News

SUPPORT LINE UPDATE

We are pleased to share with you that our Support Line can now offer a full service of phonecall, text and email contact. Our core hours are now from 1pm to 5pm every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. 

We appreciate that the past several months have been difficult with Support Line unable to operate as fully as we would have liked, and we want to say thank you for your patience and understanding during this time. The Support Line team look forward to continuing our work providing emotional support and information to survivors throughout the Highlands.

You can contact us by phone 03330 066909 

You can text us on 07451 288080

Or send us an email support@rasash.org.uk

RASASH Welcomes Award-Winning Journalist Iona M.J. MacDonald as Charity Ambassador

As part of International Women's Day, we're proud to announce the appointment of award-winning teenage journalist Iona M.J. MacDonald as our newest Charity Ambassador. Iona’s advocacy and dedication to raising awareness of gender-based violence make her a perfect fit for our organisation's mission to support survivors and combat sexual violence. 

In her role as Charity Ambassador, Iona will work closely with RASASH to amplify our message, promote our services, and advocate for the rights of survivors. Through her platform and influence, Iona aims to challenge stereotypes surrounding survivors of gender-based violence and empower others to speak out against abuse. 

Reflecting on her appointment, Iona expressed her excitement to contribute to RASASH's life-changing work.  

"There was a time where I never thought I would gain the freedom to have my name or picture anywhere public, without putting myself and my loved ones in danger. So now, it fills me with fierce pride to say I'm the new Charity Ambassador for RASASH - a lifeline charity helping people who are enduring circumstances similar to my own past experience of gender-based violence." 

As an award-winning teenage journalist, I want to change the stereotypes of what a survivor "should" look like, or "should" be capable of. I wish for a world where all survivors can seize the freedom and empowerment to write their own narrative too. I'm really looking forward to getting involved with this essential charity who carries out fearless, life-changing work." 

Our CEO, Romy Rehfeld, reflected on Iona’s appointment, stating, "We are thrilled to welcome Iona M.J. MacDonald as our Charity Ambassador. Her passion, resilience, and dedication to raising awareness of gender-based violence are inspiring. With Iona's support, we will continue to expand awareness of our service and provide vital support to survivors in our communities across Highland." 

Iona’s appointment comes at a critical time for our organisation as we strive to meet the increasing demand for our services and tackle the root causes of sexual violence across Highland. As Charity Ambassador, Iona will play a pivotal role in driving positive change and fostering a culture of respect and equality. 

Join us in welcoming Iona to the RASASH family! Together, we'll continue our life-changing work, empowering survivors and spreading hope. Stay tuned for more updates on how you too can get involved and make a difference!  

Becoming a Trustee: Experiences from an LGBT+ young woman

By Arrate de La Cruz. Arrate wrote this piece for LGBT History Month about her time volunteering with RASASH and working as a Trustee for our organisation.

As we celebrate LGBT+ History Month, I reflect on my experience as a young LGBT board member in a feminist organisation.

RASASH is a charity committed to supporting survivors of sexual violence across the Highlands, providing outreach support so everyone can access the service regardless of location. It also promotes social change by raising awareness of sexual violence and campaigning.

I started volunteering at RASASH when I was 21 to support campaigning and fundraising as I believed in the importance of working towards preventing gendered-based violence.

As I learned more about feminist values and the urgency of supporting survivors of all backgrounds, I felt I wanted to help make an impact at the strategic level, but when I heard of the Trustee vacancy, I was unsure about what it implied and whether I would fit the role.

I was genuinely nervous about being young and still a student, which made getting involved in the governance of a charity feel huge. Still, encouraged by loved ones and colleagues, I decided to look into it further and apply for the role. I couldn’t be happier I did.

Even though, as a Trustee, you don’t work at the front line with survivors, you have a critical influence at the operational level and are able to contribute to the charity’s development and growth.

Being part of the RASASH’s Board has been an enriching experience, both personally and professionally. As a feminist organisation, we use consensus-based decision-making to embrace networks of connection and to allow everyone to have their say - rather than adhering to more traditional hierarchical approaches to leadership.

