Shining the Light on Abuse

By Melissa Cunningham
Border Mail
February 10, 2017

http://www.bordermail.com.au/story/4458898/shining-the-light-on-abuse/?cs=12

Ballarat will become a sea of colour in support of survivors of child sexual abuse in May.

Survivors and the community will join together for a week long event aimed at shining the light on child sexual abuse. The No More Silence week will run from May 21 to 27.

It marks the two year anniversary of the formation of Ballarat’s grassroots Loud Fence movement, which encourages people to tie brightly-coloured ribbons on the fences of Catholic institutions, as a symbolic act of solidarity with victims of sexual abuse.

It’s been another tough week with revelations from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual abuse almost one in ten priests in the Diocese of Ballarat had allegations of child sexual abuse levelled against them between 1950 and 2010.

But behind the scenes, a community group made up Ballarat City Council leaders, counsellors and Loud Fence are working tirelessly to gather hundreds of photos, news articles, and short films documenting the journey of child sexual abuse victims.

The pieces will be used for a pioneering exhibition with elements on display at M.A.D.E and the Gold Museum. The team also hope to secure state or federal funding for curator to collate, assemble and digitise the exhibition.

A profound focus of the week will be the royal commission hearings held in Ballarat, Melbourne and the survivors’ trip to Rome to bear witness to Cardinal George Pell’s evidence.

There will also be a Loud Fence at the Ballarat library where people can tie a ribbon of support for victims of sexual abuse and a civic reception at the Trench Room in the Town Hall.

Centre Against Sexual Assault senior counsellor Andrea Lockhart said the week was critical in continuing to raise of awareness of sexual assault.

“We know that so many women, men, children, young people and families in our community have been impacted by sexual assault,” she said. “We need to keep these conversations happening in order to continue to give sexual assault survivors a voice. It is a way of supporting people to seek help in the future.”

Loud Fence creator Maureen Hatcher said child sexual abuse was an ongoing issue.

“Sadly, we can read headlines and news stories and forget about them the following week,” Ms Hatcher said. “I hope No More Silence week engages the community so we all continue to support all survivors and victims and to send a strong message that we will do all we can to keep children safe in our community.”

To contact CASA call 5320 3933 or free call 24 hours 1800 806 292.