Coming back to school doesn’t usually make people think of things like sexual assault prevention. However, recent studies have shown that sex-related incidents are more frequent early in a term, giving the first six weeks of a term the name “The Redzone.” Because of this, the University Women’s Center has put together their own “Redzone” campaign to increase awareness during these weeks.
While it’s still in the early stages, the main plan for this campaign is to provide campus-area bars with coasters that have sexual assault prevention tips. Because it can be quite a heavy topic, they have added some humor to these coasters to make it more appropriate for the bar scene.
“Use the buddy system! If you are not able to stop yourself from assaulting people, ask a friend to stay with you!” is an example of one of the two tips that are on the new coasters. On one side, they have tips like this, and on the other they list the numbers for SWAT and the Women’s Center.
“We’ve been thinking about this for a while,” said Nina Nolen, the public relations coordinator for the University Women’s Center. A goal of the campaign was not to use typical tips that put responsibility solely on the survivor.
“It’s putting the responsibility on the perpetrator, but it’s also doing it in a humorous way,” she said.
For now, they have coasters with two different tips. The goal is to eventually have 10 different tips, and to have these coasters spread all over Eugene. For the moment, they are still in the process of talking to bar and restaurant owners and looking into finding funding from other sources.
“Obviously it’s not a light issue — we know that,” Nolen said. “Hopefully it allows people to look at it and laugh at it, and also know it’s an important issue and look at it in a different way.”