The Violence Stops Here

Will you help give a voice to the women in your life?

The Violence Stops Here Campaign takes the anti violence message forward into the 21st Century recognizing that violence against women isn’t only a woman’s issue but is clearly an issue for men.
We urge men to own their role in ending violence against women, become part of the solution and break the silence.

There are all types of courage.

It takes an enormous amount of courage for a woman to stand up to violence. To walk out on a man who is abusing her, to end a violent relationship, or to seek help.

Like you, we honour and respect all women who have faced abuse. Tragically, in British Columbia, 1 in 3 women experiences violence. We honour their courage to simply survive. Battered Women’s Support Services exists to end violence against women and to provide support services to women survivors
.
We need to honour the men who stand up and say: “The Violence Stops Here”

It takes guts for an abusive man to finally admit what he’s doing. To stop. And to get help.
It takes courage for a man to break the silence, to stand up to other men who abuse women.
And it takes strength for a man to support a woman he loves who is facing abuse.
After years of advocating against violence, we know now that men have to be part of the solution.

Violence against women is a man’s issue, too.

The ugly truth is that more than a million children in Canada have witnessed violence against their mother.

This act of witnessing perpetuates the cycle of violence. Including men is key in ending violence against women. People everywhere are realizing that violence against women is real. Men are starting to end the silence, and we have to take an ever greater stand – women and men, united – to make the violence stop here.

Right here, right now, we’re giving you the chance to do just that. We’re thrilled to tell you about the launch of our new campaign, The Violence Stops Here, and to ask you to lend us your support.
The Violence Stops Here campaign will reach out to men throughout the province and ask them to end the silence and do their part to stop violence against women.

Troy Westwood – Little Hawk, Byron Hurt among the few to raise awareness to a male audience about violence against women http://abortmag.com/index.php?s=troy+westwood&sbutt.x=0&sbutt.y=0&sbutt=Go

Violence against Women - The Facts
According to the Statistics Canada:

One-half of all Canadian women have experienced at least one incident of violence since the age of 16 (1993).
One in three Canadian women were victims of assault by a spouse or partner (1993).
Four in ten Canadian women were victims of sexual assault (1993).
Of all the provinces, the highest rate of violence was reported by women in B.C. (59%) (1993).
16% of all Canadian women (1.7 million) have been involved in at least one incident of sexual or physical assault by a date or boyfriend since the age of 16 (1993).
Half of all women who reported an incident of dating violence were between the ages of 18-34 (1993).
24% of women 18 – 24 years had been sexually and/or physically assaulted by a date or boyfriend. This figure is 50 per cent higher than the national figure of 16 per cent (1993).
In Canada, almost 75 women are murdered by their partner each year (2006).
98% of sex offenders are men and 82% of the survivors of these assaults are girls and women (1999).

The Statistics Canada Homicide in Canada 2000 reported that:

Women were the victims in three of four spousal murders.

Police and Crime Summary Statistics for B.C. in 2000 indicate that.

10,121 incidents of spousal assault were reported.
78.2% of the accused were males.
12.9% of the accused were females.
8.9% of reports involved both spouses assaulting each other.

According to the Canadian Crime Statistics, 2000 report:
Male on female violence accounted for the majority (46.5%) of all violent crime in Canada.

37.8% was attributed to male on male violence.
Female on female crime – where women were both the accused and the victim – accounted for 8.1% of the total.
Female on male violence accounted for the lowest percentage of all violent crime in Canada at 7.6%.

In 2000, according to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, globally at least one in three women and girls is beaten or sexually abused in her lifetime.

Engaging Men and Boys - Previous Projects by Battered Women’s Support Services

2007

On Engaging Men for the Prevention of Violence against Women – Focus Group, Conducted and Reported by Harry Stefanakis, Ph.D.

The focus group was created with the purpose of acquiring knowledge on how to engage men in prevention work. More specifically the purpose of this focus group was to build an understanding of what prevention messages would resonate with men in general and men from marginalized communities specifically. To this end participants engaged in a three hour focused discussion.

2008

Taking a Hard Look at Ourselves & Creating Change for the Future by Curtis Clearsky

Discussion between men and boys - How do you think you have been influenced to behave as a man? How does that contribute to violence against women? How can we individually create change towards ourselves, women and men? How can we create change collectively?

Emerge Vancouver – Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes a film by Byron Hurt – presented by Battered Women’s Support Services and Vancity Theatre (2008)

Battered Women’s Support Services (BWSS) hosted a special showing of Byron Hurts’ acclaimed film Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats & Rhymes. An official selection of the 2006 Sundance Film Festival Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats & Rhymes provides a riveting examination of representations of manhood in hip-hop culture. Byron Hurt, former college quarterback, gender violence prevention educator and longtime hip hop fan will be in Vancouver and will be joined by Chuck D. Chuck D is an American rapper, author, and producer. He helped create politically and socially conscious rap music in the late 1980s as the leader of the rap group, Public Enemy.

