Rebecca Kotz began speaking and educating on issues of men's violence against women ten years ago and has trained thousands of professionals, students, and community members.
She currently works as an assistant director at a university women's center and focuses on gender violence prevention, ethical relationships and sexuality programming, advocacy, and support for student victim/survivors, leaders, organizers, and activists. In the past she has worked or interned for a variety of social justice and anti-violence organizations providing services and advocacy for/with survivors of trafficking, sexual, and domestic violence.
Kotz has a decade of experience in sexual assault and relationship abuse counseling, facilitating offender programming, community organizing, group and workshop facilitation, consulting, program creation, curriculum development, technical assistance, professional training, policy and protocol development, research, advocacy and analytical writing, lobbying, criminal/legal systems change, classroom presentations, and liberation education.
She currently works as an assistant director at a university women's center and focuses on gender violence prevention, ethical relationships and sexuality programming, advocacy, and support for student victim/survivors, leaders, organizers, and activists. In the past she has worked or interned for a variety of social justice and anti-violence organizations providing services and advocacy for/with survivors of trafficking, sexual, and domestic violence.
Kotz has a decade of experience in sexual assault and relationship abuse counseling, facilitating offender programming, community organizing, group and workshop facilitation, consulting, program creation, curriculum development, technical assistance, professional training, policy and protocol development, research, advocacy and analytical writing, lobbying, criminal/legal systems change, classroom presentations, and liberation education.
Kotz created the first Safe Harbor program in central MN for youth and adult survivors of the sex trade and trafficking. She also created and facilitated the court-ordered, feminist-rooted accountability program for men convicted of soliciting prostituted/trafficked individuals: Men Accountable for Sexual Exploitation (MASE).
Rebecca was an organizer and educator within the prostitution partial decriminalization movement to shift social norms and ultimately abolish all forms of sexual objectification, commodification, and exploitation against both youth and adults. This policy and service model works to end the criminalization of survivors of the sex trade and to expand housing and services to survivors across the state of Minnesota. This is known locally/state-wide as Safe Harbor for Youth & Safe Harbor for All, known nationally in the US as the Equality Model, and known internationally as the Nordic/Swedish/Abolitionist model of partial decriminalization of prostitution.
Kotz is a member of multiple state, regional, and local county anti-violence and sex trafficking task forces, and has acted as an advisor for many Minnesota Department of Health Safe Harbor and sexual violence prevention initiatives and consulted on primary prevention, victim service practices, and offender accountability efforts statewide and nationally.
Kotz has her Master's degree in Social Justice & Community Organizing from Prescott College. Her thesis, entitled Towards a Consistent Ethic of Social Justice: Confronting Prostitution Exceptionalism in Abolitionist Discourse challenges the prison abolition and prostitution abolition movements to join as a unified force against interpersonal abuse and systemic/state-sanctioned violence to promote holistic transformation and liberation for all, without exception. Kotz's academic focus and framework continues exploring the intersections of radical feminist, anti-neoliberalist, lesbian and queer analysis, critical theory, and abolitionist praxis to ultimately end men's violence.
Rebecca's Bachelor's degree is in Political Science and minor in Human Relations & Multicultural Studies. She earned multiple scholarships for her undergraduate work and was awarded the School of Public Affairs Honor's Research Graduate Distinction for her academic achievement and defending an additional graduate thesis, "Legal Practices, Policies, and Programs Curbing the Sex Trade."
As an undergraduate student, Rebecca was a student activist who founded Students Against Trafficking & Sexploitation (SATS), the first student organization in Minnesota to solely address these topics. She was also the president of a campus ministry and organized around issues of ending voter suppression, homelessness, economic justice, racial justice, immigrant rights, environmental protection issues, and GOTV (get out the vote).
Kotz has authored viral articles such as "Dear John: A Letter from an Advocate to the Men Who Buy Women for Sex" and "A Church in Crisis: Pornography and Patriarchy" that have tens of thousands of views and shares. She was a regular writer for CBE International on topics of feminism, egalitarian theology and relationships, ethical sexuality, eradicating patriarchy in the church, and men's violence against women. Her blogs have been featured in multiple websites. Kotz wrote two chapters on sexual violence and healthy intimate relationships in the book Created to Thrive: Cultivating Abuse-Free Faith Communities (book released in 2021).
In 2012, Rebecca co-founded an outreach for women working in local exotic dance clubs. She also founded and chaired an interdenominational church coalition that takes action against trafficking, sexual, and domestic violence.
