Plain Sight
Tackling Public Misconceptions of Adult Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse
Plain Sight is a creative research project designed to challenge harmful attitudes that exist in society about adult survivors of child sexual abuse.
Viv Gordon Company is working with Dr. Alison McKinlay from the Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology at University College London to understand what needs to change in terms of how CSA survivors are thought about and talked about in the UK today. Stigma and taboo leave so many of us feeling isolated, unable to speak up and unable to access opportunities and services. Enough is enough. It’s time for CSA survivors to disrupt the conversation and take control of our own narratives.
Plain Sight Short Films
We have been supported by the Violence, Abuse and Mental Health Network (VAMHN) to work collaboratively to create a series of short films inspired by CSA survivor responses to our creative online survey.
These four films, created in collaboration with Fluxx Films and based on responses from 25 CSA survivors, kick back against toxic positivity and the idea of the "well behaved" survivor, call out pathologising systems and cultures, reflect the pain, isolation and embodied experience of CSA survival and sing with hope for a different future.
The films are about surviving CSA and do not contain any content about abuse itself. Please take time to consider your own needs engaging with these films. Remember you can stop at any time and you do not need to watch all 4 films at once. You might prefer to watch with a friend, therapist or support group. You might want to think about nurturing or grounding activities you can do if needed like having a warm drink, stroking a pet, having a stretch or noticing things in your space.
Information, resources and support are available for child sexual abuse survivors, their families and friends here:
The Survivors Trust Website: https://www.thesurvivorstrust.org/
If you are a survivor needing support right now please contact the Rape Crisis England & Wales 24/7 Rape & Sexual Abuse Support Line: 0808 500 2222 or Live Chat: https://247sexualabusesupport.org.uk
Viv Gordon Company is working with Dr. Alison McKinlay from the Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology at University College London to understand what needs to change in terms of how CSA survivors are thought about and talked about in the UK today. Stigma and taboo leave so many of us feeling isolated, unable to speak up and unable to access opportunities and services. Enough is enough. It’s time for CSA survivors to disrupt the conversation and take control of our own narratives.
Plain Sight Short Films
We have been supported by the Violence, Abuse and Mental Health Network (VAMHN) to work collaboratively to create a series of short films inspired by CSA survivor responses to our creative online survey.
These four films, created in collaboration with Fluxx Films and based on responses from 25 CSA survivors, kick back against toxic positivity and the idea of the "well behaved" survivor, call out pathologising systems and cultures, reflect the pain, isolation and embodied experience of CSA survival and sing with hope for a different future.
The films are about surviving CSA and do not contain any content about abuse itself. Please take time to consider your own needs engaging with these films. Remember you can stop at any time and you do not need to watch all 4 films at once. You might prefer to watch with a friend, therapist or support group. You might want to think about nurturing or grounding activities you can do if needed like having a warm drink, stroking a pet, having a stretch or noticing things in your space.
Information, resources and support are available for child sexual abuse survivors, their families and friends here:
The Survivors Trust Website: https://www.thesurvivorstrust.org/
If you are a survivor needing support right now please contact the Rape Crisis England & Wales 24/7 Rape & Sexual Abuse Support Line: 0808 500 2222 or Live Chat: https://247sexualabusesupport.org.uk
UCL Research Ethics Committee Approval ID Number: 23515/001
'Alive' - written and performed by Viv Gordon
‘Alive’ is a kick back against toxic positivity and the idea of the good survivor, a theme that came through strongly in the research. Survivors wanted people to engage with how exhausting it is trying to be “positive” as we navigate catastrophically broken systems that fail to serve us. ‘Alive’ is a hymn to our anger and the fact that surviving is fucking hard. It bears witness to our messy, uncomfortable, complex experiences that don't need tidying up to be worthy of attention and support.
'The Story' - written and performed by Viv Gordon
‘The Story’ looks at the lifelong embodied experience of surviving. If we survive abuse, we don’t survive once but every day. Our bodies are the site of the trauma and the site of the healing and the only places we can live. In the research we heard over and over again about the long term impacts on our physical and mental health, our attainment, careers and earnings, our relationships and friendships and every aspect of our being. But of course, we don’t yet know how the story ends…
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'Mirror' - written and performed by Viv Gordon
‘Mirror’ is a humorous and pointed exploration of being a CSA survivor working inside systems that silence and pathologise CSA survivors. Our normal trauma responses are often labelled as mental health illnesses. This is problematic for many of us because it gives us the message that there is something wrong with us for struggling after trauma, rather than abuse being wrong and perpetrators being wrong. Of course many people working in mental health and social care are themselves CSA survivors. There’s often an unhelpful separation between professionals and survivors putting the onus on us to compartmentalise and losing our expertise by experience that we could bring to many roles.
'We' - written and performed by Viv Gordon
‘We’ imagines a survivor meeting other survivors for the first time - hearing their own thoughts reflected back to them. We were really aware when doing this research that looks at public misconceptions of survivors that we are also “the public” and we have our own misconceptions about ourselves, internalised stigma born from the dominant cultural narrative. ‘We’ is an affirmation of community, it is an incitement for us to gather together and it celebrates the power of our voices to make change.
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Plain Sight film team:
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Viv Gordon: Writer, performer and Artistic Director Viv Gordon Company
Dr R Alison McKinlay: Lead Researcher, University College London |
Barney Witts/Fluxx Films: DOP
Izzie Gazzard: 1st AC |
Kate McStraw: Executive Producer, Viv Gordon Company
Kayla Harkins: Assistant to Viv Gordon |
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Alison McKinlay is a health researcher based at University College London. Her research interests include public health policy, stigma and discrimination, and health/wellbeing support for survivors. Alison’s lived experience led her to joining the board of a community-based women’s centre specialising in support for women who have experienced domestic violence and abuse. On the Plain Sight project, she is the lead researcher and study Principal Investigator. You can find out more about her work here.
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