Leah Perri/ Winonan
The latest Wellness Wednesday program held last week focused on bystander intervention and its importance.
The program, hosted by the Winona State University women and gender studies (WAGS) department and led by the Gender-Based Violence Program on campus, aimed to educate students about issues such as sexual assault and bystander intervention.
Bystander intervention is any situation in which a person notices behavior that could lead to sexual assault or harassment and steps in before the situation escalates.
According to junior Callie Gustafson, a certified sexual and domestic violence advocate earning a minor in WAGS, sexual violence is a relevant issue on Winona State’s campus as well as on every college campus.
“Winona State, like other college campuses, does not have any statistics on the amount of rapes or sexual assaults that occur here, so it gives the impression that our campus is free from sexual assault,” she said.
But this, according to Gustafson, is simply not the case.
Gustafson led the hour long program, along with Winona State students Kaylee Jakubowski and Emily Homan, showing a brief slideshow presentation and a fifteen-minute video demonstrating how anyone, friend or stranger, can be a good bystander and intervene to prevent sexual violence.
The program concluded with Gustafson and her colleagues leading a discussion of various scenarios, allowing students to speculate which ones were considered sexual violence.
According to Gustafson, we live in a society which puts a lot of blame on victims of sexual assault instead of the perpetrators—a phenomenon referred to as “rape culture.”
Because of this, men and women are often taught they are responsible for not getting raped, instead of being taught how to not rape other people.
“It should not matter how drunk a woman is, or what she is wearing, or why she is walking home alone,” Gustafson said. “That is why we have this program—to help educate not just the victims, but everyone in general so that we can take this matter seriously and address the problems that rape culture creates.”
As Gustafson and her colleagues emphasized numerous times, consent is key. Receiving consent from a sexual partner is absolutely necessary in every situation. If consent is not given, it is an act of sexual assault.
The program leaders noted sexual assault involves both men and women, making it important to educate both sexes on the issue.
“So many rapes and sexual assaults go unreported, so while the purpose of the event isn’t to get people to report, it makes it clear to the survivors that they are not to blame for what happened to them,” Gustafson said. “There are people on this campus who they can go to for help.”
The WAGS department is hosting another event on April 22 called “Taking Back the Night.” The event provides a safe place where victims of sexual assault can share their stories.
