For women, the world might feel like it’s slowly becoming worse. Earlier this month, the UN announced that four peacekeepers in the Central African Republic have been accused of raping two women and an underage girl, as well as a 12-year-old girl. Last month, four women were raped and killed in Mexico City. And then there’s Syria, where reports keep emerging of how Islamic State militants justify raping women and children.

“Who Killed Rúben Espinosa?” read headlines throughout Mexico after the brutal murder of five people in Mexico City. On July 31, the victims were found in an apartment the Narvarte neighborhood of Mexico City.

When I met Sophie Otiende, she was running late. I had reached out to her in December 2014 while I was in Nairobi doing research for a film about sex trafficking. Sophie and her boyfriend, Jakob Christensen, are volunteers at the anti-trafficking nonprofit HAART Kenya and had agreed to meet me for dinner. But as time wore on, I was beginning to think I’d been stood up.