EXETER HAS A PROBLEM
Our Mission:
To raise awareness about the prevalence of sexual assault and violence against women at night, specifically in the Exeter area.
We want to change the narrative and bring more attention to the behaviour of perpetrators, encouraging behaviour change through preventative education.
Our team:
Our team felt that Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) was an important social justice issue that we wanted to advocate. As a primarily female group, it was a topic close to our hearts.
Production Managers – Mads, Callie
Production Designer – Lucy
Researchers – Freya and Finn
Communications Director – Amelia
There were 5,494¹ sexual and violent assaults in Exeter in 2024. 90%² of these sexual assault victims were women.
Furthermore, a report³ found that 97% of women in the UK between the ages 18 - 24 have been sexually harassed with a further 96% of women not reporting those situations due to the belief that justice won't be served.
This is a shocking statistic, revealing the severity of VAWG.
We created this interactive map below to display the magnitude of people affected by violence. This map displays areas where sexual assault in Exeter has happened.
Although it is frightening to be able to see the frequency of these violent acts, we felt that it brings light to the gravity and prevalence of this issue.
All data records are from data.police.UK.
During our exhibit, we asked people to answer questions about how safe they feel in Exeter and what they do to help them feel safer.
Of these results, 77.8% were female and 22.2% were male
Despite amendments to the law, there has been a 63%⁴ increase in violence against women and girls in the past decade, according to CPS.
Something has to change.
We must educate others on this issue to bring improvements to behaviour and increase awareness of women's safety.
Reference List
¹ Police UK (2020). Home | data.police.uk. [online] Police.uk. Available at: https://data.police.uk/.
² RAINN (2025). Victims of Sexual Violence: Statistics. [online] Rainn.org. Available at: https://rainn.org/statistics/victims-sexual-violence.
³ UN Women UK (2023). Make public spaces safe for women, NOW - UN Women UK. [online] UN Women UK. Available at: https://www.unwomenuk.org/campaigns/safe-spaces-now/.
⁴ CPS (2017). CPS report shows more offenders are being successfully prosecuted for sexual crimes than ever before | The Crown Prosecution Service. [online] www.cps.gov.uk. Available at: https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/cps-report-shows-more-offenders-are-being-successfully-prosecuted-sexual-crimes-ever.