The Open Letter Movement

Reported by Cayla Bleoaja

Newberg, Ore. -- On Oct. 1, every student received a message from Student Life and Campus Public Safety about a “safety concern” regarding incidents of sexual harassment that occurred outside dorms on campus. The brief email closed by encouraging “common-sense precautions” such as walking in well-lit areas and wearing only one earbud.

When Justine Hostetler opened and read the email, it left her with “a gut feeling that something about it was off — not just off, but very wrong.” In asking students to protect themselves using precautions that were largely being followed during both assaults, the email shifted the responsibility of attacks from the perpetrator to the survivor. 

Hostetler says such messaging is “an affront to survivors by subliminally implying assault is somehow something they could have avoided.” 

In response, Hostetler wrote an open letter to George Fox, calling for concrete institutional changes to be made in concert with students reflecting that the university places a high priority on equally safeguarding the physical and emotional wellbeing of all students, especially survivors of sexual assault. 

“We cannot Be Known if our own university does not protect, empower, and believe us,” she wrote. The letter became the start of The Open Letter Movement. Within 48 hours, the letter received over 150 signatures solely through social media, where the Instagram account gained more than 300 followers in less than a day.

For Hostetler, the incident points to a need for cultural change in how discussions on sexual assault are framed. The email was problematic in that it focused on students protecting themselves instead of emphasizing that perpetrators will not be tolerated. 

“A zero tolerance policy is the norm on other campuses and it must be here as well,” Hostetler says. “The way to effect change is first and foremost through a cultural shift, which begins in messaging.” 

“If we change our emails, our conversations, and our questions to run along the lines of ‘what could a perpetrator possibly be thinking, believing they could get away with touching you?’ instead of ‘what were you thinking, walking alone at night?’ there will be an opportunity for true campus-wide reform,” Hostetler says. 

An Open Letter Movement is dedicated to changing the narrative at GFU to one that holds perpetrators responsible, genuinely honors survivors, and communicates that sexual assault, of any kind, is always a crime. 

It aims not only to raise awareness, but to initiate actual change by normalizing a dialogue between students and campus leadership about Title IX. The ultimate goal is for GFU to become a zero-tolerance campus, and it starts with intentional change on every level of the university— in the student body, security, and leadership.

“As a faith-centered community, we should be the forerunners of justice and equality. We have an opportunity to redeem what is broken, to protect those who are vulnerable, and to heal what has been hurt,” Hostetler says. 

Students and staff can support the movement by following An Open Letter Movement on Instagram @openlettermovement and Twitter @openlettermove.