SARA has an amazing, important event coming up very soon! Our friends at The Collins Center of Harrisonburg asked us to help arrange for a community dialogue on child sexual abuse and Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church was kind enough to let us use their facilities. I hope you all will come out—the more people who learn about child sexual abuse and how to prevent it, the safer our children will be!
The Colli
ns Center, along with the Virginia Department of Health and Stop it Now!®, is hosting a community dialogue to bring together those whose lives have been touched by child sexual abuse and to explore steps we can all take to protect our children. The dialogue will include a panel discussion between two survivors of child sexual abuse, a recovering sex offender, a trauma counselor, and a treatment provider who will share their individual perspectives and engage in discussion prompted by audience participation.
Research has shown that while adults are aware that child sexual abuse is a widespread problem, relatively few adults feel they have the tools necessary to prevent assault from happening in their families and in their communities. Having open and honest conversations about the issue is the first step to empowering adults to take action. By overcoming fears and misconceptions, adults can learn practical, effective ways to protect children.
Stop it Now!, a national organization that encourages adults to take responsibility for preventing child sexual abuse, created this public dialogue project as a format for a deeper conversation about prevention. The organization has coordinated over 50 previous dialogues in various settings with an average of 30 – 60 participants.
This event will be held on Tuesday, August 17, from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. at Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church at 105 Lankford Avenue. Registration is free and a continental breakfast will be served. All community members are invited. Details are available at www.saracville.org.
As the former director of am agency in Washington state, I am pleased to see another agency so active. I currently present papers on CSA at conferences. Here are a few things I’ve learned over the years.
1. Extrapolate the prevelancy data and we find that 45 million adults in the US were molested as children. That’s 22% of each high school graduating class. Why do you think the numbers so high?
2. Five studies show that 1 in 5 men is sexually attracted to little children. (No data for women are available.) Children are our first line of defense against predators. Do they have the vocabulary and knowledge for what they should tell you? Do they know what to do if you decide not to believe them?
2. We talk about preventing child sexual abuse. Let’s be specific–we want to stop people we know from molesting our children. How might you feel if your child tells you they were molested by someone you know?
3. Learn what the consequences are for our children if we don’t report.
I would be interested in attending the Dialogue on August 17th.