The United Nations General Assembly has designated November 25 as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.
As per Wikipedia: the premise of the day is to raise awareness of the fact that women around the world are subject to rape, domestic violence and other forms of violence; furthermore, one of the aims of the day is to highlight that the scale and true nature of the issue is often hidden.
According to the UN, violence against women and girls (VAWG) is one of the most widespread, persistent and devastating human rights violations in our world today (and) remains largely unreported due to the impunity, silence, stigma and shame surrounding it.
In general terms, it manifests itself in physical, sexual and psychological forms, encompassing:
- intimate partner violence (battering, psychological abuse, marital rape, femicide);
- sexual violence and harassment (rape, forced sexual acts, unwanted sexual advances, child sexual abuse, forced marriage, street harassment, stalking, cyber- harassment);
- human trafficking (slavery, sexual exploitation);
- female genital mutilation; and
- child marriage.
1 in 3 women and girls experience physical or sexual violence in their lifetime…
Just let that sink in for a minute.
My mum was 1 in 3.
I am 1 in 3.
My BFF Adelle Onyango is 1 in 3.
Today on International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women I am putting up three posts:
- My mum’s story titled It Ends With Us.
- My story titled Nothing Good Happens After 2 A.M.
- A guest post on Femicide by Adelle Onyango titled The F-Word.
While mine and my mum’s stories are separate from each other, there are also parallels that link them together. So kindly read It Ends With Us before reading Nothing Good Happens After 2 A.M. Please note that both posts were not easy to write so chances are they will not be easy to read either. If at any point you find yourself triggered by something I have written please feel free to stop reading and return to the post at a later date, if at all.
Adelle is also launching Safe 24/7 today, a project by the Adelle Onyango Initiative done in partnership with international NGO Carolina For Kibera. It is a free group therapy program that will see 3 groups of 10 rape survivors each go through a 10 week counselling course to help them heal from trauma. The sessions will be facilitated by trained professionals and the course is created by survivors, a curriculum developer and two trained therapists. The project will also set up and run a support group for 50 additional rape survivors.
To make Safe 24/7 a reality, we need 4,000 people to donate KES 350 each via this mchanga link:
https://secure.changa.co.ke/myweb/share/36348
Do donate & share about #Safe247
Lwile the Leo 