men are survivors. “When someone’s rights are taken away from them without their full consent, it’s very traumatizing. That fear, anger or betrayal has a ripple effect and it touches the friends and loved ones of the victim as well,” Pasquale said. For survivors Brittany Worley, 21, and Kelsey Clancy, 20, both juniors at UM, the speak out, rally and march provided by TBTN encouraged both of them to become active members in UM’s University Students Against Rape. Although Worley dragged Clancy to their first rally their freshman year in the pouring rain, both women now freely volunteer with USAP and TBTN, helping to apply for grants, ask for donations and organize. “Six people isn’t a whole lot of people to pull something off like this,” Worley said. “It’s three events, but it’s three events in three weeks.” The first event was a benefit for TBTN held on March 20. Now the volunteers are gearing up for the speak out, their most private event. “Our philosophy with all of the events we do is that we want to support survivors. Our speak out is much more intimate. We do not invite reporters; we don’t even have chairs!” said Meghan Gallagher, co-student leader of University Students Against Rape. Clancy agreed. “We do our ‘speak’ out in a small, intimate setting with pillows, blankets, chocolate… it’s more intimate than, ‘I’m going to get up in front of hundreds of people and speak about this thing,’” she said. Unlike most TBTN rallies, marches and speak outs, the Ann Arbor chapter changed the events from being all in one night to being on separate nights. Since the speak out is completely different from the celebratory, loud rally and march, volunteers thought it would be best for survivors and their supporters to have a day to process everything after the speak out. Also, the volunteers found that the two events, while obviously related, weren’t necessarily conducive to each other. “We find that the traditional model of going up to the podium and having all these people stare at you is really scary, especially for all these women telling their story for the first time,” Gallagher said. The speak out will take place inside the Michigan League in the Kalamazoo Room. At 7 p.m. on April 6, survivors and their supporters are encouraged to come speak and listen. This year, the event has no end time and there will be counselors and peer support from SafeHouse Center. “The last one that we had was planned for two hours and they started to kick us out of the room because we had gone over the time,” Gallagher said. “There weren’t necessarily that many people there, but when you’re surrounded by people that you feel supported by, a lot of people open up.” After the initial speak out, attendees are welcome to stay and ask questions about sexual assault. The event is seen as an opportunity to talk about the issue since it is so often ignored or avoided. “People don’t like to talk about sexual assault like a crime. It’s not like a robbery. People can talk about a robbery,” Gallagher said. Pasquale sees this open sharing of information as one of the key ways to prevent sexual assault from happening. While she said that anything a survivor does to survive is courageous, she hopes that the survivors and supporters that choose to speak out know just how valuable their words are. “We need to debunk that myth that a perpetrator might put out there saying, ‘You can’t tell because no one will believe you.’ If the whole community stands up and says, ‘Yes we can pal, and yes we will believe them,’ then we set an atmosphere where that perpetrator will think twice before they do that again,” Pasquale said. For Pasquale, believing a survivor when they share their story is the most important thing a supporter can do. She cited the National Department of Justice, which says that 98 percent of the time, women and men that share their sexual assault stories are telling the truth. Pasquale also emphasized the importance of putting blame on the assaulter, not the survivor. She battled with this issue herself. “As survivors and friends and family of survivors, they need to hear that it’s not their fault,” Pasquale said. “Of course you want to say, ‘Well, why didn’t I do this?’ or, ‘What if I would have kept her from doing that?’ It isn’t that because we’re not responsible for another person’s bad behavior.” On April 8 at 7 p.m., survivors won’t be worrying about who believes them and who doesn’t. That’s when the rally starts. With this celebration, survivors and their supporters will be aiding in the fight to prevent sexual assault. Besides, the volunteers acknowledge that the last thing a perpetrator would want is for their victim to be out on the streets condemning their actions. By doing this, the men and women involved gain back the control they once lost and demand they be treated like equals. “The law says that if you are coerced into giving sex and there’s not equal power at the moment, that’s not consent,” Pasquale said. “What’s the opposite of sexual assault? Mutual respect.”
