Sex Abuse and Female Soldiers

I came across this video of A report that Katie Couric did back in March 2009 about sexual abuse and female soldiers. In the beginning of the interview, a former female soldier, Jessica, shared her story and it was very horrific to hear. Her squad leader try to force himself on her and someone she knew from another military base raped her. At point she said ".. figure out how to turn the guy and become one of the guys..." Its disturbing to hear that w person who is fighting for her country has to be afraid being attacked by her officers and even her fellow soldiers.

Katie Couric also mentions in the article that the Pentagon started a program in 2006 to track sexual assaults because Congress ordered them to do it. For the the fact that the Pentagon didn't want to find out about these attacks and had to to be forced by Congress is sad to hear. It seems as though they would rather turn a blind eye on the sexual assaults happening. A good thing that I learned about from the video is that the Army came up with a program called " I. A.M. Strong". This is how the website describes the program:

What is I. A.M. STRONG?

Intervene, Act, and Motivate  (I. A.M.) STRONG is the Army’s campaign to combat sexual assaults by engaging all Soldiers in preventing sexual assaults before they occur.

Grounded by our shared belief in the Army Values, we are a band of brothers and sisters, placing mission first, never accepting defeat, never quitting and never leaving a fallen comrade.   Our interdependence and shared respect among comrades frames who we are as a Team and an Army - a Team that finds sexual assault reprehensible and beyond toleration.   Those who commit assaults hurt a member of our Team and wound our Army.    This criminal act is cowardly and damaging to the very moral fiber that gives our Army its innermost strength.

As Soldiers and proud members of our Team, we are duty bound to Intervene, Act, and Motivate others to stop sexual assaults and the sexually offensive language and gestures that create an environment friendly to this abuse.

It's wonderful to see that they are taking the necessary steps to reduce the number of sexual attacks happen. This comes to show that they are starting to listen to these female soldiers.