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The V Word

Advocating to end sexual and domestic violence

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October 2014

Tiffany Jana- Remember My Name

Welcome to today’s edition of the V Word!

 

Joining us today is Tiffany Jana talking about YWCA’s Remember My Name Event on October 30,2014 in Richmond VA. Tiffany Jana is the CEO of local diversity and inclusion firm TMI Consulting. She will be delivering the keynote at the event and will speak from her experience as a domestic violence survivor.

Since 1995, the YWCA of Richmond has been the host of Remember My Name, a memorial service to commemorate the lives of individuals in our community who have died as a result of domestic violence. Remember My Name is a nationwide event honoring victims of domestic violence.

 

Listen to the episode here

For more information visit the YWCA website here 

 

 

Do you need help or information?  Here are some options…

If you have been assaulted and feel comfortable with calling the police, call 911.

If you are not comfortable with talking to the police, but want to talk to someone, you can call  the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.

You can now text/chat The Virginia Hotline at http://www.vsdvalliance.org/

If you have been assaulted in the last 72 hours you can get a  forensic exam to collect evidence and receive medical care. You can do this with and without reporting to the police. The local hospitals in the Richmond area with Forensic Nurse Examiners are at Medical College of Virginia and St. Mary’s Hospital.

For help with counseling and advocacy, find a Domestic Violence/Sexual Assault Agency near you . To find a center near you  call the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.  

Are  you a family member or a bystander and want know how you can help?

Get involved with your local domestic violence/rape crisis agency.  Donate to services that help survivors recover and heal. The Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline is also available to family/partners/loved ones/ and allied professionals.

Want to share a story or ask a question?  Email me at thevword.radio@gmail.com or tweet me at my twitter account:  @preventviolence.  You can read the transcript for this show and past shows on my blog at www.thevword.org

Today’s host was Carol Olson. The V Word is recorded in the studios of WRIR-LP 97.3 and streamed at wrir.org, The V Word is produced by Carol Olson. Music was created by The Etching Tin

 

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The V Word broadcast: RHART with Fatima Smith

Fatima Smith of RHART
Fatima Smith of RHART

Today Fatima Smith stopped by to give an update on the RHART program, a collaborative hospital accompaniment program comprised of local centers around the metro Richmond area.

You can listen to the show here

Through RHART, trained volunteers respond to area hospital emergency rooms to provide advocacy and support to individuals who have experienced sexual and domestic violence. RHART is a regional collaborative between Safe Harbor, Hanover Safe Place, and the YWCA of Richmond.  Volunteers respond to hospital accompaniment requests 24/7 and connect survivors with community resources and follow-up services. We provide services to anyone who has experienced intimate partner/domestic violence regardless of race, gender, age, national origin, gender identity or expression, faith, sexual orientation, disability, ethnicity and geographic location. Our services are available in both English and Spanish, and all services are offered free of charge to anyone seeking help.  – Safe Harbor

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The V Word: An Interview with the YWCA of Richmond

Today’s show is an hour long special. Becky Lee and Carol Ann Lajoie of the YWCA of Richmond talk about upcoming campaigns, the state of funding in Virginia and their new regional collaborative hotline.

You can listen to the episode here

Resources:

YWCA of Richmond

Show is broadcast on WRIR 97.3 FM and streamed at wrir.org

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The V Word: Justice

 

Welcome to today’s edition of The V Word. Today we are talking about justice.

Listen to today’s episode here

 

Do you need help or information?  Here are some options…

If you have been assaulted and feel comfortable with calling the police, call 911.

If you are not comfortable with talking to the police, but want to talk to someone, you can call  the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.

You can now text/chat The Virginia Hotline at http://www.vsdvalliance.org/

If you have been assaulted in the last 72 hours you can get a  forensic exam to collect evidence and receive medical care. You can do this with and without reporting to the police. The local hospitals in the Richmond area with Forensic Nurse Examiners are at Medical College of Virginia and St. Mary’s Hospital.

The Richmond area has a new regional hotline specific to the needs of sexual and domestic violence survivors: 804-612-6126

For help with counseling and advocacy, find a Domestic Violence/Sexual Assault Agency near you . To find a center near you  call the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.  

Are  you a family member or a bystander and want know how you can help?

Get involved with your local domestic violence/rape crisis agency.  Donate to services that help survivors recover and heal. The Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline is also available to family/partners/loved ones/ and allied professionals.

Want to share a story or ask a question?  Email me at thevword.radio@gmail.com or tweet me at my twitter account:  @preventviolence.  You can read the transcript for this show and past shows on my blog at www.thevword.org

Today’s host was Carol Olson. The V Word is recorded in the studios of WRIR-LP 97.3 and streamed at wrir.org, The V Word is produced by Carol Olson. Music was created by The Etching Tin

 

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Patricia Turner Jones- Chesterfield Domestic and Sexual Violence Coordinator

Check out the interview by Mark Hickman of Inspire Indeed, a sister show at WRIR 97.3 (wrir.org) of a local domestic violence program. Great focus on DV this month on Inspire Indeed!!

