A 2020 Post, Revisited
How anger, hope, and speaking up turned into a fight for justice
Mini-journal, by Jade Blue
Five years ago, as I moved into 2021, I wrote this without knowing how long the road ahead would be.
I knew I was angry.
I knew I wanted change.
I knew silence wasn’t an option anymore.
The rape happened in 2017. But 2020 was the worst year of my life.
Not because of the assault itself - but because of what followed. The actions of the CPS and the wider justice system caused deeper, more lasting harm than the crime itself. The delays. The dismissal. The sense of being processed rather than protected. The harm didn’t end with the offence - it was compounded by the system meant to deliver justice.
What I didn’t yet understand was how heavy speaking up can be - how slow justice moves, how often it resists scrutiny, and how much endurance it demands when the system would rather you didn’t.
That version of me was already brave, even if she didn’t call it that. She believed that speaking out mattered. She believed that personal experience could drive change. She believed that getting shit done meant refusing to look away from injustice - even when it hurt.
The journey since hasn’t been neat or linear. It’s been exhausting, exposing, and at times incredibly isolating. But it’s also been clarifying. It’s shown me that voice isn’t just volume - it’s persistence. It’s choosing to keep naming harm when it’s inconvenient. It’s insisting that lived experience belongs at the centre of justice conversations, not on the margins.
Make Yourself Heard exists because of that belief - and because silence was never going to be the price of survival. Five years on, the fight looks different - but the truth is sharper now. Change doesn’t happen quietly. Justice doesn’t improve on good intentions alone. And systems don’t correct themselves unless they are challenged.
Using your voice is an act of care - not just for yourself, but for everyone who has been silenced, dismissed, or told to move on. It’s how harm gets named. It’s how patterns get exposed. It’s how power gets questioned.
Nothing changes if we don’t call the shit out. Nothing shifts if we stay polite for the comfort of broken systems.