2009

Tough Guise: Violence, Media and the Crisis in Masculinity by Jackson Katz – presented by Battered Women’s Support Services and the Urban Women’s Anti-Violence Strategy (2009)
This 1999 video featuring Jackson Katz examines the relationship between images in popular culture and the social construction of male identities in the United States -- of which media messages play a large role. Katz' recent book, "The Macho Paradox," is a way supplement aging examples seen in "Tough Guise." The video identifies several cultural developments in the last 30 years that are in part responsible for the current levels of date rape, domestic violence and school shootings. Media are crucial to constraining men to seeing violent masculinity as the cultural norm -- there is a growing connection in society between being a man and being violent (lots of statistics about men being the violent ones -- 85% of murders are by men; 95% domestic violence is by men; 99% of rapes in prison are by men, etc.). Abused boys tend to grow up to take on that role.

Prevention of Violence Against Women Week April 19 – 25, 2010
Men’s Roundtable

Can you believe it’s 2010 and violence against women is still happening?

In BC alone, 1 in 3 women is affected by violence. It happens every day. It happens to women in every social and economic situation, in all walks of life. It happens to our mothers, our sisters, our daughters. We are calling on you to do your part and speak out and say: “The Violence Stops Here”

End the silence. Join “The Violence Stops Here” campaign and attend the Men’s Roundtable The first of it’s kind, the Men’s Roundtable will bring together men’s anti-violence activists, professional athletes and politicians local, national and international (US). Smack dab in the 21st century, candid and groundbreaking by men for men, urging men to own their role in ending violence against women.

This special initiative is a chance to take a stand. Because it’s up to all of us to speak up. Every man, woman, and child. Together, we must end the silence. It takes courage for a man to break the silence, to stand up to other men who abuse women. And it takes strength for a man to support a woman he loves who is facing abuse. After years of advocating against violence, we know now that men have to be part of the solution.

As part of Prevention of Violence Against Women Week, the Men’s Roundtable will be held on Saturday, April 24, 2010, from 7 pm until 9 pm location TBA.

Plan to attend, you will be contributing to a legacy that will nurture a succession of over 1 million boys and girls, who each year witness their mother’s abuse, to live in domestic peace and to change the world.

In honour of our mothers, our sisters, our daughters, our granddaughters our nieces, our girlfriends. In honour of every boy who dreams to live free of a destiny of violence perpetuation. In honour of our community, our neighbours, and our families, ourselves – The Violence Stops Here.

Please call 604-687-1613 or email strategicinterventions@bwss.org for more information.

Ten Things Men Can Do To Prevent Violence Against Women

by Jackson Katz

1. Approach violence against women as a MEN'S issue involving men of all ages and socioeconomic, racial and ethnic backgrounds. View men not only as perpetrators or possible offenders, but as empowered bystanders who can confront abusive peers

2. If a brother, friend, classmate, or teammate is abusing his female partner -- or is disrespectful or abusive to girls and women in general -- don't look the other way. If you feel comfortable doing so, try to talk to him about it. Urge him to seek help. Or if you don't know what to do, consult a friend, a parent, a professor, or a counselor. DON'T REMAIN SILENT.

3. Have the courage to look inward. Question your own attitudes. Don't be defensive when something you do or say ends up hurting someone else. Try hard to understand how your own attitudes and actions might inadvertently perpetuate sexism and violence, and work toward changing them.

4. If you suspect that a woman close to you is being abused or has been sexually assaulted, gently ask if you can help.

5. If you are emotionally, psychologically, physically, or sexually abusive to women, or have been in the past, seek professional help NOW.

6. Be an ally to women who are working to end all forms of gender violence. Support the work of campus-based women's centers. Attend "Take Back the Night" rallies and other public events. Raise money for community-based rape crisis centers and battered women's shelters. If you belong to a team or fraternity, or another student group, organize a fundraiser.

7. Recognize and speak out against homophobia and gay-bashing. Discrimination and violence against lesbians and gays are wrong in and of themselves. This abuse also has direct links to sexism (e.g. the sexual orientation of men who speak out against sexism is often questioned; a conscious or unconscious strategy intended to silence them. This is a key reason few men do so).

8. Attend programs, take courses, and watch films, and read articles and books about multicultural masculinities, gender inequality, and the root causes of gender violence. Educate yourself and others about how larger social forces affect the conflicts between individual men and women.

9. Don't fund sexism. Refuse to purchase any magazine, rent any video, subscribe to any Web site, or buy any music that portrays girls or women in a sexually degrading or abusive manner. Protest sexism in the media.

10. Mentor and teach young boys about how to be men in ways that don't involve degrading or abusing girls and women. Volunteer to work with gender violence prevention programs, including anti-sexist men's programs. Lead by example