500% Increase

Just a moment ago, I typed in http://www.rainn.org since I want to organize a RAINN Day event at my college in April (yes, I registered! I'll be signing up for classes soon :] )

Then I saw this article on their site: http://rainn.org/news-room/news/degrassi-debut and I'm both... horrified and strangely relieved.

I watched this episode when it aired and thought it was awesome that the producers were tackling childhood sexual abuse, especially with how Jane could not remember it until certain triggers pushed the memories out. I've had a close family member go through the same when I was three--I was, unintentionally, triggering her because that was the age that she was molested. I didn't know about this until many years later. A couple years ago, though, I was reading about people who had repressed memories of CSA because it is such a controversial subject, but I didn't get much of an understanding of it until very recently when I bought Trauma and Recovery.

Thanks a lot Freud for contributing to the many doubts about sex abuse victims :[ The more cases he heard from women and children, the less he actually believed because he was completely shocked that sexual abuse was so widespread.

I think this article from RAINN paints a disturbing picture about how widespread it still is--and that is just with the audience that watched the premiere of that episode. How many more victims are out there that haven't come forward yet?

I'm relieved about this statistic because RAINN managed to get their hotline out to a very big audience, and I am happy for the people that came forward about their stories. Talking about it is a very important step in healing.