Male Survivors Project

RAL is one of the few organisations, in Scotland, who work with both female and male survivors.  RAL has offered support to male survivors since it first began 28 years ago.  In addition RAL has run a helpline answered by male support workers..  The lines are not gender-specific for callers, but offer choice.

In 2009 RAL was granted some additional funding from Survivor Scotland to attempt to plug the major gaps in services for support for male survivors of rape and/or abuse, both recent and historic.

Our first aim was to recruit more male volunteers.  We have always had many fewer numbers of male applications in recruitment campaigns.  This time we launched a male specific recruitment campaign to highlight the need for male volunteers in this field.

We are running the Male Survivors Project alongside the Rural and Remote Project and hence we are highlighting the issues of male survivors in the general course of the roll out of the rural project.  Again, we have found that there is a huge lack of services for men.  Where most rural places have some kind of support for females (although not specifically rape support) there were almost none who were able to offer support to men.

A large part of the Male Survivors Project is awareness raising.  There is generally wide acceptance that abuse can happen to women and girls, but there is much less awareness that this could happen to men and boys, and they too are entitled to appropriate support.

RAL’s volunteer training includes many topics, one of which is male abuse issues.  We are already very experienced and knowledgeable in this field.  In part, there is still a huge need to get information to males about the services are available to them; they do not need to suffer alone.  RAL hopes that with awareness raising campaigns we can increase understanding, knowledge and skills base when working with male survivors; which in turn will reduce stigma associated with disclosure. 

RAL’s up and coming conference, to be held on the 31st of May and the 1st of June 2011 (more details on events page) aims to share information and knowledge with a host of different agencies, professionals and counsellors around the issues of supporting male survivors.  The first day will be dedicated to male abuse issues, appropriate support and services, as well as looking at how to encourage male involvement in these fields.  If attitudes are to change we all need to work together to share the information and practices to allow this to occur. 

I would encourage any male survivors who would like to share their experiences of support services, or lack of support services, or ideas on how men could be better supported, to visit our “Survivor Voices” section.  There you can send us your feedback/comments and have your say on how we can improve services in general terms for those who need support.

We appreciate all service users comments and ideas; we will consider all ideas and thank you for taking the time to send them to us.