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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
New York Times Op-ed author Helen Benedict sent Salon the following response, which we wanted to share with readers:
"Several readers wish to know where my statistics on rape and sexual assault come from, and also where to go for help. I am happy to oblige. For help from outside the VA system, contact W.O.W., Women Organizing Women, www.vetwow.com; or S.W.A.N., the Service Women Action Network, www.servicewomen.org. For help from the VA itself, go to Women's Mental Health Center: www.womenvetsptsd.va.gov. All citations for the research I quote, and all discussion of why sexual assault happens in the military, what needs to be done to prevent it and where to find help are in my forthcoming book, "The Lonely Soldier: The Private War of Women Serving in Iraq." Alas, one cannot condense an entire book, many pages of footnotes, or such a complex issue into a few hundred words for an Op-Ed. The sources for these statistics on rape, sexual assault and harassment are veterans studies conducted by psychologists, sociologists and doctors at the Dept. of Veterans Affairs or at universities. Veteran studies are more reliable than surveys of active duty troops because veterans feel less threatened and more able to tell the truth. Most of the studies were conducted by teams led by Anne Sadler and Maureen Murdoch and published in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, Military Medicine, Archives of Family Medicine, and the Journal of American Medical Women's Association between the years 1995-2006. They can be found online. But in brief, a 2003 survey of female veterans from Vietnam through the first Gulf War found that 30 percent -- nearly one third -- said they were raped in the military. A 2004 study of female veterans from Vietnam and all the wars since, who were seeking help for post-traumatic stress disorder, found that 71 percent -- nearly three-quarters -- said they were sexually assaulted or raped while serving. And a third study, conducted in 1992-93 with female veterans of the first Gulf War and earlier wars, found that 90 percent said they had been sexually harassed in the military. These are widely respected and oft-cited studies. -- Helen Benedict"
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