According to the Fawcett Society, more than a third of people still believe “if a woman goes out late at night, wearing a short skirt, gets drunk and is then the victim of a sexual assault, she is totally or partly to blame.”

A convicted sex offender, Adam Johnson, recently claimed he wishes he’d raped his 15-year-old victim.

Rape Crisis centres struggle to attract the same volume of donations as other causes, quite possibly because public attitudes and tendencies to victim-blame mean there’s just not as much support for them.

All these things I’ve read in the last 2 days and it made me so angry that Rape Crisis services can be so needed, yet receive so little support, I decided I wanted to do something to raise money and raise awareness.

Virtually everyday, through people I meet in my voluntary work or from stories online, I hear about the devastating effects that rape and other forms of sexual violence have on lives and how much difference dedicated, specialist support services who understand women’s experiences make. 

But even more often I see examples of women being blamed for the things that have happened to them, hear stories of perpetrators receiving unduly lenient sentences, or services at risk of losing their funding and shutting down.  

I thought about what I could do and came up with shaving my hair off. Aside from asking people to sponsor me (please, please sponsor me and make my crazy fundraising attempt worth it!!) I expect it will be a good talking point and reason to raise awareness with people I might not otherwise talk about these subjects with.

My hair will also be donated to the Little Princess Trust who provide real wigs for children suffering from hair loss http://www.littleprincesses.org.uk/. 

Whatever you can do, whether it's donating or sharing this page with your friends, to support me and Rape Crisis England and Wales will be very much appreciated :)