Unbound: My Story of Liberation and the Birth of the Me Too Movement

by Tarana Burke

We were committed to being better about taking responsibility for the young people in our care who were experiencing any kind of trauma. For all the good the organization did, sexual violence was its blind spot. Years and years of girls spilling their innermost truths about their experiences, and 21C never employed a trained professional to oversee these sessions. Numbers of girls, and some boys, gave us clear indications that they may not have been safe at home, and we sent them back anyway, with no defense and no recourse. It remains in the front of my mind today. It is wildly irresponsible to make people feel comfortable enough to open up without being prepared with the resources to help them process their experiences and receive continued support. We were doing our best with the limited knowledge and resources we had at the time, but even then I wished we were doing more.