"empowerment" is a fuzzy MBA corporate-speak word that unfortunately has spread through a lot of lefty communities. A more accurate description would be "taking power." People who are raped have the power to control what happens to their own bodies taken away from them during that rape. By actively doing something about their environment, whether (far too rarely) pressing charges against their attacker, marching in a Take Back the Night rally, becoming a rape crisis counselor, holding a protest, or writing their thoughts and feelings down on a t-shirt and hanging it up in public, these people take back some of the power and control that was taken from them.

Another function of the clothesline would hopefully be inspiration. As in, you walk across the campus and, seeing the clothesline project, really start thinking about rape and sexual assault on your campus (I know of three women who have told their TAs about being raped at my school this quarter alone) and do something yourself, such as joining the Students Stopping Rape or Men Against Rape groups on your campus.