END THE BACKLOG NOW!!!

Last night was the first night of my new screenwriting class at UCLA. And instead of heading to campus our instructor invited us to a house in the hills of Beverly Hills (yes, way way up there) to attend a party with some industry folks. It was quite the event. The house was on par with, oh, the Bellagio in Las Vegas, and the views were breathtaking. Seriously, watching the sunset over the mountains while standing in a gorgeous yard next to a gorgeous pool, wow.

After some mingling we were all invited inside to screen tonight's episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit called "Behave". It's about a woman who's being victimized by a serial rapist and how justice is being denied to her. Her rapist hasn't been caught because of the government's backlog of rape kits that have not been processed.

Here's a couple of things you may not know:
- A rape kit is the evidence taken from a victim after an attack, it includes DNA, clothing, photographs, etc.
- "Experts in the federal government, including the US Department of Justice and members of Congress, estimate that there are hundreds of thousands of rape kits in police and crime lab storage facilities throughout the country" (from endthebacklog.org).
-There's a statute of limitations on prosecution for rape and many rapists are never charged because the rape kits are not processed in a timely manner. Illinois is the first state to make a change to this law -- a change that happens this month.
-New York city, in combination with some awesome volunteer groups, no longer has a backlog AT ALL. This is amazing. And from what I understand, took years and millions of dollars and a lot of work. A lot of work.

After we screened the episode the showrunner got up and talked about why he and his staff wrote the episode and what they hoped to achieve from putting it on the air. Most of all what I heard last night was that these people want to raise awareness. And that it did. I knew that governments took their sweet time (because of many different factors, I realize this) in getting through evidence but this is ridiculous. Just because the government is low on funds, criminals -- violent sexual criminals -- go unpunished, free to continue raping? Unacceptable.

I was very interested in the politics of it all, of the science of it all, and in the volunteer work that's been done and has to be done. But even more so I was interested in the reason I had been invited in the first place:

Television reaches people. Particularly 10pm dramas on major networks.

In grad school I took a class on health communication. I studied and wrote several papers on how television and media affect the communication of health information to people. I studied ideas like Does ER do more harm than good? and Do telenovellas really encourage people to get tested for diseases?

This class was my first taste of using media to impact social change. And last night I witnessed what I hope will be another step in the process of using television to get a message out. Should all television have a "message" or a "cause" to support? No. I don't think it has to. Yes, last night's episode of Glee had a plot that focused on a dentist and his "cause" but do I think it was intended to get high schoolers to floss? No. And that's totally fine. But sometimes I think television can use it's mighty reach to make an impact. To encourage people to sit up and take notice. And this is one of those times.

Last night as I stood at the end of the driveway and waited (and waited and waited) for the valet to bring my car around I reminded myself that the wait I was experiencing was nothing like the wait the young woman who attended the screening had experienced. She waited almost 15 years for her attacker to be prosecuted. And last night, as I watched her wipe away tears after watching the episode, I thought how no one else should be victimized a second time by the very government they rely on to protect them.

So I encourage you to watch tonight's episode. I encourage you to log onto endthebacklog.org afterwards and find out what you can do. Maybe you can donate money. Maybe you can write your congressperson or your local sheriff. Maybe you can spread the word just like the people who produce Law and Order: SVU are trying to. And let's end these backlogs all over the country. Let's change the law so that there is NO statute of limitations on this horrific crime. Let's make a change for the better. Because it takes ALL of us doing our part, using ALL of our voices.

Keepin' on keepin' on...

"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you." --Matthew 7:7 (NIV)

"Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you." -- Matthew 7:7 (NLT)

This scripture verse from Matthew is one of my favorite. I have it written on little pieces of paper and stuck throughout my house as a reminder to pray. Open my jewelry box, there it is. Open my day planner, there it is. Actually, all it says on those little pieces of paper is: Remember to ASK. And it does cause me to remember.

Last night as I got into bed I saw my devotion book. I'm a few days behind but I skipped ahead to the day's lesson and read about "Supersized Prayers" and Matthew 7:7. It reminded me that if I ask God for something I need to believe it will happen. Because without that faith, what's the point in asking. It also reminded me to pray big, for what I want and what I have, to praise as much as I pray.

I thought about that as I pulled out my prayer journal, which was a bit dusty. And I started writing. Yes, I've been praying a lot, as always, but I thought about how maybe I need to be much more specific in my prayers. And much more of a believer that God will actually hear my prayers and answer them.

I like the New Living Translation of Matthew 7:7 - it says "keep on asking". So that's what I'll do. I'll keep on. I'll keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking. For that job that will keep us in our house for one more month. For that job that I want when I'm exactly ready for it. For the people I love to be painfree at this exact moment. For the specifics and for the broadstrokes. I know God knows it all but I also know He wants to hear it from me. He also wants to hear my praise and I cannot forget that.