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From Patricia, NJCASA's executive director:

I’ve always loved politics. It undoubtedly came from my mom, who brought me to County Committee meetings, and campaigning for local and statewide candidates, and to the State House to support school bus safety. It also came from my dad who was a union worker that sometimes needed to picket to ensure fair wages or appropriate benefits.

And now, here I am on a train, heading to the State of the Union as a guest of Senator Bob Menendez with the awesome responsibility of articulating the nuanced needs of the nearly 2M survivors living in New Jersey. I am humbled.

I know that the country is very divided and that many of the people I love, respect, and admire, will not watch the SOTU tonight, and that’s okay; these are challenging, triggering times. Sometimes we just need to shut it all off in the name of self-preservation.

But, policies impacting survivors in New Jersey are made in Washington, D.C. and Trenton. So…I will be there. Today. Tonight. Tomorrow.

I do not pretend to speak for all survivors. Every survivor’s story is unique and personal, and as such, not all survivors want the same thing. Some want us to work harder to ensure our existing systems are well-trained and prepared to respond to the lived experiences of survivors. Some want us to divest from these systems – understanding that they may not have the capacity to embrace concepts like restorative justice – principles that are critically important to many survivors. Part of my job is ensuring that these nuances don’t get lost in our attempts to “fix” things. We can’t legislate our way out of rape culture.

I do know - we all deserve to live freely in our bodies. We deserve to call-out the misogynistic rhetoric that attempts to paint activists as hyperbolic when we express the ways in which we are impacted by the wide-range of behaviors and attitudes that fall within the spectrum of sexual violence. Aziz Ansari to Harvey Weinstein to Brock Turner. We all know people just.like.this.

I bring this truth with me tonight and I remain humbled by the opportunity.