Send a Holiday Message to a Prison Rape Survivor

Just a few uplifting words can have a huge impact.

The holidays are a wonderful time to spread well-wishes all around. This season, you can do that by sending a kind message to a survivor of prison sexual abuse.

Just Detention International, a human rights organization with a mission to stop the sexual abuse of prisoners, offers an easy way to send uplifting words to those who really need them. It only takes a few seconds, yet your message will mean an immense amount.

One example comes from a survivor who told his story to Buzzfeed:

In the months after Joe Booth was raped by another inmate in a California correctional facility, he recalls, he wrote somewhere between 20 and 50 letters to law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, and advocacy groups, looking for some kind of legal avenue to bring charges against his attacker.

The only helpful response he received wasn’t from a lawyer or government official, he said — it was an anonymous handwritten Christmas card from a stranger.

“Right at that point I was literally just ready to give up,” Booth told BuzzFeed News. “I can’t tell you what it meant to me at the time…When you’re locked up, and you’re sitting in a cell by yourself, and people are telling you that you’re everything but a child of god, and nobody is saying anything good about you, it just really helps to know that you’re not alone.”

You can do the same for another survivor. Please send your message and be sure to spread the word.

Thanks,

AlterNet Staff

Originally posted here