Rebecca was an organizer and educator within the prostitution partial decriminalization movement to shift social norms and ultimately abolish all forms of sexual objectification, commodification, and exploitation against both youth and adults. This policy and service model works to end the criminalization of survivors of the sex trade and to expand housing and services to survivors across the state of Minnesota. This is known locally/state-wide as Safe Harbor for Youth & Safe Harbor for All, known nationally in the US as the Equality Model, and known internationally as the Nordic/Swedish/Abolitionist model of partial decriminalization of prostitution.
Kotz is a member of multiple state, regional, and local county anti-violence and sex trafficking task forces, and has acted as an advisor for many Minnesota Department of Health Safe Harbor and sexual violence prevention initiatives and consulted on primary prevention, victim service practices, and offender accountability efforts statewide and nationally.
Kotz has her Master's degree in Social Justice & Community Organizing from Prescott College. Her thesis, entitled Towards a Consistent Ethic of Social Justice: Confronting Prostitution Exceptionalism in Abolitionist Discourse challenges the prison abolition and prostitution abolition movements to join as a unified force against interpersonal abuse and systemic/state-sanctioned violence to promote holistic transformation and liberation for all, without exception. Kotz's academic focus and framework continues exploring the intersections of radical feminist, anti-neoliberalist, lesbian and queer analysis, critical theory, and abolitionist praxis to ultimately end men's violence.
Rebecca's Bachelor's degree is in Political Science and minor in Human Relations & Multicultural Studies. She earned multiple scholarships for her undergraduate work and was awarded the School of Public Affairs Honor's Research Graduate Distinction for her academic achievement and defending an additional graduate thesis, "Legal Practices, Policies, and Programs Curbing the Sex Trade."
As an undergraduate student, Rebecca was a student activist who founded Students Against Trafficking & Sexploitation (SATS), the first student organization in Minnesota to solely address these topics. She was also the president of a campus ministry and organized around issues of ending voter suppression, homelessness, economic justice, racial justice, immigrant rights, environmental protection issues, and GOTV (get out the vote).
Kotz has authored viral articles such as "Dear John: A Letter from an Advocate to the Men Who Buy Women for Sex" and "A Church in Crisis: Pornography and Patriarchy" that have tens of thousands of views and shares. She was a regular writer for CBE International on topics of feminism, egalitarian theology and relationships, ethical sexuality, eradicating patriarchy in the church, and men's violence against women. Her blogs have been featured in multiple websites. Kotz wrote two chapters on sexual violence and healthy intimate relationships in the book Created to Thrive: Cultivating Abuse-Free Faith Communities (book released in 2021).
In 2012, Rebecca co-founded an outreach for women working in local exotic dance clubs. She also founded and chaired an interdenominational church coalition that takes action against trafficking, sexual, and domestic violence.
Rebecca has also been a lead organizer for the End Demand 2020, Stop Traffick & XXXploitation anti-porn protest, the Women's March, Take Back the Night, and other marches, demonstrations, and activist events in the community.
Rebecca is a trained and certified group facilitator of many renowned anti-violence/trafficking curriculums in the field: Ending the Game, Safe Dates, #NotANumber, My Life My Choice, and more. She was a statewide trainer-of-trainers to certify professionals in Love146's #NotANumber sex and labor exploitation/trafficking prevention curriculum and GEMS's Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children 101 training and Victim-Survivor-Leader training.
Rebecca has committed to use her voice as an activist, speaker, consultant, educator, writer, and community organizer to defend women's liberation, global social justice, and ending all forms of men's violence.
Kotz was the 2017 recipient of CBE International's Micah Award "for courage, creativity, and tenacity in opposing abuse and advancing justice for women and children."
Kotz lives in central Minnesota.
*Click HERE to see past speaking engagements.
Rebecca is a trained and certified group facilitator of many renowned anti-violence/trafficking curriculums in the field: Ending the Game, Safe Dates, #NotANumber, My Life My Choice, and more. She was a statewide trainer-of-trainers to certify professionals in Love146's #NotANumber sex and labor exploitation/trafficking prevention curriculum and GEMS's Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children 101 training and Victim-Survivor-Leader training.
Rebecca has committed to use her voice as an activist, speaker, consultant, educator, writer, and community organizer to defend women's liberation, global social justice, and ending all forms of men's violence.
Kotz was the 2017 recipient of CBE International's Micah Award "for courage, creativity, and tenacity in opposing abuse and advancing justice for women and children."
Kotz lives in central Minnesota.
*Click HERE to see past speaking engagements.