Why does the Number of Sexual Assaults Continue to Increase Throughout your Army?

In the early 2000s, the United States Department of Defense started tracking more and more files of sexual assault, within the military, and reports have been higher in the Army than any other branch. From an article on ABC News (Luis, Martinez), The number of sexual assaults in the military reported by victims increased to 6,769 in 2017, a significant increase over the numbers for 2016 and the largest percentage increase in four years, the Pentagon said Monday.

For about ten years, about 90 percent of these files of assaults and harassments were from Army soldiers. The new ways soldiers react today compared to how we used to treat these situations have made a major impact over the years. That to me has made more of an impact from the outside looking in at the fat that these cases are finally mitigated and not ignored more than before. In an article from (Army News Service, Dec. 4, 2014) (Dr. Christine T. Altendorf) said "We have put a lot of focus and effort on this in the last couple of years, and we do believe we are making progress," Altendorf said. "Do we still have more things to do? Yes. Will we continue to do more things? Yes. But we are making progress."

The training from that time has only enhanced its methods and made soldiers more aware of real scenario and cases. They have implemented programs to help identify and prevent sexual assault and harassment, the most popular program is Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention, it maybe was not correctly understood of other methods of reaching out and helping others in need. The intent for all soldiers is to have them realize the programs are not just here to pacify what people think about any kind of assault or harassment, but to know that it is real, and they can easily prevent it. The change in the more recent programs to this day can always be improved the more people react and are more knowledgeable on the subject, because the more insight, the more you can dig deeper and answer questions that have not been answered from previous lessons. To understand the programs and to be confident in prevention is hard to implement if no one understands the reality of how serious a situation can become. To have an understanding about what it is, hoping to educate and give courage to those that are or may one day be affected. An individual not only a soldier can have the same resources and gain the amount of knowledge to know how to prevent and help others in need. You can always speak with an individual about their issues but the problem of helping is being insecure, and afraid of the outcome. Nevertheless, with the increasing number of files recorded might be a more positive sign more than a negative.

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