Take Back the Night offers support for victims and survivors

WSU%E2%80%99s+Coalition+for+Women+Students+hosted+%E2%80%9CTake+Back+The+Night%E2%80%9D+in+Todd+Auditorium+on+Thursday+night%2C+featuring+spoken+word+and+musical+performers.

WSU’s Coalition for Women Students hosted “Take Back The Night” in Todd Auditorium on Thursday night, featuring spoken word and musical performers.

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Draped in glow sticks and with a cause in their hearts, they work together to take back the night.

Take Back the Night is an annual event hosted by the Coalition for Women Students and the Women’s Resource Center.

Tables and booths lined the walls outside Todd Auditorium with information detailing support groups and organizations, such as Alternatives to Violence on the Palouse, Health and Wellness and The Office of Equal Opportunity.

“I wanted to incorporate so many different groups,” Timonae Taylor, Coalition for Women Students chair and leader of the event said. “I thought about how many (people) on this campus don’t know how to report discrimination, sexual violence, any type of abuse.”

As a freshman, Taylor needed something to do, a meeting to go to every week and something she could align herself with, and she found that with the Coalition for Women Students.

Taylor believes in moving past gender and race to bringing people together. She knows that with Take Back the Night, she will be reaching out to survivors and supporters alike. She hopes to empower people to share their stories and also show no one is truly alone.

There were four spoken word performers and one musical performance, all based on the performer’s own experience with sexual assault or times this year where injustice toward women took place.

“They are telling their stories (and) talking about these issues through their art form and about the issues that matter,” Taylor said. “They talk about the realness of it.”

Emily Feuerstein, a freshman majoring in bio-engineering, expressed her appreciation for the tabling piece of the rally, saying that assault could happen to anyone, and it is important to know where victims can go.

“We talk about it not really stressed in society, so I think it’s good that is becoming more of a prominent awareness issue,” Feuerstein said.

Take Back the Night 2016 took place on Thursday. Attendees marched from Todd Hall and ended their parade at the fire pit across from Streit-Perham Hall, chanting together, ‘though it is a night of awareness, it is also a night of healing.’