If you’re reading this blog, chances are good that either you are a survivor of child sexual assault or you know someone who is.
It is not something that is new to the world — children have been sexually assaulted by family, friends, neighbors, etc., for as long as human life has existed. Children are easy to manipulate and easy to abuse, and those in positions of power (in relation to those children) have been doing it for far too long.
Let’s make 2015 the year where children fight back and stop this horrible, violent attack on the youth of our world.
One young woman who has already made this her lifelong quest is Erin Merryn. Her tireless effort to make “Erin’s Law” the law of the land throughout the United States has already achieved recognition and she is picking up supporters in states where the law currently does not exist, and I have been involved in efforts to make the law happen in my home state of Nebraska.
Quoting from the Erin’s Law website, here is what Erin’s Law is all about:
Erin’s Law is named after childhood sexual assault survivor, author, speaker and activist Erin Merryn, who is the founder and President of Erin’s Law, which is registered with the State of Illinois and the IRS as a 501 (c)(4) non-profit social welfare organization.
After Erin introduced the legislation in her home state of Illinois, the bill was named Erin’s Law after her by legislators and it has caught on nationwide.
“Erin’s Law” requires that all public schools in each state that passes it implement a prevention-oriented child sexual abuse program which teaches:
— Students in grades preK – 5th grade, age-appropriate techniques to recognize child sexual abuse and tell a trusted adult
— School personnel all about child sexual abuse
— Parents & guardians the warning signs of child sexual abuse, plus needed assistance, referral or resource information to support sexually abused children and their families.
More than half of the states in the U.S. have either passed Erin’s Law or have it under consideration in their respective legislatures. Her home state of Illinois was the first to pass the law in February of 2011, and the states of New Mexico, Utah, Tennessee, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Louisiana, South Carolina and Vermont passed the law in 2014.
Here in Nebraska, a modified version of Erin’s Law was introduced by State Sen. Dave Bloomfield. The difference between LB143 and Erin’s Law is that the Department of Education would be required to draw up a template for a child sexual abuse policy that school districts in the state would have the “option” of incorporating into their schools. Obviously, this is not enough, and Bloomfield has told me on numerous occasions that any attempt to change LB143 to make the policy mandatory would be grounds for him to pull the bill, as he feels — erroneously, I might add — that the requirement would be an unfunded mandate, which he is opposed to.
Sen. Bloomfield’s support of his own legislation is, at best, tepid. He had a chance, during the 2014 session of the Nebraska Legislature, to make the bill his priority bill and open the door for school districts to introduce child sexual abuse policies in their school. Instead, he chose a bill that would give motorcycle riders the option of riding without a helmet (motorcycle riders are required to wear helmets in Nebraska). When asked how he could justify this decision, he told me that he had 94,000 motorcyclists in the state who, he felt, should have the freedom to choose whether or not they wanted to risk their lives by riding without a helmet. How this trumps more than 300,000 children under the age of 18 in the state to have the tools to keep themselves safe from sexual abuses, to this day, defies logical thought.
One of my personal goals for 2015 is to overcome this close-minded “representation” within Nebraska’s governing system and get THE version of Erin’s Law passed. With a new governor and a number of new state senators on board, the opportunity to help the children of Nebraska couldn’t be better.
I would encourage you to check out the Erin’s Law website at www.erinslaw.org and get involved in the effort to make Merryn’s law the law of the land in all 50 states. More than 20 are already on board — let’s make a nationwide effort to make every state an “Erin’s Law” state.
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Erin Merryn’s new book is outstanding
As I was preparing for my first interviews after publication of “Call Me A Survivor,” I ran across the name of a young lady from Illinois – Erin Merryn.
Her name came up in a Google search with a link that talked about “Erin’s Law,” an effort she began to put sexual abuse education and prevention in every public school in America.
To say the young lady is on a crusade would be like saying water is wet – in a short time she has seen her law passed in nine states (including Arkansas, which ran it through in a remarkable three weeks from first day of testimony to the governor’s signature) and has 19 more states looking at it during their respective 2014 legislative sessions (including my home state of Nebraska, which has a modified version of it, LB143, that makes it optional for school districts – I’ll be talking to state senators about upgrading it to the full version).
I downloaded her second book, “Living For Today” on my Kindle and found myself unable to put it down. I found myself looking back on some of my experiences as a survivor of sexual assault and feeling a lot of the pain she expressed in her writing. We have corresponded back and forth a few times on e-mail about getting Erin’s Law passed here in Nebraska, and I am happy to say that I’ve just finished reading her third book, “An Unimaginable Act” that she published earlier this month.
Merryn details not only her experiences as a survivor, but some of the health issues – physical, mental and emotional – that she has dealt with in her life. She also talks extensively about the work she has done to get Erin’s Law passed in her home state, as well as in other states such as Michigan and Arkansas, and her special moment last year when she was named one of Glamour magazine’s Women of the Year for 2012.
Merryn has had to overcome quite a bit. Not only her efforts to battle through the pain as a survivor of sexual assault, but overcoming those who doubted or didn’t believe in her. This is one self-determined young lady who refuses to take no for an answer when it’s something she truly believes in with all her heart. She is not the least bit afraid to talk about her experiences and to ask people in state governments across the country why we require schools to teach our kids about stranger danger and saying no to drugs, but we can’t educate them about safe and unsafe touch, safe and unsafe secrets or how to get away and tell today.
Erin Merryn is on a mission – and if your state doesn’t already have Erin’s Law in place, you need to call your state representatives and get them on board with it.
And, while you’re at it, get this book as well. “An Unimaginable Act” is an outstanding piece of work by an outstanding young lady. It’s a must read for anybody who is a survivor of sexual assault – or has one in their lives.