Inspire InDeed

Domestic-Violence-Awareness

October is Domestic Violence Awareness month and this month Inspire Indeed will be featuring agencies addressing domestic violence in their communities. Today we are talking to  Patricia Turner Jones, coordinator of The Chesterfield Domestic and Sexual Violence Resource Center. Today you will hear such topics as funding for these critcial programs, community resources, a new national campaign called EndtheBacklog and how it impacts local cities, the national White house campaign “It’s on Us,”and  law enforcement trainings/ response

Guest Speaker:  Patricia Turner Jones, Coordinator of The Chesterfield Domestic and Sexual Violence Resource Center

Listen to the episode here

Resources:

Inspire Indeed on WRIR

Chesterfield County Domestic and Sexual Violence Resource Center

Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline- 1 800 838 8238

Get in touch with the program at:

(804) 318-8265
(804) 318-8264 to speak to the Court Advocate

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Carrying the Weight of Sexual Violence

Here is today’s edition of The V Word

You can listen to the broadcast here

Today I am going to talk about a student’s response to her rape on campus. Have you heard of Emma Sulkowicz  and her mattress?

A Student at Columbia University named Emma has started carrying her dorm mattress for her visual arts senior thesis  to create awareness about her sexual assault that happened on campus. Emma stated that she will carry her mattress everywhere until the school takes accountability for what happened to her. She was sexually assaulted in 2012 and her perpetrator remains at the school. After she reported her assault to Columbia, she appeared before a disciplinary panel, where she was forced to explain to a university official how the painful manner in which she had been raped was physically possible. Then the panel found her accused assailant not responsible. The school has failed Emma as a survivor in making sure that she and other survivors are safe. This creates a message that sexual violence is tolerated and accepted at the university.

Emma has created rules for this project where she is not allowed to ask for help in carrying her mattress but she IS allowed to accept others help if offered. Her hope is that others become aware of what she is doing and offer their help. Shortly, after her project became known to the campus students stepped up to help her carry her mattress to and from classes. This act of carrying the mattress together is an act of solidarity to let Emma know that she is not alone and should not have to carry all the crime committed against her. We can all learn from Emma and the students of Columbia in creating a community together that is survivor centered. Sexual violence is a community health issue that impacts us all.

Emma is an example of women using art as activism to bring awareness about the realities of sexual violence to a global level. Emma is not alone and is certainly not the first activist to use her own story to start a conversation about sexual violence. However, her story is an example of  how art can be used as activism to talk about these issues in a different way. The symbol of using her bed is very poignant. How would you describe your bed? A place of comfort? A place for love? A place of safety? Yet for those who are raped in their beds, it can take on such a different feeling, the bed becomes a symbol of torture, of pain, of helplessness. This is how trauma changes the meanings of everyday objects.

Emma’s story has gotten much publicity and it makes me wonder, does it take someone carrying the very same mattress they were raped on to get people to listen about this issue? Does it take something this visually powerful for people to grasp the epidemic that is violence against women in our world? If someone  was sexually assaulted but chose not to use art to make their story heard, or did not have the same resources as Emma, or was fearful to come forward, is their story then lost in the masses or any  less meaningful? What will it take for society to finally understand?

If we all helped carry the weight of injustice  we might finally stop tolerating what we’ve been content to force others to carry alone.

 

Do you need help or information?  Here are some options…

If you have been assaulted and feel comfortable with calling the police, call 911.

If you are not comfortable with talking to the police, but want to talk to someone, you can call  the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.

You can now text/chat The Virginia Hotline at http://www.vsdvalliance.org/

If you have been assaulted in the last 72 hours you can get a  forensic exam to collect evidence and receive medical care. You can do this with and without reporting to the police. The local hospitals in the Richmond area with Forensic Nurse Examiners are at Medical College of Virginia and St. Mary’s Hospital.

The Richmond area has a new regional hotline specific to the needs of sexual and domestic violence survivors: 804-612-6126

For help with counseling and advocacy, find a Domestic Violence/Sexual Assault Agency near you . To find a center near you  call the Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-838-8238.  

Are  you a family member or a bystander and want know how you can help?

Get involved with your local domestic violence/rape crisis agency.  Donate to services that help survivors recover and heal. The Virginia Family Violence and Sexual Assault Hotline is also available to family/partners/loved ones/ and allied professionals.

Want to share a story or ask a question?  Email me at thevword.radio@gmail.com or tweet me at my twitter account:  @preventviolence.  You can read the transcript for this show and past shows on my blog at www.thevword.org

Today’s host was Jenn GallienneThe V Word is recorded in the studios of WRIR-LP 97.3 and streamed at wrir.org, The V Word is produced by Carol Olson. Music was created by The Etching Tin

 

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National Domestic Violence Awareness Month – 2014

Today Barack Obama published a proclamation about Domestic Violence.  While it is always nice to have your President publicly support efforts to end domestic violence, I do wish it was something that was said everyday as it is a daily problem. I have included excerpts below.  You can read the entire proclamation here.

Presidential Proclamation

Domestic violence affects every American. It harms our communities, weakens the foundation of our Nation, and hurts those we love most. It is an affront to our basic decency and humanity, and it must end. During National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, we acknowledge the progress made in reducing these shameful crimes, embrace the basic human right to be free from violence and abuse, and recognize that more work remains until every individual is able to live free from fear.

Last month, we reached the 20th anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). This act is helping change the perception of domestic violence and helping communities work toward increasing funding and making changes. Recently two new campaigns:

1 is 2 Many initiative launched by VP Biden. This initiative is going to raise awareness about dating violence. You can see the PSA here

“It’s on Us” campaign – part of the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault to address the intersection of sexual assault and dating violence on college campuses.

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