In August, Tim Lennon released his new book, “Stand Up Speak Up: How Survivors Created a Movement to End Sexual Violence.” The book delivers an in-depth look at how sexual assault has shaped American society and chronicles the tactics that survivors have used to fight back.
One of the first things I noticed when I started my Zoom call with Tim Lennon was a saddle blanket mounted on the wall. When I asked about it, he was eager to tell me that it was 100 years old, and he moved the camera around his living room to display several other native textiles. Lennon could be mistaken for a lifelong Tucsonan, but while he did briefly attend college at the University of Arizona in the 1960s, he only set up permanent residence here in 2016.
One reason Lennon decided to move here was his collegiate experience. Although he didn’t complete his degree, he attended the University of Arizona from 1965 to 1968, where he became involved in anti-war activism. Even when he transferred away, Lennon continued his activism, becoming involved in left-wing movements for many years afterward.
But it was only three decades later, in 1995, when he started the journey that led him to the publication of his book, “Stand Up Speak Up”. In 1995, he witnessed SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, holding signs in front of the San Francisco Cathedral. This triggered memories that he had buried for 35 years to come to the surface.
Lennon grew up in Sioux City, Iowa, in a devout Irish Catholic family. Beginning at 12 years old, he was continually abused for months from 1959 to 1960 by Father Peter B. Murphy, a parish priest.
“[He] had been caught by the Church and three different parishes before he came to my parish,” Lennon said. “My abuse stopped because he got caught abusing another kid, and they transferred him again.”
For 30 years after Lennon’s memories first surfaced, he has been continually coping with the trauma, but his own experiences have also inspired him to engage with the survivors movement and expand his activism.
In 2010, he joined the SNAP Board of Directors. “I was president for three years, so I’ve been incredibly active,” Lennon said. “I stepped down from presidency and the board of SNAP in 2021, and that’s more or less the start of […] my website.”
He’s been maintaining his website, StandUpSpeakUp.org, since 2021. On it, you can find his own story, information about the movement and a vast array of resources for sexual abuse survivors. But after years of maintaining it, Lennon felt that he could still do more.
According to Lennon, he didn’t have the bandwidth to do it all himself, so the book is a way to reach more people.
In it, there is a breadth of material about sexual abuse in the United States: powerful people and institutions that commit it, victims from all walks of life and the activists and organizations who fight back.
According to Lennon, many survivor organizations, while doing great work, are too siloed from each other. “[Groups will work] with just the Boy Scouts, just with girl athletes or whatever the different organization is; they stay within the field,” Lennon said. “My view, politically, socially, culturally, is we have more power as a movement.”
In Lennon’s opinion, the movement needs power to address the scale of the problem. According to him, most sexual abuse survivors don’t come forward and that a third of all women and a fourth of all men will be sexually abused in their lifetime.
He also discusses how powerful institutions like the Catholic Church and Hollywood abuse legal tools to protect themselves from accusations; many organizations will intentionally delay their response to abuse allegations until the statute of limitations expires.
“I call it a ‘get out of jail free card,’” Lennon said. Typically, abusers employ them to silence their targets in exchange for monetary compensation. Although these agreements are illegal, survivors often don’t have the resources to fight them in court. When that happens, Lennon explains, “the abuser continues, and no one knows that this guy’s [an] abuser and has a dozen women that have signed NDAs.”
In a 2024 study, the Clayman Institute for Gender Research at Stanford University found that non-disclosure agreements harmed survivors’ future career prospects and mental health.
Still, he’s hopeful. As the interview ends, Lennon answers one last question: If a reader only takes away one message from this book, what should it be?
His answer is simple. “You’re not alone.”
