NAMIBIA (MintPress) – As couples around the world celebrate this Valentine’s Day with roses and chocolates, millions more men and women are choosing to spend the day fighting against the threat of sexual violence.
According to U.N. statistics, one out of every three women will be raped or beaten in her lifetime. On Feb. 14, men and women around the world will rise up in support of One Billion Rising, a campaign to demonstrate global collective strength and solidarity in support of the elimination of violence against women and girls.
Dozens of grassroots organizations are partnering with the hosting global activist movement, V-Day, to carry out the day’s festivities.
Julia Drost, policy and advocacy associate at Amnesty International USA (AIUSA), told Mint Press, “By teaming up with One Billion Rising, AIUSA hopes to bring awareness to the startling fact that one woman in three has been beaten, coerced into sex or abused in her lifetime, and to mobilize activists to make this a fact of the past and not of the present or future.”
According to World Bank data, women aged 15 to 44 are more at risk from rape and domestic violence than from cancer, car accidents, war and malaria. The U.N. campaign to End Violence Against Women, UNiTE, says that several global surveys suggest roughly half of all women who die from homicides are killed by their current or former husbands or partners. In the United States, one-third of women murdered annually are believed to be killed by intimate partners.
“An estimated one billion women and girls have experienced violence in their lifetime,” said Drost. “AIUSA believes that just one woman or girl affected by violence is one too many and all women have the right to live lives free from violence. Every day that this violation continues is one more day that women’s safety hangs in the balance and women are prevented from exercising the full spectrum of their human rights.”
More than 100 One Billion Rising events are planned in the United States alone this Valentine’s Day, which marks the 15th anniversary of V-Day, the global activist movement coordinating the campaign. V-Day, whose sole vision is to demand an end to violence against women and girls, officially launched on Valentine’s Day 1998 by a group of women in New York City who believed in the power of performance to transform the world.
More than a Performance
Playwright and activist, Eve Ensler, spearheaded the V-Day movement after realizing the success of her transformative, groundbreaking 1994 play, The Vagina Monologues, which addressed women’s sexuality and exposed the social stigma surrounding rape and abuse.
Each year from February through April, Eve allows groups to produce a performance of the play and uses the proceeds to support local projects like shelters and rape crisis centers to end violence against women.
In a poem to commemorate the 15th anniversary of V-Day, Ensler wrote: “We need people to truly try and imagine — once and for all — what it feels like to have your body invaded, your mind splintered, your soul shattered. We need you to let our rage and our compassion connect us together so we can change the paradigm of global rape.”
One Billion Rising calls for women and those who love them to “walk out, dance, rise up and demand an end to this violence.”
The official campaign website emphasizes the importance of dance strikes in lifting up communities, saying “dancing insists we take up space. It has no set direction but we go there together. It’s dangerous, joyous, sexual, holy, disruptive. It breaks the rules. It can happen anywhere at anytime with anyone and everyone. it’s free. No corporation can control it. It joins us and pushes us to go further. It’s contagious and it spreads quickly. It’s of the body. It’s transcendent.”
V-Day utilizes creative events to increase awareness, raise money and revitalize the spirit of existing anti-violence organizations. While an official V-Day event involves a benefit production of The Vagina Monologues or one of the five other artistic events curated by V-Day, One Billion Rising events are part of a one-time campaign.
Performance is just the beginning for V-Day. The movement hosts a variety of large-scale benefits and produces innovative gatherings, films and campaigns to educate and change social attitudes towards rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation and sex slavery.
Top Reasons to Act: Supporting Noxolo Nogwaza
According to Julia Drost, who works for Amnesty International’s women’s human rights program, “Violence against women is one of the world’s most pervasive global human rights abuses.” Amnesty has made the all too human cost of that violence visible by publishing the stories of 10 real women affected by sexual violence.
Amnesty cites Noxolo Nogwaza of South Africa as the No. 1 reason to take action this V-Day — Nogwaza was raped and murdered in 2011 on her way home from a night out with her friends.
“AIUSA is calling for justice in the case of Noxolo Nogwaza from South Africa, who was raped and murdered in 2011 apparently because she was a lesbian,” Drost said. “The government still hasn’t made progress in bringing her killer(s) to justice; Amnesty is working to change that.”
A South African survey showed 25 percent of young men admitted to having had sex with a woman without her consent before he had turned 18 years of age. Additionally, UNiTE reports that a woman in South Africa is killed every six hours by an intimate partner.
According to Drost, Amnesty International is glad the One Billion Rising campaign is bringing such incredible visibility to these critical issues that organizations like AIUSA have been working on for several years.
“AIUSA hopes the campaign will help change hearts and minds, hold governments accountable, and inspire people all over the world to eliminate violence against women today and prevent it from happening tomorrow,” Drost said.
Amnesty urges people to take action on and after Feb. 14 by demanding justice for Noxolo Nogwaza and urging Congress to make ending violence against women and girls a top diplomatic priority by supporting the International Violence Against Women Act (I-VAWA) when it is reintroduced later this year.
Activists in the United States can also urge Congress to take action to pass an inclusive domestic Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), which has provided support and protection to millions of women in the U.S. since 1994.
The current version of the bill, which overwhelmingly passed the Senate on Tuesday, has received much opposition from Republican representatives in the House over provisions to extend protections to victims of domestic and sexual violence in Native American and Alaska Native, LGBT and immigrant communities.
Please visit the One Billion Rising campaign website for a complete list of V-Day events and to learn more about getting involved in the fight to end violence against women and girls worldwide.