April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month!

Week Two Theme: "Affects All" 

 What is sexual harassment?

A form of sex discrimination that involves unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature when:

a.       Submission to or rejection of such conduct is made either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of a person's job, pay, or career, or

b.      Submission to or rejection of such conduct by a person is used as a basis for career or employment decisions affecting that person, or

c.       Such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual's work performance or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment. (SOURCE: OPNAVINST 1752.1B)

Have military personnel experienced sexual harassment and/or sexual assault?

Of women who experienced unwanted sexual contact, over 50 percent had experienced these other unwanted and intimidating behaviors. Twenty-five percent indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them before and after the incident. Twenty-three percent of women indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them before the incident and 7% indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them after the incident. (SOURCE: 2010 Workplace and Gender Relations Survey of Active Duty Members: Overview Report on Sexual Assault, Page 29)

Of the men who experienced unwanted sexual contact, 24 percent indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them before and after the incident. Eleven percent of men indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them before the incident and 3% indicated the offender sexually harassed or stalked them after the incident. (SOURCE: 2010 Workplace and Gender Relations Survey of Active Duty Members: Overview Report on Sexual Assault, Pages 29-30)

What is Military Sexual Trauma?

Psychological trauma, which in the judgment of a VA mental health professional, resulted from a physical assault of a sexual nature, battery of a sexual nature, or sexual harassment which occurred while the Veteran was serving on active duty or active duty for training. (SOURCE: U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs webpage. Retrieved online from http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/military-sexual-trauma-general.asp)

FACT: 36.1% of female recruits were victims of rape since the age of 14. (SOURCE: Tina Lee, Psychiatrist, Veterans Affairs Palo Alto (Calif.) Health Care System)

FACT: In FY-10 there were 3,158 reports of sexual assault in DoD. A 2 percent decrease from FY-09. (SOURCE: DoD. (2011). 2010 WGRA. Washington, DC: DMDC. Available: http://www.sapr.mil/index.php/research.)

FACT: The Veterans Administration (VA) spends approximately $10,880 on healthcare costs per military sexual assault survivor. Adjusting for inflation, this means that in 2010 alone, the VA spent almost $872 million dollars on sexual assault-related healthcare expenditures. (SOURCE: Suris et al. 2004. ―Sexual Assault in Women Veterans: An Examination of PTSD Risk, Health Care Utilization, and Cost of Care.‖ Psychosomatic Medicine 66: 749-756)

Myth: Sexual assault does not affect combat effectiveness.

Fact: Sexual assault is incompatible with Navy core values and it is corrosive to morale and

to operational and combat readiness. (SOURCE: DOD Fiscal Year 2010 Annual Report on Sexual Assault in the Military; 2011. 37)

Myth: Sexual assault does not affect mission readiness.

Fact: The crime of sexual assault takes an immeasurable toll on the victim and diminishes the

Department of Defense’s (DoD) overall capability by undermining core values, degrading mission readiness, subverting strategic goodwill, and raising financial costs. (SOURCE: DOD Fiscal Year 2010 Annual Report on Sexual Assault in the Military; 2011. 6