What does it mean to build culturally responsive systems within gender-based violence work?
Hey! I’m Leah M. Forney, The Culture Doctor.
For more than a decade, my work has centered on one question: How do we better equip the people and organizations entrusted with serving survivors?
As a gender-based violence subject matter expert, researcher, author, survivor, and professional development leader, I bring together lived experience, research, direct-service knowledge, and culturally responsive practice to strengthen how professionals understand and respond to the needs of survivors.
I believe you cannot train your way out of a culture problem. Professional development must go beyond checking a box or transferring information.
It should challenge how we think, strengthen how we practice, and build the capacity needed to create meaningful change.
Through my work as The Culture Doctor, I help professionals and organizations across the gender-based violence prevention, response, and recovery ecosystem move from knowing better to practicing better because culturally responsive survivor services begin with the people responsible for delivering them.
My Survivorship Story
I am a survivor of both child sexual abuse and adult sexual assault.
Sexual violation entered my life early, beginning around the age of eight through exposure to inappropriate and sexualized behavior within my family environment. Like many survivors, my experience did not begin in adulthood. It was layered across my childhood, adolescence, and into my adult life, when I was sexually assaulted by a man I had only been on one date with.
Like the data shows for so many survivors, my earliest experiences of harm happened before the age of 18. And like many survivors of color, my experiences were not isolated events. They compounded over time, shaping how I saw myself, my body, and the world around me.
For years, I struggled with self-trust, self-esteem, and feeling safe in my own body. I became hyper-aware of my surroundings, guarded in relationships, and carried the belief that my body was the only thing others saw when they looked at me.
When I chose to seek justice as an adult, I encountered systems that did not believe me. My report was dismissed by law enforcement, and even in court, I was met with disbelief and bias. I was denied a restraining order, and my case was never taken forward.
My rape kit remained untested for nine years. An experience that reflects what far too many survivors endure within systems that are meant to protect and support them.
These experiences are what led me into advocacy and activism.
I entered this field not from theory alone, but from lived experience. Over the past decade, that lived experience has been joined by years of direct-service work, advocacy, research, education, and professional expertise.
Along the way, I have seen how deeply culture shapes the way survivors are believed, supported, and served—particularly Black and brown survivors and others whose identities and experiences have historically been marginalized.
Today, my lived experience does not stand apart from my professional work. It informs how I ask questions, how I challenge the field, how I approach culturally responsive practice, and how I equip professionals to better serve the people who trust them with their stories.
Because survival should not end where the system fails.
I moved from victim, to survivor, to thriver, to leader and I carry every part of that journey into the work I do today.
What I Believe......
I believe you cannot do gender-based violence work without a foundation rooted in cultural responsiveness and anti-oppression. This work cannot be effective when it ignores the cultural realities of the people it claims to serve. You cannot effectively support survivors of color without understanding how culture, identity, and systems of power shape their experiences and outcomes.
I also believe the anti-violence movement was built by survivors, and survivors must remain central to its future. Professionalization and credentialing have value, but not at the expense of lived experience. Survivors bring knowledge that cannot be replicated by a degree, certification, or textbook and that knowledge belongs in the rooms where decisions about survivors are being made.
I believe justice is not one-size-fits-all. Justice must be defined by survivors themselves. For many Black and brown survivors, justice does not always involve law enforcement or traditional systems of accountability. Assuming otherwise can limit the possibilities for healing, safety, accountability, and truth.
I believe cultural responsiveness is not optional. It is not a “nice to have,” a checkbox, or an additional layer we add after everything else. It is foundational to effective and ethical gender-based violence prevention, response, and recovery.
Finally, I believe the anti-violence field is in a necessary reset. The systems, practices, and institutions that serve survivors must be willing to evolve. The future of this work requires us to question what we've always done, unlearn what no longer serves survivors, and develop the capacity to practice differently.
That is the work I am committed to and the work I am committed to helping this field do better.