One in Three Women

In April of 2007, I was confronted with what seemed to be a no-brainer situation. A few classmates and I were discussing favorite movies and "The Hills Have Eyes" came up. Seeing as how I had never seen the movie and a good friend of mine had to get up and leave due to the violence, we tuned out as best we could. One of our fellow students asked why we hadn't seen the movie and my friend replied, "The opening scene is of a rape!" This was enough for me to chime in with my two cents. I told him that I felt there was no need for the plot line to show a rape being performed for the sake of the movie. This fellow student was persistent in telling me that the actors were being paid to be raped and it was all in justification of the movie. I couldn't help myself. I told him as sternly as I could that rape is never justified, and can never stand to be. My good friend, "Jane", and I wanted to prove this third party, "John", wrong. Jane & I came together on Facebook and made a group titled, "Rape is NEVER Justified". The conversation left the classroom and John began instigating the conversation online. Therefore, I pasted the IM transcript into the group. We invited our entire lists and before you knew it, we had 30 and 40 people in our group in less than a week. Eventually, we moved out to the Cause & Page applications as well as Myspace.

[More:]

We stand today, nearly two years later, with over 35,000 supporters by word of mouth. We have recently purchased a domain name (www.rapeisneverjustified.net) to help secure our mission. As a staff of five, we have dedicated our time to being a support group for victims of abuse and rape. We felt as though that was something most victims lacked - Support. Most of the time, we just need to be reassured that we have someone to talk to, day or night, when we need to. We have divided up our staff, with three counselors, and two executive members. I am the founder of Rape is Never Justified. I am eighteen years old and am a sophomore in college working towards a major in business management. My goal for RNJ is to raise enough money through donations and merchandise to receive aid from the government to help support RNJ in its growing moments. I try to spread my knowledge and do a little bit of everything. Emily, my vice president, is sixteen years old and focuses primarily on the design aspects of RNJ. She has dedicated her time to organizing and running a benefit concert for us last June, 2008 in Michigan and dedicates her services to designing our merchandise, banners, and graphic design. Rivka, my head counselor, is twenty years old and has been with RNJ as a counselor for nearly a year now. She helps in the organizing of our counselors and meeting the needs of our supporters who come to us. Our two counselors Erica (twenty) and Sarah (twenty-six) dedicate their time strictly to helping victims who come to them. Erica has been with RNJ for nearly a year and has been teaming up with Rivka for majority of the time. Sarah is our newest member to the RNJ staff, but we have faith in her as she is working towards a counseling degree.

The grateful mission of RNJ is simply to provide a support system for those victims around the world who are in need of a shoulder to lean on. The "baby" of the RNJ family (our more dedicated supporters found on the message boards) is fourteen and our oldest support to my knowledge is in his late fifties or early sixties and works with organizations such as Wo(MEN) Speak Out! Like any organization, each staff member has different strengths and opportunities for improvement, but we have made sure that we spend a careful amount of time getting to know each individual who puts forth the effort. We have been around for nearly two years, and to have the amount of support we have already been given has been an amazing experience. We can do nothing but thank each individual who has contributed their time and energy to helping RNJ grow.

Ali Mark

Rape is Never Justified Co-Founder