The Daily Campus

Issue date: 4/23/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Ed Ryan A Minor performs at 'Take Back the Night,' an event aimed at eliminating violence against women. The evening included a speeches, poetry, emotional testimony from victims of sexual assault and a candle-lit march around campus.

A hotline counselor for the Sexual Assault Crisis Center of Lower Fairfield County was assuring the 400 students assembled at the Take Back the Night rally that a good life was possible after suffering sexual violence when she paused mid-sentence.

She trembled visibly as she pulled back from the microphone. A moment later, recomposed, she revealed - like many people in the audience would that night - that she was a victim of sexual abuse. She calmly finished her speech.

"[After sexual trauma,] you can not only heal: you can grow, and you can thrive," she said, and was met with a standing ovation that eventually became a defiant chant bellowed throughout campus in a massive parade.

This was the mood at Wednesday's rally; a sobering balance between triumph and tragedy organized by the Women's Center and the Violence Against Women Prevention Program. The rally was designed to protest violence against women and to give victims a safe area in which to confront their pasts.

The rally comprised three parts, beginning with a series of speeches from people including UConn President Michael Hogan, followed by a candle-lit parade, and culminating in an emotional hour where victims of sex crimes and domestic violence stood on a stage and - often tearfully - related their experiences with abuse.

"We collectively believe that we should be able to walk down the street at night, and the truth is we cannot do so now," said Allison Berk, the 10th-semester philosophy major and Women's Center staff member who organized and opened the event.

Hogan, who helped convene the Connecticut Campus Coalition to End Violence against Women, also spoke at the event, reflecting on the three decades worth of "Take Back the Night" rallies he has attended.

"In 1977, so much of what we thought we were changing, we weren't," he said. "It's difficult to bring change to widespread social patterns, and difficult how strong and insistent we must be to see that change, even incrementally.

Continued...

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