*If you haven’t read about this exhibit or seen the website, I highly encourage you to do so with the caveat that it’s painful, triggering for victims/survivors of sexual assault, and powerful. I couldn’t tell you for the life of me what I was wearing the first time, or the third or fourth. In my view, what I was wearing is immaterial, other than that I was ‘wearing’ a female body, a child’s female body, and that meant – or so it seems – I was fair game for predators of all kinds.
From the website: The purpose of this exhibit is to dispel a victim-blaming myth that clothing somehow invites a sexual assault. Victims of crime are not responsible for crimes committed against them. Survivors of rape/sexual assault are often asked, “What were you wearing?” We need to stop asking this. We encourage you to look at these stories and outfits of local survivors to see that clothing is irrelevant when it comes to sexual assault. As you read what these survivors shared, please take a moment to reconsider what may be your own long-held beliefs about sexual assault that are, in reality, myths and stereotypes that can aid perpetrators of crime in avoiding accountability for their choices.
*About the Dove Center, which sponsored the exhibit:
At DOVE Center, we are committed to cultivating an informed community free from domestic abuse and sexual violence.
We work to empower those impacted by domestic abuse and sexual violence. We do this by:
Relentlessly pursuing community education to increase bystander awareness and shift culture norms.
Providing safe shelter and trauma-informed services in order to facilitate safety, healing, and assault recovery;
Engaging children and youth to understand safe, healthy relationships and mutual respect, to break cycles of violence in families and in the community;