I’ve had the chance to meet like-minded people that I would not have met otherwise, and I feel that I can make a difference. As a young woman from the LGBT+ community, I wanted to contribute to RASASH’s services being as inclusive as possible as I believe in the importance of lifting the voices of those historically unheard, such as LGBT members, which Trustee roles can enable.

I would encourage anyone with a keen interest in social change and community impact to join a charity Board regardless of their experience or background. Becoming a Trustee enables you to gain a broad range of skills, to network and to support vital services. Although it may feel overwhelming at first, experience is something that is gained over time and with good mentoring.

After all, nothing ventured, nothing gained!

LGBTQ+ Access and Inclusion at RASASH

As part of LGBT History Month in February, we are keen to highlight some of our engagement work with LGBTQ+ communities in Highland who have generously shared their thoughts, ideas and experiences with us to help ensure we are as inclusive a service as we can be.

Sexual violence is everywhere: often, it is hidden, but it is out there. Even in the smallest of villages and remotest of communities in Highland where people insist things ‘like that don’t happen here’. As the Highlands’ only specialist support service for survivors of sexual violence, at RASASH we know this mindset all too well: the denial that there is a problem in this area of Scotland with ‘that sort of thing’.

Such refusal, disbelief and silencing within smaller, rural communities will often add another layer of challenge for those who’ve experienced sexual violence: how to speak out and disclose what’s happened when you’re embedded within a culture that you fear will not stand by you and at worst, may well ostracize you? These fears are well-founded, with the end result being that many survivors opt never to disclose what’s happened to them, often holding trauma for years, and sometimes, decades.

The challenges for survivors in remote and/or rural communities who also belong to marginalized communities, such as LGBTQ+ survivors, are further compounded. As part of RASASH’s ongoing work to ensure our service is as accessible and inclusive as possible across the region, we have heard from a range of LGBTQ+ individuals who have generously and courageously voiced their experiences and views on what it is to navigate life as a member of the community in Highland and what it means for a service to be truly inclusive and accessible.

The learnings from this work are far-reaching and have read-across for services across the board, beyond the Third Sector. Recurring themes which have arisen throughout our engagement with the LGBTQ+ community include:

• The need to be explicit about a service’s inclusivity: when this comes to RASASH, this means emphasizing in our external communications and materials that we support anyone of any gender or sexuality age 13+: sexual violence can and does happen to anyone, but those in the LGBTQ+ community are disproportionately affected.

In the current climate, services can and must do more in particular to promote trans inclusion.

• Gestures from organizations such as displaying Pride or Progress flags are good, but must not be tokenistic or just once a year; they must be backed up with concrete actions year-round. Specifically, rigorous staff training around diversity and inclusion was highlighted as an absolute baseline necessity for any service aiming to be welcoming to the LGBTQ+ population.
• Confidentiality: this is a concern for any sexual violence survivor when disclosing. For LGBTQ+ individuals it is especially important, particularly for those who are not ‘out’ in their communities. Services must be transparent and upfront about their privacy and confidentiality policies and under which circumstances information may need to be shared on to a third party. Being mindful of power dynamics at all times when working with survivors is of paramount importance: bearing in mind that sexual violence is an abuse of power, workers must endeavour to minimize replicating any imbalance of power in their relationships with service users, and this applies to holding information confidentially.

• There is no ‘universal’ experience of being an LBGTQ+ person. As one participant astutely highlighted, ‘if you’ve met one trans person, then you’ve met one trans person’. There can be a tendency for LGBTQ+ people to be viewed as a homogenous entity when it comes to service design, but as this participant emphasized, ‘one size fits none’. Instead, working from a truly person-centered standpoint entails meeting individuals exactly as that: individuals. This approach must be built into the ethos of the organization for it to not only meet users’ needs, but also for it to be truly equitable in its provision.

There is more work to be done to ensure that RASASH is working for all survivors, and we are have an ongoing commitment to this as an intersectional feminist organization. What we know is that there is always more to learn and reflect on: doing things better is never a tick-box exercise. We are incredibly grateful to the range of LGBTQ+ individuals we have spoken with in recent months whose openness and strength in sharing their experiences and thoughts has been not only hugely informative, but truly powerful to bear witness to. Thank you.