Ministers, counselors establish support group
Campus Times
March 5, 1999
There are reasons behind Catholic Campus Minister Elena Cardeña's
statement, "It is dangerous being a woman in this world."
It is because of this realization that Cardeña, along with Protestant
Campus Minister Debbie Roberts, is attempting to form a support group at
the University of La Verne for victims of rape or sexual assault.
Cardeña's statement is echoed by statistics from Project Sister
Sexual Assault and Prevention Services spokesperson Susan Ton.
"1.3 women in the United States who are 18 years or older are forcibly
raped each minute. That adds up to 78 per hour, 1,871 per day and 683,000
per year."
With rape being a crime that is significantly underreported, Cardeña
and Roberts are hoping to reach out to its victims.
"What a support group does is not substitute therapy. Rather it's
an augmentation to the work that people are already doing. One misperception
by people is, 'If we just don't talk about it, it'll go away,' " Cardeña
said.
According to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CCASA),
one in six women in the United States and one in 33 men have experienced
a complete or attempted rape at sometime during their lifetime.
"Every case is individual with this," Cardeña said,
"meaning we just have no way of predicting [how people will react to
this support group] because each person's spirit, personal fortitude or
the moment it happened are all completely individual.
"For those who think, 'Well, this only happened once,' must realize
that fine china only needs to drop once to shatter."
Rape is a crime primarily against youth. According to Project Sister's
statistics, 21.6 percent of rape victims are under the age of 12. 32.4 percent
are between the ages of 12-17, 29 percent between 18-24 and 16.6 percent
are committed on people over the age of 25.
Another study done by the CCASA found that 302,100 women and 92,700
men in the United States have experienced a complete or attempted rape with
in the last 12 months.
Last year, ULV had one case of sexual battery filed.
John Lentz, director of campus safety and transportation said, "Sexual
battery is any touching in an unwanted manner. In this case, a man approached
a student and took her by the wrist and held her. She wasn't raped, but
what added to this case was the guy's conversation. The tone of the conversation
was sexual. That, with the touching, made it sexual battery."
With such figures, it may be assumed that a support group is needed,
yet no one has contacted Cardeña or Roberts to find out about the
group.
"I don't think that anyone is ever irreparably damaged by assault;
although, sometimes people feel that way," Cardeña said. "They
feel that, 'There is no way anyone understands what I'm going through, and
there is no way anyone can help, and there is no way anyone will ever see
me as being whole and complete if they know what happened to me.'
"Or sometimes a person will ask [a rape victim], 'Couldn't you
have dressed differently ... or gone home earlier?' and that suddenly puts
the responsibility on the woman. Part of the reason I think we ask these
types of questions is because we are truly afraid of the real reality-that
any one of us, at any time, could be a victim of violent, sexual assault
and that is terrifying," Cardeña said.
"That is when the support group really comes to help," she
said. "Because you find out that there are other women who are in the
same boat as you are, and either it happened to someone a while ago or for
others it happened to them when they were 3.
"No matter how careful we could have been, it can still happen.
We want to be able to admit that this really happened," said Cardeña.
"I myself am a survivor. We can be careful and very smart, but can
still become a victim, and we must realize that the person who is at fault
is the attacker, not the person that was attacked, no matter what the situation."
"What we are hoping is that this support group will work in tandem
with the Counseling Center so that if something happens that Debbie and
I are unable to handle, we will have the support of the Counseling Center
behind us," she said.
Stephanie Carson, one of the Counseling Center's interns, agreed and
said, "If either Elena or Debbie needed our help, all they would have
to do is walk the person up to our door, and that door is always open.
"Anytime you have a rape or sexual assault case, some of the big
issues the victims deal with are a feeling of helplessness, self-blame and
low self-esteem. It's a very victimized feeling," Carson said.
"It's difficult for them to admit that it happened or to seek help.
It's very difficult to get sexual assault survivors to seek treatment,"
she said. "With the group they are doing, it is offering the first
step."
ULV's small-campus size is another reason Cardeña feels no one
has called. "Being on a small campus does have some wonderful things
about it, but it also makes it really difficult, in everyone knowing everybody's
everything.
"This is the kind of thing we don't want everybody to know. The
survivor of sexual assault is the one who has the right to share her story
with whomever she wants. That is why we have all the secrecy with the meeting
times, it is so information is never made public," said Cardeña.
"As for the support group opening up any old wounds," she
said, "well, when a wound gets infected the doctor has to lacerate
it. The doctor has to open it up, squeeze out all that pus, get in there
with a cotton swab and antibiotics, clean it up, and it hurts. Anyone who
has had an open wound cleaned by a doctor will tell you that it hurts, to
the very bone. It is then, though, that the wound can heal. Otherwise, it
cannot, and it starts to poison your life."
Cardeña said sexual assault is "anything that causes a person
to feel afraid for themselves psychologically, emotionally, spiritually
or physically. Anytime in which sex is used as a tool against them."
Victims of rape or sexual assault interested in this support group may
contact Cardeña at ext. 4322 or Roberts at ext. 4320. For those seeking
outside help, Project Sister is available at (909) 626-4357 or (626) 966-4155.
For the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network, call (800) 656-4673.
