I did not show up

#ichhabnichtge Zeiten was a nationwide social media campaign that women privately organized as part of the Kofra advice center in Munich in 2012 to give victims of sexual violence a voice.

Execution of the action #I have not shown

The campaign #ichhabnichtge Zeiten started nationwide in Germany on May 1st, 2012 after other campaigns first took place in Sweden, England and then in France. The German campaign was based on the French one and was limited to one and a half months until June 15, 2012. It was aimed at women and men who have experienced sexual violence but have not reported it. The aim was to show what experiences are behind the number of unreported cases in the rape statistics, what resistance has kept those affected from filing a complaint and to give impetus to seek competent help.

The victims of sexualised violence were provided with the blog # ichhabnichtge Zeiten.wordpress.com and an email address for anonymous publication of their experiences. The texts were collected, partially answered and made visible by those responsible for the campaign, Daniela Oerter, Sabina Lorenz and Inge Kleine. From there they went anonymously on Facebook and were sent to Twitter at the same time, based on the French and English campaign, in order to reach the broadest possible public. The response to the campaign was great. Within six weeks 1,105 women and men published their experiences and statements as to why they had not reported sexual violence. Numerous media reported about it. The German Women's Council supported the action.

Results

The results were evaluated and published in a report. 506 of those affected were children or adolescents at the time of the offense. According to the organizers, many of those affected had spoken about the experience for the first time because it had happened a long time ago and they had repressed it by then. If perpetrators were named, in 93 percent of the cases they came from the social environment of the victims. They did not report the crime because they felt responsible for the protection and continued existence of family, friends and workplaces. Other reasons given were emotional stress and fear as a result of the crime, as well as a lack of trust in the police and the judiciary .

The success of the campaign prompted the initiators to turn to the Federal Ministries for Family, Justice and Home Affairs with concrete proposals and demands in an open letter with 1,544 signatures from supporters. The demands on the Ministry of Justice include the lifting of the statute of limitations in the case of sexual violence "in order to do justice to the victims, who are only able to file a complaint after a long time due to trauma ".

In July 2012, the organizers, together with the Munich women's emergency number, presented a summary of the results at a press conference in Munich. Representatives of the Munich police headquarters welcomed the demand for psychosocial support for those affected from the time they were reported to the end of the trial and said that they wanted to encourage women to report rape.

foreign countries

England: # ididnotreport
France: # jenaipasportéplainte
Sweden: # prataomdet

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ #prataomdet in Sweden

↑ #ididnotreport in England ( Memento from May 17, 2012 in the Internet Archive )

↑ #jenaipasporteplainte in France

↑ # ichhabnichtgebicht.wordpress.com

↑ Beatrice Osdrowski: wendo - way of women , In: Yvonne Franke et al. (Ed.): Feminisms Today. Positions in theory and practice , Transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2014, ISBN 978-3-8376-2673-5 , p. 326