Tears Foundation

General information

TEARS (Transform Education About Rape and Sexual Abuse) (Start a Rising)
Tears says NO to Rape and Sexual abuse

The Tears Foundation as a Non Profit Organisation with a Schedule A+ BEE certification

The TEARS programme is tackling the social problem of Rape and Sexual Abuse. Through a multi-pronged, market-based approach that integrates Technology and traditional marketing methods we will provide information and access to assistance services to victims of rape and sexual abuse, and through education and awareness building promote knowledge of individual rights and healthier social attitudes. The aim is to reduce widely entrenched violence against women, children and adolescents, and to promote and protect the sexual rights of minorities and other vulnerable groups.

It is our aim to make TEARS the 911 helpline for victims of rape and sexual abuse. TEARS has designed a unique programme, in the form of a mobile phone portal and website, Through this system, access to legal, medical and psychological support is available on all cell phone networks, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, free or at minimal charge, to every member of society.

EVERY 17 SECONDS

� Interpol has named South Africa the Rape Capital of the World. (Interpol)

� In South Africa, someone is raped or sexually abused every 17 seconds. (Interpol)

� 2 out of 5 South African male learners say that they have been raped, according to a survey carried out in 1 200 schools across the country. (Published in BioMed Central's International Journal for Equity in Health)

THREE IS THE NUMBER

� 3 is the number of children raped every minute

� 13 800 is the number of child rape victims per year

� 45% of rapes reported to police in South Africa are child rapes

� 50% of South Africas children will be abused before the age of 18

� The greatest increase in sexual violence has been against infants and children under the age of seven. (www.rape.co.za (Rape Statistics South Africa and Worldwide)

� 64 514 was the number of rapes reported to police in South Africa last year. 75 80% of rapes and sexual crimes go unreported (www.saps.gov.za/.../reports/crimestats)

� South Africa has some of the highest incidences of child and baby rape in the world.

� 1 in 3 of the 4000 women questioned by the Community of Information, Empowerment and Transparency said that they had been raped in the past year.

� In a related survey conducted among 1 500 schoolchildren in the Soweto Township, a quarter of all the boys interviewed said that 'jackrolling', a term for gang rape, was fun. (Reuters: South Africas child-rape epidemic, Finbarr OReilly)

� Less than 10% of the rapes reported to police last year resulted in successful convictions (www.southafricaproject.co.za)

� Between 28 and 30% of adolescents reported that their first sexual encounter was forced. (www.rape.co.za (Rape Statistics South Africa and Worldwide))

� According to a report broadcast on e.tv, 1 in 3 South African women will be raped in their lifetime.

� A 2009 Medical Research Council (MRC) report found that more than 25 percent of men interviewed in KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape provinces admitted to committing at least one rape, and more than half of those persons admitted to raping more than one person. In a 2011 study conducted in Gauteng province by the MRC and Gender Links, 37.4 percent of men admitted to having committed one or more rapes.

� According to the NGO Childline, 25 percent of girls and 20 percent of boys were at risk of being raped before age 16.

� 40% of victims who report rape to the police are girls under 18, and 15% are under the age of 12 (MRC Gender & Health Research Unit, Medical Research Council)

Cultural attitudes

We are faced with unique cultural challenges.

Common myth holds that sexual intercourse with a virgin will cure a man of HIV or AIDS. This is thought to be the cause of the shocking number of child and baby rapes that occur in our country.

Prevailing attitudes in a largely male dominated society. Often, sexual crimes committed against women are considered to be the right of males, particularly if they occur within a marriage or intimate relationship. This includes the tradition of polygamy, and customs such as Ukuthwala, a form of abduction that involves the kidnapping, rape and forced marriage of girls as young as twelve, by grown men old enough to be their grandfathers.

Corrective rape is also practiced throughout Africa. This belief holds that if a man rapes a woman who is a lesbian, he will cure her of this affliction.

Organisations at the forefront of service provision for rape survivors report that 75 80% of survivors do NOT report their crimes because of a lack of faith in the criminal justice system (1 in 9 Campaign). There is an ongoing lack of state funding for the operational costs of government agencies that provide services to rape victims (Alipo, 2010).

Because cases of rape and sexual abuse are so grossly under-reported, it is difficult to give an exact figure. However, through our own research, we estimate the numbers to be anything from 5 10 million people per annum.

The result is insufficient awareness of protocols concerning the protection of victims of sexual offences by police and the criminal justice system, despite the fact that this protection is mandated by the law.

Lack of Police follow-through

The majority of crimes go unreported, for the following reasons:

The perception is that the police are unsympathetic and that nothing will be done.

Victims often fear further reprisals from their attackers if they report the incident.

Increasing statistics and lack of recourse in schools

Rape and sexual abuse is rife in schools across South Africa, adding to the current state of disarray in which our education system finds itself, and contributing to the dismal matric pass rates which threaten the future economic wellbeing of our youth, and the country as a whole. Victims of abuse stay away from school or drop out altogether, due to physical and psychological trauma, and the fear of further abuse from their attackers.

These appalling, and deeply saddening, statistics leave us in no doubt that to realise, among our other shared hopes and beliefs, a vision of a society that is empowered, free, healthy and whole, urgent intervention is required. It is our belief that unless we make inroads against sexual violence, the very fabric of our society, and the future we bequeath to our children in our country, is imperilled.

The effect of rape on HIV/AIDS statistics in South Africa

Because rape is a crime of force, the mucosal tearing and bleeding that occurs as a result makes the transference of HIV to victims a certainty. Medical researchers are in agreement that one of the greatest contributors to South Africas high statistics for HIV/AIDS is our high and rapidly increasing rape statistics. South Africa accounts for 17% of the global burden of disease relating to HIV infection.

Website: http://www.tears.co.za/